Name: Founder Friday: Meet Max Goldstein, Co-Founder of Gol Labs
Uploaded: 2017-02-10
Duration: 12 min 47 s
Description: He worked at Google in product marketing, partnerships and data science.

[ BLANK_AUDIO ] Hi Facebook, my name is Polina Marinova, and this is Founder Friday. I'm here with Max Goldstein, co- founder and CEO of Gold Labs. Max, welcome. Thank you. It's good to be here. Big fan of the show. Good, glad you watch. And Facebook, if you have any questions, post them in the comments, and we'll try to answer them live. In two sentences, Max, tell me about what your company does and what it is. Yeah, so our company is Gol Labs, and what we're really trying to do is reinvent television for the mobile- only emerging world. From our perspective, we see cheap Android devices being sort of the primary content endpoint for most of the world's population. And we think that those user experiences are gonna be fundamentally different for those users than say a traditional television. That's so interesting so before you started Goal Labs you were at Google for a few years. So what were you doing there and what did you notice that kind of sparked this desire to start a company. Yeah so I worked on two projects that were really important to my experience. One Help launch Google +. So for those of you who didn't get a chance to use Google +, a social network that Google created, essentially to compete with Facebook. Huge resources behind it, big company initiative, I was on the team that helped launch it to market. And to be honest it just wasn't particularly successful, and one of the sort of key experiences for me from that experience, is that You really have to solve a user problem. You have to build something that people want. You can't just something because it's a company strategic initiative. It's a cool thing to do. Yeah or you're just trying to compete with Facebook. You need to solve a problem. So that was a really interesting experience and also We had all the resources in the world. I feel like we could have done a lot, or we felt like we could have done a lot to make it extremely successful. We couldn't get that many people to engage with it. And so we tried in everything, we did hang out with the Pope How was that not successful? We did everything we could to bring attention and bring traffic to the platform, but it wasn't particularly successful, and then I worked in a roll managing our sports partnership. I got to work with teams and leagues here in the states, integrating Google technology in with the sports industry. That is when I really got a chance to start working with some of the European football clubs. They have No problem generating engagement. My co- founder was working on a project, looking at real time search data during the World Cup. Your co- founder, also at Google. Yeah, he was working at Google as well. And we were looking at all this data and, particularly, where the data was coming from. So If you go on Google search trends right now and you look up some of the biggest topics in the football world, the top countries for relative search volume are places like Sierra Leon or Liberia, Nigeria. And what that tells is, you know, because many of these markets are still Under 8 to 10 %, and, in that penetration, that's literally the first thing people do when they come online is look for soccer scores. And with half the planet not online yet, over 3 billion people, we saw a unique opportunity to try to understand, one, why people love soccer so much, and, two, what is the user experience that could be the first product That people use when they come online that's related to soccer. Yeah, and you actually mainly deal with countries in Africa, most of your users are in Africa. Yeah. And the first time that you went to Africa was after you launched your company, is that right? Yeah, I mean, we I think some friends, family probably thought I was a little bit crazy for doing this. I think we saw a huge opportunity. From our perspective, there's so much happening in the world, there's so much uncertainty. But we felt like if there's one thing that we absolutely know for sure that there's gonna be billions of soccer fans coming online Let's go just try to learn and solve a big problem. And so we spent as much time as we could on the continent, talking to users, trying to understand why you have a cell Phone. Where do you get a cellphone? What apps do you use? How much data do you use? And you actually filmed when you're in Africa. Explain to the users what's happening right now. Yes. So this is actually a walk- through through to the, in about 45 minutes outside of Lagos, Nigeria. This is the largest cellphone market in Africa. Really? So there's about 20, 000 stores and stalls in this A few square- block area, you're gonna be able to buy sorta your cheapest burner phone that's just made for voice calls to more high- end phones. But a lot of phones are brands like Tecno, Infinix, Many of which are manufactured in China, all Android- based, that we would just be completely unavailable here in the United States. We have a Facebook question, what is the craziest story from Nigeria? So Nigeria, it's a frontier market, and it's a pretty wild place. It's loud- [ LAUGH ] There's a lot of things going on. I think, you know, it's still a place where you can get stopped by police and pulled out of the car and someone will take your money. Did that happen to you? [ LAUGH ] Yeah, it actually happened a couple times. Wow. It sort of, you know, we definitely think about here in the United States If things aren't working correctly we get a little frustrated. That's pretty run of the mill for a lot of places in the emerging world. So it certainly gives you a perspective on obviously the situation we have in here in the US and what most people are dealing with on a day to day basis. You told me a little about the informal economy that predominantly takes place in Africa. Tell me about that and how it's different from the way we think about the world. You know not a lot of former jobs. And so for people to generate money and to generate income basically the mind set is let's find something that someone might want to buy or might want at some point. And then try to kind of build a little fence around it. And then take money from them in order for them to get asked. So I'll give you a perfect example, soccer pitch, obviously people are playing soccer all the time. We went to go visit to watch some of the local games. And there's just a lady that sits there And make sure that you pay her in order to get in. I don't think that that's sort of officially sanctioned, but she has her little perch, you know collects a toll, and obviously, very different than the situation that we have here in US. But it's also entrepreneurial in that sense. Exactly We have another Facebook question. What inspires you the most? What inspires? I mean, I think, our users. We have a unique opportunity to work with people and to listen to people that don't necessarily get Get technology built for them. So, I think what's inspiring for me, obviously, is seeing people connect on our platform and enjoy what we're doing. We've had people who met us early in our journey, before we even built a product or had an idea, that have been with us along the way. And they're friends. You know for me to be in a situation where I was, you know, working at Google and obviously privileged in that sense Yeah to be able to fly all across the world and connect with somebody and help really build something with people that Yeah grew up in completely different circumstances obviously is extremely inspiring. And we have a question about, what was it like to work for Google? But I wanna kinda add another question. Also, Google's a great company to work at. Amazing, yeah. And I feel like most entrepreneurs when they wanna decide to like quit their jobs and start a business It's hard if you have a nice cushy job. So at what point did you decide to quit, but tell me what it was like working there. If anyone gets a chance at any point to work for Google, do it. I mean, it is you wanted so much about. And really, what a really big idea. I think many times, there are a lot of companies are trying to solve small problems, this is a company that's only trying to solve big problems, and so that obviously has a huge impact on the way you think, and the way that you ultimately wanna sort of chart your own professional path. I think the decision to leave is. You know, life is more than free lunches, and I think you can certainly get an amazing experience at Google, but I think a lot of people, you know, you get there, you absorb it, you take everything you can, you give as much as you can, but, you know, it's ultimately a 50, 000 person company or larger and sometimes it's time to go, time to do your own thing. So what was the moment that you were like, I have to do this. I don't know if I had like one sort of particular moment, but there's certainly. I had four years. If you talk to like a Director or VP, when you look at sort of entry into middle management jobs at Google, I think so four years you get a really good And obviously, they come and it gives you amazing opportunities to change offices and work abroad and all those things. But at least for me, personally, it's a sort entrepreneurial hitch. Got it. So I wanna do it, yeah. And when you started your company, you had a little bit of trouble raising money and getting investors behind this idea How did you get around that? Yeah, so I think sort of the [ INAUDIBLE ] I wouldn't say it was a problem but we were committed to solving a problem and we weren't quite ready to build a business. And I think that there are two distinct Components to that. So, we're now at a point, about 18 months in, we've really filled, we're obviously very deep on this problem. We're learning everything we can. We've built a great product and It really builds a product philosophy. But now we're in a position where we're like, okay, let's build a business. And we're starting to shift it a little bit more towards looking at working with rights holders and broadcasters to actually use our technology to help reach their own audiences versus simply just trying to Build our own brand on the ground. Which is certainly challenging. So yeah, I think, you know, obviously when you start a company you, you know you're reading Tech Crunch, you read about the latest fundraising stuff and all, you read about all the different successes, but you know, running a, building a company is essentially. Like how determined are you to run through a wall? And if that wall doesn't like, you can't run through that one, find a different one to run through. And it's really just about perseverance and I think even the most successful entrepreneur will tell you that. So speaking of running through walls, what's been one of the hardest, most challenging things you've encountered as a first- time founder? Yeah, I think it's resources. Coming from Google, you obviously get trained and executing, understanding big problems but I think. You know putting together a sort of smaller budget is obviously like, it's challenging and thinking Yeah. about how to allocate resources more effectively. I think that's definitely been the, yeah. And what's the best business advice you've ever received. That's a really good question. I mean you know I get great business advice. We have great investors, I'm from a family of entrepreneurs, both of my parents were entrepreneurs. And so I think they constantly I think Everyone that I've been able to at least attract to what we're doing I think is incredibly supportive in making sure to continue that we believe in ourselves. And I think the minute you start to take a step back and question yourself and your ability, you're pretty done. And so I think that constant, you're gonna fail, you're gonna make mistakes. But being able to always be able to believe in yourself, and have confidence that You'll figure it out, I mean, you'll just figure it out. It's hard to do, but yeah, definitely. Awesome, well thank you so much, Max Sure Thank you Facebook, and we'll see you next time on Founder Friday. [ BLANK_AUDIO ]

He worked at Google in product marketing, partnerships and data science.