⚡ How 148 Rejections From Investors Meant that These Founders Could Build the World’s Biggest Millennial Focused Jobs Platform

Morning Innovators ⚡ This week (in less than 5 minutes!) we’ll explore…

🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the start-up world
📰 The biggest news stories in the start-up world
💼 How 148 rejections from investors meant that these founders could build the world’s biggest Millennial focused jobs platform
🥇 How a bit of healthy competition can open you up to brand new audiences
👀 Our 3 favourite start-ups to keep an eye on this week
🎨 A tool that helps you easily create beautiful websites

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this opportunity with Founder & Lightning who are on the hunt to invest in and help grow B2B start-ups.

Happy hustling,
Rich & Gary

As one of our valued subscribers, we wanted you to be the first to know that we’re launching a series of awesome events, celebrating all things Start-Up.

Our first event is on March 21st in Cardiff, is totally free, and will be packed full with fun events, music, drinks, plus the founder of Ogi talking about all the hurdles they faced in their early days. Trust us when we say you don’t want to miss this!

We’ll be promoting this wider next week, so this is your chance to guarantee a space before all the spaces are gone.

Can’t wait to see you there!

🎤 Events/Opportunities

💰 For young founders (aged under 35) there’s currently a chance to win up to £150k to invest in your business via the Stelios Foundation’s Awards for Young Entrepreneurs. Enter here by the 29th Feb.

🧑‍⚕️For our APAC readers, Bupa Asia Pacific has raised a $20m fund with the aim of backing exciting healthcare start-ups.

🔐 Cylon Ventures are on the lookout for exciting start-ups in the security sector.

🌍 SeedLegals are hosting an event on building a remote team, and how to hire outside the UK. Check it out here.

💼 Job opportunities

🅿️ Product Owner, YourParkingSpace
🎥 Senior Product Designer, Club
🎶 Software Engineer, Disco

🔎 Two former Amazon employees have raised $12.5m to further develop the technology of their data searching start-up Marqo. Bloomberg

🧳 Paris Hilton backed travel start-up Layla has acquired AI itinerary building start-up Roam Around. TechCrunch

✈️ If you’re after very last minute flights, then you’ll be pleased to hear about a new start-up, Runtofly that’s just launched, offering flights departing within 24hrs. Travolution

💷 A new expert panel has been created to look at reforms designed to help drive pension funds into start-ups. UKTN

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Say goodbye to high acquisition costs and hello to growth, as we make scaling effortless and enjoyable. With glowing testimonials from industry leaders, our proven track record assures you're in capable hands. Ready for tangible results? Join the pack at Fratelli and let’s achieve greatness together.

🥑 The Unstoppable Journey of The Muse

In the labyrinth of New York's bustling start-up ecosystem, Kathryn Minshew and Alex Cavoulacos embarked on a journey that would challenge the status quo of the career industry. Today we’re looking into the formative days of The Muse, tracing the arc of its inception, the trials faced by its founders, and the strategic decisions that propelled it from a fledgling idea to a beacon for millions navigating their career paths.

The Muse was born not in boardrooms or investor meetings, but within the hallowed halls of McKinsey & Company, where Kathryn and Alex, both management consultants, found a shared dissonance with the existing career navigation tools. Kathryn's personal ordeal—a laughably irrelevant job recommendation—served as a catalyst, igniting a shared passion to mend the broken bridge between job seekers and their aspirations.

Kathryn and Alex nurtured The Muse as a side project, a nocturnal endeavour parallel to their consulting roles. This period was marked by a voracious learning curve, where the duo experimented with content, engaged with early users, and iterated on their vision. They recognised the need for a platform that transcended mere job listings, one that provided a panoramic view of potential career pathways, enriched with insights, company cultures, and real employee experiences.

The early fundraising journey for The Muse was a Herculean trial, with Kathryn facing over 148 rejections from venture capitalists. Each rejection was a blow, yet also a lesson, refining their pitch and resilience. Kathryn's relentless pursuit, fuelled by an unwavering belief in their mission, eventually broke the dam, securing the crucial funding that would enable The Muse to scale.

Central to The Muse's early growth strategy was an unyielding focus on the user experience. Kathryn and Alex sought not just to inform but to inspire, crafting a platform that resonated with the aspirations and values of the millennial workforce. They leveraged content as a tool for engagement, creating a tapestry of career advice, insider company insights, and skill-building resources that drew users in and kept them coming back.

From its inception, The Muse was imbued with a culture of inclusivity, respect, and empowerment. Kathryn and Alex understood that to build a platform that championed authentic career journeys, they needed to foster an internal environment that mirrored these values. This commitment to culture became a magnet, attracting not just talent but like-minded companies and partners, expanding The Muse's ecosystem and impact.

Today, The Muse stands tall as a testament to the power of perseverance, vision, and a user-centric approach. With millions of users and partnerships with forward-thinking companies, it has redefined career discovery and fulfilment. The Muse has become more than a platform; it's a community, a movement, and a catalyst for meaningful career journeys.

What's your Muse? What's the idea that keeps you up at night, the vision that you can't help but pursue, despite the odds? How will you navigate any rejections and failures to find success?

Who said a bit of competition was bad for business? Certainly not these two brothers! Kit, the founder of Surreal, and Mike, the founder of Days, decided to take their sibling rivalry up a notch and create a marketing campaign that went global!

This competitive stunt racked up hundreds of thousands of views across social media and allowed the two businesses to leverage each other’s audiences. It’s always easier to jump on the back of someone else’s traffic than it is to create your own from scratch.

You may not have a sibling who also runs a Start-Up, you also may not have the budget for a big billboard ad. How can you replicate this and make it your own? Maybe find a friend, someone you share a co-working space with or even just another local business and set up a social media competition with them, or just crack a bit of banter between each other like these two brothers!

This week we’re trialling something different. Each week we’ll now be featuring one start-up we love. We’d love this to come from community recommendations, so if you know a start-up doing something awesome who deserves a shout-out, please reply to this email. 

🍽️ Nory revolutionises restaurant management with its AI-powered operating system, designed specifically for the hospitality industry. It optimises operations and boosts profitability by offering tools for performance management, inventory control, workforce management, and payroll integration. Nory's platform aims to reduce labor costs, cut food waste, and save administrative time, ensuring smoother operations and higher satisfaction for both management and staff. Trusted by numerous operators, it's positioned as an essential tool for modern restaurant management​.

Each week we’ll be highlighting our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

Creatify is an AI-powered application designed to simplify video ad creation. Users can generate high-quality marketing videos by simply inputting a product link or a text description. Creatify aims to democratise video marketing by allowing users to produce engaging content effortlessly, regardless of their marketing resources. The platform offers features such as AI-generated scripts, a selection of voices and avatars, and access to high-quality stock footage. It caters to businesses looking to boost their advertising ROI by testing multiple ad variations with minimal effort.

Next week we’ll be looking at how a snowboard shop became one of the biggest ecommerce platforms in the world. We’ll also show you how underutilised packaging space can make you a lot of extra cash whilst getting you a lot of extra attention along with showing you more cool start-ups, funding opportunities, and plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with us on LinkedIn…