Collective Wisdom For Tech Startups

We often think customers want the latest and greatest tech, but as Kegan Schouwenburg discovered, they care as much about colors and comfort.

Kegan Schouwenburg explains why people care as much about the personalities behind startups as their products.

Kegan Schouwenburg raised over $11M in VC with a pitch in the podiatry space. If she can make feet fascinating, you have no excuse :)

Most tech reporters want to write about companies like Facebook—find out how Kegan Schouwenburg from SOLS got them to write about feet.

With so many people obsessed with the latest apps, it's easy to ignore massive markets right under your feet!

FULL EPISODE: Much of the tech industry is focused on social networks, self-driving cars, and slick Apple Watch startups, but Kegan Schouwenburg is bewitched by bunions. Shoe inserts to be specific. She founded a company called SOLS (http://www.sols.com), which recently raised $11 million dollars to go toe-to-toe with Dr Scholl's. In short, she’s making the treatment for Hammer Toe as elegant as an Hermès handbag. SOLS uses an iPad and 3-D printers to create custom insoles perfectly matched to your feet. The process is amazing. It’s basically what Iron Man would have invented if he was a foot fetishist instead of a superhero. Micah Rosenbloom sat down with Kegan and talked about her preoccupation with plantar fasciitis, fundraising for a company in an unusual industry, what it was like building a 25,000 square foot 3-D printer factory, and how to get top publications excited about toe cheese.

#1: How Shark Tank Helped This Startup Hook Top-tier VCs [Full Episode] by Founder Collective

In the immortal worlds of Micah Rosenbloom, "It turns out prime TV is a good thing for a consumer startup."

The hard lessons you learn when shipping apples instead of apps.

The age old question—what to wear when asking a stranger for $1M or more?

Have you ever wondered what it’s like pitching on Shark Tank? Spoiler alert, it involves pooping goats. Or how to make a startup that solves a boring problem like plantar fasciitis appealing to the New York Times? Well Collective Wisdom, a new podcast from the team at Founder Collective will answer those questions as well as distilling the lessons we’ve learned funding companies like Uber, Buzzfeed, MakerBot, Hotel Tonight, PillPack, SeatGeek. This podcast isn’t about startup philosophy or mythology. You won’t hear stories about how a founder got their start selling candy on the school bus. This podcast breaks down what makes exceptional companies, well, exceptional. Whether it’s fundraising, PR, or branding, each episode will provide lessons that can be applied directly to your startup or job. Heck, we’ll even tell you what to wear when you’re pitching a VC. There are a lot of podcasts out there, but in addition to interviewing compelling guests that have raised millions in venture capital and had wild startup success, we’re also going to try some new things. We’re going to provide excerpts so you can get answers to exactly the questions you want. And transcripts! Yes, in the world of podcast a web log is still a novelty. Our goal is to build the best educational platform possible for entrepreneurs. If you want to be a part of it, subscribe to our feed on iTunes, follow us on Twitter at @fcollective.