Winning in a large target market with Cognism's James Isilay
This week on How to Win: James Isilay, co-founder and CEO of Cognism, a sales intelligence and data platform. Founded in 2015, Cognism has seen explosive growth, going from $13.6M to $31M in revenue in the last year alone and sitting at over 320 employees. In this episode, we discuss the advantages of choosing a large target market and an essential product, and James explains how Cognism is targeting their ideal customer with a focused brand narrative. I share my thoughts on the "dos and don'ts" of mentorship, pivoting in the early days of your business, and how to tell the story of what makes your company unique.
Key Points:
- James explains how his trading background led him to founding Cognism (01:04)
- Cognism's first major pivot (02:25)
- My thoughts on early pivots with a quote from Eric Ries (03:39)
- James describes how Cognism's market size meant there was plenty of growth opportunity, despite competition (06:24)
- I explain the advantage of starting your business outside the hyper-competitive US market with a quote from Jean-René Boidron (07:18)
- James talks through why friendly, warm relationships with your early customers is key (08:53)
- My opinion on networking and why you should begin marketing efforts years before your product is available (09:57)
- I unpack why even mediocre companies can succeed if they have excellent product-market fit, with a quote from Wealthfront's Andy Rachleff (12:28)
- James discusses the importance of mentorship (13:28)
- My advice on seeking out mentors (14:21)
- Why Cognism did things in the early days that wouldn't scale, with a quote from Y Combinator's Paul Graham (16:26)
- My thoughts on building out your brand narrative once you've identified your competitive edge (18:55)
- James describes the moats Cognism is building for the future (23:57)
- Advice James would give to fellow SaaS founders (26:40)
- Wrap up (28:09)
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