Handpicked with Naomi Simson

Go slow and steady, or raise money and turbocharge it? Lisa Taylor of Wicks Intimates asked me the question I get more than any other. My answer surprised her — before you look at your cap table, look at your cash flow. for more information www.naomisimson.com/podcast/how-to-fund-business-growth-three-options-before-you-raise-capital
Thanks to Odoo for supporting this season of Handpicked. Odoo brings everything you need to run your business together in one easy-to-use, fully integrated platform, so you can spend less time juggling different tools and more time focusing on your business. Find out more here
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mark Wege calls Orbital a 40-year-old startup. Founded by Ralph Sarich, now building drone engines in Perth and selling almost entirely offshore. His advice for anyone with a big idea: build for the global market from day one, because you cannot bolt it on later. For more information www.naomisimson.com/podcast/build-for-the-world-from-day-one
Thanks to Odoo for supporting this season of Handpicked. Odoo brings everything you need to run your business together in one easy-to-use, fully integrated platform, so you can spend less time juggling different tools and more time focusing on your business. Find out more.”


See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thanks to Odoo for supporting this season of Handpicked. Odoo brings everything you need to run your business together in one easy-to-use, fully integrated platform, so you can spend less time juggling different tools and more time focusing on your business. Find out more.”



See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When you're creating an entirely new category, you can't just sell—you have to educate. Kate Abrahams, founder of TrafficAI (a platform that predicts reputational risk events using workforce behavioral data), sits down with Naomi Simson to discuss the exhausting gap between building groundbreaking technology and getting customers to understand why they need it.
Drawing on her experience launching RedBalloon when "experience gifting" wasn't a thing, Naomi shares battle-tested strategies for market development: how to look bigger than you are, turn customers into your sales force through case studies, and build authority when nobody knows your category exists. Kate and Naomi explore keeping tech teams energized during years of customer education, what investors actually need to hear about new categories, and how to cut through the AI hype to demonstrate real value.
If you're building something genuinely new and struggling to reach customers who don't yet know they need you, this conversation offers practical frameworks for building customer reach and turning an interesting idea into a must-have solution.
https://www.naomisimson.com/podcast/a-founders-guide-to-building-customer-reach
Thank you to Deel.com for supporting Australian business owners through it's sponsorship of Handpicked Season 6 for more information about Anytime Pay click here
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What's slowing your business down could become your biggest competitive advantage. James Yang, founder of Kaizen Solutions (a productivity suite for remote teams), asks Naomi Simson the hard questions every Australian startup founder faces: why do our businesses fizzle while American companies scale globally? How do you shift from selling to individuals to landing corporate clients? When do you stop competing and start acquiring?

Naomi delivers game-changing insights drawn from 20+ years scaling RedBalloon: stop buying customers one by one and build distribution partnerships instead, transition from throwing people at problems to building platforms that scale, and most powerfully—identify your biggest constraint and weaponize it. She shares how 1-800-GOT-JUNK cornered the market by pre-buying their truck supplier's entire production, preventing competitors from copying them, and how RedBalloon locked up Australia's best experiences before a billion-euro competitor could enter the market.

If you're struggling to scale, burning cash on customer acquisition, or wondering whether to compete or consolidate your market, this conversation offers brutally practical frameworks for turning limitations into competitive moats.
https://www.naomisimson.com/podcast/stop-fixing-your-constraints
Thank you to Deel.com for supporting Australian business owners through it's sponsorship of Handpicked Season 6 for more information about Anytime Pay click here
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.