Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services to Exit

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. We maintain that one of the best ways to identify complex problems worth solving inside enterprises is by offering services to them, thereby gaining exposure to the domain. DataSong is yet another case in point. After I spoke with Founder John Wallace, DataSong was acquired by

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Best of Bootstrapping: Founder Bootstrapped a Big Data Company Using Services

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. We maintain that one of the best ways to identify complex problems worth solving inside enterprises is by offering services to them, thereby gaining exposure to the domain. DataSong is yet another case in point. After I spoke with Founder John Wallace, DataSong was acquired by

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Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: So your system recommends where to move the dollars to? John Wallace: Correct. Sramana Mitra: How do you sell this solution? What part of your organization is buying and how is the sales cycle?

Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: If you could be more granular, how do you account for that? What data can you work off of and how do you tie that to how you charge? John Wallace: I thought you were going in the direction of how I know what they spend. So you mean how do we measure

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Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: What were the backgrounds of these other two companies? Were they using a vertical approach? John Wallace: No, they’re horizontal. I think what they have in common is that they have simplified the problem by collecting data off of Excel. They try to get themselves on the website. It makes the day of

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Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Can you talk about that? John Wallace: The problem now has a name. It’s not an ideal name but it has a name. It’s called marketing attribution. It’s looking at the effectiveness of marketing spend. The field closest to that would be approaches of this in Statistics in the past 20 years –

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Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: How much did you do in terms of revenues in the first couple of years? John Wallace: It probably took us four years to get to a million dollars. Sramana Mitra: How many people were involved? John Wallace: There were about four people. My original hypothesis was that there would be a lot

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Bootstrapping a Big Data Company Using Services: DataSong CEO John Wallace (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: You were kind of an applications engineer? John Wallace: It was a great opportunity. Sramana Mitra: That brings us to 2003? John Wallace: Yes. In 2003, I started a firm doing analytic consulting. I thought that I would be more impartial to what software we use to solve a problem and be more focused on

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