#awinewith Ridhi Singh
MEET Ridhi
Ridhi is the Founder of 91 Ninjas.
Find Ridhi here:
Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:10):
All right, Rudy, thank you so much for being here on Spark tv. It's an honor to have you.
Ridhi Singh (00:16):
Thank you, Daniel. I'm super excited to be here and I look forward to an interesting conversation today.
Danielle Lewis (00:21):
Oh, so good. Well, how about we start things off by sharing your story. So you are the founder of 91 Ninjas, and so I'd love for you to share not only what 91 Ninjas actually does, but how you got there. So have you always been in business? Did you have a career beforehand? Let's just share your story.
Ridhi Singh (00:44):
Interesting question. Indeed. Right, so we keep talking about business so much that very few times we reflect back on the journey on how we started. So nice. So I'm a marketer. I've always been a marketer, so it's been a decade that I've been working in digital marketing space and I had a career across startups nationally. So I've worked across startups of all stages, right? Seed series A, series B to growth to unicorns and on. It was just at the time of covid when I thought I've always wanted to start my own agency and I thought it's just time to take that leap and do it now, otherwise I wouldn't be able to do it again. I took that lunche, right, and started off as consulting few brands across Singapore, UK, and India. And when I saw that there was some need, I was getting some response, there was a problem, people are looking for solutions. So I said, okay, I can have the flexibility, can enjoy what I'm working on and make some money as well. So makes sense to start up.
Danielle Lewis (01:48):
Wow, that's awesome. And so those early days in business, so you started with just a couple of clients, you said Singapore, India, and the uk. How did you go about getting those first clients?
Ridhi Singh (02:02):
Just majorly network, right, so I worked, as I said, right? So over a decade I worked with many people and then I moved to Singapore. And when I was in Singapore, the option was either to go for a job or to do something of my own. And then I thought let's give it a try. If it doesn't work out for say five, six months, then I'll probably start looking out for opportunities. And luckily one of my mentors was in UK and that's how he just asked me, really, what are you up to nowadays? I said, you know what, I want to start my consulting. And I got my first gig there and then it slowly started picking up then via friends of friends when they got to know it, they said, oh, you're available, we have some problem. Can you solve these for us? And that's how it picked up. And then I started seeing that it was not just one project, one strategy, there was a deeper problem. So people would ask, can you set up the team for us? Can you maybe do the end-to-end execution? Do you know somebody? We have some freelancers. And I said, the value is actually in solving the problem and doing for your clients, not just consulting. And that's where the model changed from consulting to an agency and have been lucky that I got people and teams and a business.
Danielle Lewis (03:15):
Wow, that is awesome. I absolutely love that idea of starting a business and kind of going, okay, these are the things I'm good at, get a few clients, but then you actually listened to the problems that they had and built a business around solving that. That's really cool.
Ridhi Singh (03:31):
Yeah, pretty intuitive also. So for example, I've been on the other side as well, so I've never run or I've never worked in an agency before, so it was a completely different world, but I had dealt with agencies all across and I knew what exactly are the business problems that you face when you're managing an agency and what are the pain points on the other side? I think that helped also, having worked in both B2B and B2C, B2C, there are plenty of agencies, very good work being done and then people usually prefer having teams in cyber. So figuring that niche out one and a half year now, I think we are very, very clear in terms of our positioning, who we want to go to, who is our ICP, what exact problem are we solving? But everything happens intuitively. As I said, it's not decided from day one. You just figure that out along the journey.
Danielle Lewis (04:21):
Yeah, absolutely, and I love that you are so right. Actually it's really interesting with my other business scrunch, we're an influencer marketing platform and agency and we always get people asking about B2B. There's so many solutions for B2C, but I think people really are looking for different solutions for B2B.
Ridhi Singh (04:42):
Yes, the approaches are different. And again, interestingly, so when I started out at thought maybe this is just the problem that I'm facing in my company, when I was a B2B marketer on the other side, then I started consulting, I said, well, there are more people who are solving the same problem. Then I thought it was just from one geography than people across geographies. Then I realized the problems are the same across geographies, there is a dearth of B2B marketing talent. There are not enough good marketing agencies there who can bring in that expertise, bring in that fast execution, especially for startups. So if you're a settled company, et cetera, you can afford consultants, you can have big things, you can attract the best of parents, but not when you're starting up and you're series A, series B, you probably need more people to help you longer journey
Danielle Lewis (05:37):
And I love that too. Specialized help. So I think sometimes when people are starting their businesses, they think they have to just hire full-time staff, but actually outsourcing to an agency like yourself that actually solves a very specific problem I find can be a lot more cost effective.
Ridhi Singh (05:57):
And surprisingly people are preferring that, right? So I see a lot of change in, so we started off in covid, right? So we are a covid startup and then recession head and all through that we have seen that serious businesses are very, very open to not increase their head count. Instead have a partner who can help them solve specific problems at specific stages of the journey. They're very open. They believe that you have the expertise, you know what you're doing, you can get the execution done and nobody wants to manage the team. If somebody else can do it for them, they're more than happy to let you take the load of them.
Danielle Lewis (06:34):
Yeah, I love that. And so what about b2b? I'm just interested, what kind of sort of differences have you seen that people struggle with when marketing B2B businesses?
Ridhi Singh (06:46):
Yeah, okay, so there are two things I'll start off with. So what is B2C is a very impulse kind of buyer. You see a shoe and you feel like buying it, right? You find a good cloth and you want to buy it. It's very instant, right? B2B is not like that. Nobody buys a software, just we're seeing an ad, right?
Danielle Lewis (07:06):
Yes, true. Very true.
Ridhi Singh (07:10):
So software selling is very, very different from consumer product selling and the same approaches don't work and the cycle is longer. So it's more iterative, number of experiments, multiple channels, longer cycle, and it doesn't work on just one aspect of marketing. So you have to invest in multiple channels. So you will have your performance marketing, you'll have some brand marketing going on, you'll have some social media, you have some pr, you'll mix all this, you'll have an A BM approach, and then you will target your accounts because, and you're fine investing that kind of money because if in your customer lifetime value is also more while if you look at B2C, it's like instant mass purchase that happens. You can have a lot of flexibility in very creative ways of communicating what you are. You're selling influencers and you would know that, right? On how much you can do. So we have influencers and conversations on this side also, but traditionally B2B is known to be boring. So how do you make it more creative
Danielle Lewis (08:15):
New
Ridhi Singh (08:15):
Age? And there are ways, if you look at new age SaaS businesses, they're killing it. What narrative, what approach? It's not like how it used to be 10 years down the line. So that means it's different. So I would say experimentation, more scientific approach and you have to be more cautious in your marketing.
Danielle Lewis (08:36):
Yeah, I think you're spot on. I love that idea of having to test and optimize, right? Because there are so many different marketing channels and yeah, you're right with B2B, you really have to understand where your customer is hanging out online, what kind of information they're reading, what channels what, and it's a bit of an experiment at the start.
Ridhi Singh (08:57):
Yeah, I mean see if you're selling a shoe, there are nine ways of selling a shoe. You can talk about the color, your benefits and all when you're selling a product. The same product can have different use cases for different people and then the problem statements might vary. So which THE, what problem, what benefit are you communicating and how you are communicating? And the channels vary based on the geography that you are in. They've seen TikTok doing fairly well in the US and Southeast Asia, but if you look at India, LinkedIn as a good channel, Google search anyways is university. So you have to think of a lot of iteration to hit the point to get the point across to your teaching.
Danielle Lewis (09:37):
Yeah, no, that's awesome. That's such good advice for B2B businesses. So how was the process actually starting the business? So did you run up against any challenges or has it just been smooth sailing
Ridhi Singh (09:52):
Sail? No, it's definitely not smooth. There have been lots of challenges on the way, but I think that's a part of the process. When you start up, you don't know what's about to come. We never imagine that covid would be like this, right? Or we never imagined that recess would come. We never imagined that many, many, many things will happen on the way, and these are just few. So challenges are there, but I think that's like any other role as well. If you're in job, you'll have different challenges every day, but you can solve. So when you start off you realize, okay, so the first thing that you want in the company is, okay, I am a person. I'm not responsible for anyone and these are my skillset. I can go out to people. People within network will give you enough for you to make good money and have a good life. Then you realize what, this is not something that I want to do just this throughout my life, maybe have some more people. Then you get some more people. Then hiring is the first challenge if you want to scale up. So getting right people then training them in the right methodologies, ensuring that their culture fit and they have the same, not same but at least feel the same way about complementary.
(11:08):
Yes, right? So finding them, ensuring they're happy. Managing remote teams without any in-person interaction was another challenge. Then you overcome that. You just, obviously you try and then luck also plays. Its part in getting to the right kind of folks in your network. Once that happens, then sales becomes a challenge. So then you figure out, okay,
Danielle Lewis (11:31):
Then you're trying to feed the machine all the time.
Ridhi Singh (11:34):
Yes, and then you're responsible for people on your team. You just can't say, okay, it's okay. I can take it live. Because those people are your responsibility and that's when you start building a machine, a sales machine. Then you realize I can't do it. Also, you have to quickly dedicate and take on better responsibilities. Even in sales, first you approach a network, then the network is exhausted. Then the next question is how do I scale next? What channels, which geography? We started off with some of the brands, as I said, three brands across three via network. Then level two core sales are very difficult. I don't come from a sales background, I've never done sales, but I realized that as a founder, you have to be good at sales. If you can't sell, your team cannot.
Danielle Lewis (12:24):
Yeah, that's so true. That's so true. I love that you raised that point because I feel like a lot of founders don't want to be the salesperson. They want to hire a salesperson straight away, but unless you figure out a baseline understanding of what you're really good, what the business is really good at, what channels, how to convert a customer, you can't just hand over nothing to a new salesperson. You've got to get it yourself first.
Ridhi Singh (12:48):
Yes, you have to. I can't think of, unless you have built a technology product that's just loved by masses, like WhatsApp, which is more on the PLG motion, if it's not like that, then founder has to sell, right? Unless you speak to customer, unless you talk to them, understand what is it that they want, customize your offerings. Growing business might be difficult. Somebody else cannot do it for you. You have to do your and then teach somebody else to do it for you.
Danielle Lewis (13:16):
Exactly. Yeah. It's interesting, isn't it? I find I love the journey that you just described, so the figuring out what you're good at finding, then a team that'll help you actually implement that. Then having to scale sales. It's funny. In business, I feel like a lot of people think when I make more money, everything will be fine and I can relax. It's like just the bigger you grow, the more problems you have to solve.
Ridhi Singh (13:43):
Yes. Right? So absolutely right. Even I used to think in my initial days, what, I'll have a team, I'll train them and then I'm done. What 10 clients are ran up, 15 clients are ran up, and then we are done. But it just doesn't stop. Then you realize the business has to keep running, you have to have clients, you have to have teams, you have to scale clients, and then you scale your team and that you ensure that your unit economics are just right. So you're not making rash decisions. You have enough cash reserves, you have enough everything, lots. Then you realize what about partnerships? Should I now explore partnerships with more people? It just never ends, right? So today, if I look at what is it that I'm doing? So earlier, there was a time when I would be securing campaigns myself initially doing things from today when most of my time goes into stakeholder management sales and the team is doing the rest. So I think it's all to the team doing a fabulous job. So I'm able to do something
Danielle Lewis (14:40):
Else. But you still have to manage the team.
Ridhi Singh (14:44):
Yeah, I think, yeah, I've been lucky because initial the core team that we put together, our very good culture fit and we are completely remote, so nobody manages nobody. The ask is simple, this is the work. There's absolute clarity on what is expected out of each person. The culture is like that. You have to deliver on your work and nothing else is asked and that you have feeling, nobody is sitting on your head to see whether you're working or not working, but it's more like you feel responsible for you work. And I think I've been lucky that the entire team is a team of owners touch work.
Danielle Lewis (15:22):
Yes, exactly. But that's a look, I mean I know you're being humble by saying that, but it does. I think it's really, yes, luck does play a part and it's amazing when you do find people that really do take ownership of their work and are accountable and responsible, but that is still leadership from the tough as well. Your leadership style obviously helps empower people to be that way as well.
Ridhi Singh (15:48):
That's right. Yeah, that's right. I agree. Yeah, both ways depends on the founder also and depends on the team also.
Danielle Lewis (15:58):
Yeah, well it's getting that right mix. I think as a founder we grow and learn new leadership skills and different ways of working and then we have team and we get lucky with some and unlucky with others and we kind of grow and kind of figuring it out as we go.
Ridhi Singh (16:14):
Yeah, it's again like that. You keep figuring that out to make some changes, then you grow, then you make some changes. It's constantly learning and unlearning and growing.
Danielle Lewis (16:23):
Yeah, no, I love that. Would you give, since we're reflecting on the journey today, would you give your younger self when you were first starting out in business? Any advice?
Ridhi Singh (16:38):
Yeah, many actually. Right.
Danielle Lewis (16:41):
Here's the playbook.
Ridhi Singh (16:44):
I think there's no one size fits all, but I think a few things. First is the support system. You need a very good support system and I think it's not, yeah, entrepreneurship has its own challenges. There's more than there is stress from other things. It happens because they're learning a lot. Also, your risk and so are rewards as well. In general also in life, having a support system is must, must, right? And as a support system, it could be a family, your friends, people who are always there for you. Then second thing is when I started off, every small thing would just make me maybe a little anxious that we need to get this done right now, how will this happen? So initially just trust that things will happen. Everything has happened. So now that's one advice that I give to younger folks that where you're starting up, things will happen and it's absolutely normal. Things will fall into place. You just work one thing at a time and you'll see that everything else will be falling in place.
Danielle Lewis (17:48):
I really that because it's so easy to get stressed out and overwhelmed by all of the things that you have to do, especially as a founder when we're wearing all of the different hats and when we're first starting out and we don't have employees, you are doing the selling and then you're doing the implementing and that can be quite stressful. But I feel like that advice of just one step at a time, trust the process, everything will all happen as it happens is really important.
Ridhi Singh (18:19):
And also one other thing is that irrespective of what you know, don't know, always think first principles, you'll get your answers. Basic things are not that complex in life. They're very is simple. All you need to do is just ask basic questions and have simple framework on how I take decisions and you would be fine.
Danielle Lewis (18:40):
That is so good. You are so right. I feel like we overcomplicate things as humans
Ridhi Singh (18:46):
Actually and look at anything that we do in a day from personal other things, we just think too much. We just optimize too much.
Danielle Lewis (18:56):
Yes, I mean it's even those things that we put off and we put off and we stress about them and we stress about them and we finally do them and they take two minutes. I'm like, oh my gosh, I've just spent two weeks procrastinating and stressing out about that and I could have just done it in two minutes.
Ridhi Singh (19:12):
That's right. Yeah.
Danielle Lewis (19:14):
Oh, that's so good. So what's next for you? So as the company grows, what's kind of the next thing that you are looking forward to in the future?
Ridhi Singh (19:26):
Good question actually. So right now, see at different stages, as I said, we had different goals, right? Steam and scaling and then ensuring delivery also. So the business that we are in is more of a long-term business. You have to maintain a track record, you have to ensure that people are happy with what you're doing and this reference will take you a long pay. And I think we've been, that was the hardest thing to do. Managing quality at scale. We've been able to do it. Now we are unlocking different geographies. So as I said, we've started setting aggressively on other geographies and scaling up team as well. So these are the two focus areas. I think we have done the groundwork, we are trained or we have our processes, we have right kind of people. We have very good people like function heads within each function who are very, very good at their job. There's a second layer below those people. We have good client base to cover us for our financials economically sound. So next step for us is to scale on both fronts to get more clients from across the globes because we are just curious to understand how marketing works, reaching out to them, seeing can we create an impact there and simultaneously build on the team
Danielle Lewis (20:47):
Scaling of
Ridhi Singh (20:48):
The team.
Danielle Lewis (20:48):
Yeah, that is awesome. So will your strategy change, so as you scale and you're looking to bring on new clients from different geographies, does your marketing or your own sales and marketing strategy change or how do you think you'll go about acquiring those new customers?
Ridhi Singh (21:05):
Yeah, we have certain plans. Initially, as I said, it was more of network then it was via cold sales. So we would pitch in where other people were pitching in. Now we are more aggressive, so we just reach out. We are doing cold sales and now earlier it was just me. Now I have people on my team who have learned, so they're good. So today if I want to step out of sales, I can do that. Nice. And I think that's a big step in last.
Danielle Lewis (21:35):
It's exciting.
Ridhi Singh (21:37):
So that is, I think if you have to have the right people, and as I said, so one good decision that I took in initial days was to hire, invest in people, good people and not optimize for cost or anything because it is important that sets the base of where you are and the work that you're doing. So that way now there are two more smart folks, at least two minimum who know how to do it. I'm there and then there's a complete delivery engine is placed that can deliver. So sometimes even I say, you guys will be able to deliver. My team says, don't worry, this is nothing. So that means good. So acquisition strategy is more aggressive, reaching out and seeing if we'll need services. If they need, then we're all happy to have the one.
Danielle Lewis (22:32):
Awesome. And I love that too because so part of our spark course is all about cold outreach. And so I'm a sales person by trade, so I always tell people how amazing sales is, but I love that you are actively and saying no, we're aggressively reaching out to people and cold pitching. And I think that that's so cool because I feel like a lot of founders are really scared about approaching people about their products, but you absolutely have to get yourself out there.
Ridhi Singh (23:04):
Yes, you have to. And also it's not as a business. So I remember a lot of changes come in the way when I used to think, right? But I used to think, okay, you know what? We'll get five clients and then we'll deliver, then we'll take a pause and then we'll get five more and then we'll deliver typical non-sales person mentality. And then it just occurred. You cannot,
Danielle Lewis (23:27):
Can never stop selling.
Ridhi Singh (23:30):
Actually. You don't say no to business. But now we are at a place where you understand it's a constant cycles and you have to do it. Lucky for us that we realize that sales is core to the business and has to be given the priority it deserves. You cannot have a business and nobody's out there buying it.
Danielle Lewis (23:48):
Oh my gosh, I love that so much. It's so true. I know I say people hate it, but I'm like you have to dedicate time to sales every day. So even if you are the founder who's wearing all of the hats, if you're not just chipping away, it's small parts every day you get to the end of the month and then you're stressed out because you haven't got any leads or you haven't got any proposals out. So it's something that you need to chip away at every day.
Ridhi Singh (24:13):
Yes. And momentum is necessary for companies to grow.
Danielle Lewis (24:16):
Yes.
Ridhi Singh (24:17):
The moment growth stops, all other kind of things will start happening. So it's better to grow.
Danielle Lewis (24:22):
Grow. Yeah, exactly. No, that is such amazing advice. So then maybe to wrap up my last question, just thinking about being a fabulous woman in business, any advice for, so business is hard and we've all gone through some crazy times over the last few years. So do you have any advice for someone who might be in their business for a couple of years and maybe wondering why the heck they started it in the first place and struggling a little bit? Any kind of words of wisdom to help out?
Ridhi Singh (24:56):
Yes. People who are already running the business, right? Yeah. I would tell them business is difficult. Yes, you'll go through these times, but it's okay. Just do what is in your control and you will see the results coming in, right? Second, don't think about failures. So focus on what you can control. Do those actions and always be ready for failures. It's okay, you try it. Nobody else did you try? You're brave enough to go and try out something unless you try out something, will, whether things will work out or not. So there's no in being in failing or anything. Third, do what you think is right rather than the world wisdom in terms of we should do this and that and is fine. Job is fine, startup is fine. Not doing anything is also fine as long as you are happy with it.
Danielle Lewis (25:51):
Wow, I love that so much. Recently, I've started to kind of dive into a little bit more business because it lights you up rather than just growing a unicorn and being miserable, actually really thinking about the life you want to live and designing your business around that. So I absolutely love that you said that. What actually makes you happy, that's awesome.
Ridhi Singh (26:16):
Because no right or wrong way to do anything or live your life, right? So what matters to you, as long as you are happy, things will be fine. Even if you found a unicorn, if you don't find happiness in it, right? Yes. Wouldn't matter.
Danielle Lewis (26:33):
That is so good. Well, you are absolutely incredible. Thank you so much for spending the time with us today and sharing your journey in business and your insights with the Spark community. Thank you so much.
Ridhi Singh (26:47):
Thanks Daniel. Absolutely love this conversation. And yeah, it's good to be connected.
Danielle Lewis (26:55):
Absolutely.
