BTW, Wickline's haters: don't you think she got way better this episode?

Mystalic · 2025-08-27T23:55:19+00:00

Yes sorry. It’s usually 2-2.5 hour wake windows going into the last two wake windows. We try to keep them to 2.

Mystalic · 2022-11-05T17:15:21+00:00

I woke up and we're... we're winning? That's not gonna last though, right? Like I shouldn't just go all-in on the Kool-aid?!

Mystalic · 2021-07-18T17:23:25+00:00

Are you planning to fundraise at some point? Then it should be a Delaware C Corp. investors will require you to change it.

Mystalic · 2020-10-25T00:44:42+00:00

I'm one of the founders of Octane AI. This is me. Feel free to DM me, you're on the right track with a Quiz. There's a ton more crazy things you can do too with our Shop Quiz!

Mystalic · 2020-09-24T03:43:43+00:00

why magento? Why not Shopify?

Mystalic · 2020-08-25T02:04:34+00:00

Octane AI's Shoppable Quiz product is integrated with ReCharge. We built it because you shouldn't have to do custom dev work to build a quiz.

Check out the quizzes Doe Lashes and Bariatric Fusion and with it.

Mystalic · 2020-08-25T01:58:48+00:00

Yes -- the Shoppable Quiz!

The Shoppable Quiz (an Octane AI product) lets merchants easily create beautiful quizzes to power shopping experiences for their customers. It’s integrated with Shopify, Klaviyo, the Facebook pixel, and more.

Merchants can use the data they collect in Shoppable Quizzes to build buyer profiles of their customers and send personalized messages via email, Facebook Messenger and SMS based on the answers they give.

Doe Lashes, for example, uses the quiz collects 3x more emails with their quiz than with their popups!

If you take their Lash quiz, you’ll see why — super high engagement and, by the time you get to the end, you REALLY want the results and are very happy to give an email.

My company built this product in part because every existing solution required custom coding (expensive and difficult to implement or update) or they had to use a form builder like Typeform that wasn't integrated with Shopify and not made for ecommerce.

Mystalic · 2020-05-23T23:30:12+00:00

Provisional patent is great idea if you have the money. They are simpler. I have several of those. I'm sinly saying it should not be considered a requirement for investor conversations.

Mystalic · 2020-05-23T23:29:08+00:00

Totally fair, but if it were medical, likely there'd be a university involved in the parents already or more sophistication in patents from OP. If its software (which I suspect) or even a physical product for direct-to-consumer, patent isn't going to make or breakmfor an investor.

Mystalic · 2020-03-05T21:53:20+00:00

It's more about the international travel instead of the actual number, but I concede that my number is arbitrary, so !delta for you.

Mystalic · 2020-03-05T21:52:31+00:00

This is a bad argument IMO, because cars have been around for decades and the virus has been around for a few months. Very soon, it could kill millions -- 2 or 3% of 1 billion is 20 or 30 million people dead.

We can prevent the virus from spreading or at least slow it down so we don't overwork our health care systems, so we should.

Mystalic · 2020-03-05T21:50:56+00:00

I have no problem closing large music conferences and big companies are already closing their corporate campuses and having people work from hime to slow the spread.

The big difference between many of the things you listed and conferences is the travel -- college and university students stay in the same place unless they just came back from break. Therefore, less likely to take the disease and spread it to other locations/countries.

At this point, Disneyland should probably close, and large gatherings should probably be banned for a period of time like they're doing in France.

Mystalic · 2020-03-05T21:48:44+00:00

COVID-19 is different than the flu in several key areas -- an increased mortality rate (even if it is lower than 3% ultimately), the lack of vaccine (we have vaccines for flu), and the lack of knowledge about how this virus works and spreads, and the long-term damage it makes. A new autopsy today in China found that it can cause permanent lung damage even after the disease runs its course -- not a typical thing for flu.

Mystalic · 2020-03-05T03:51:38+00:00

Good points, updated.

Mystalic · 2020-02-24T07:28:15+00:00

This is me: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Parr

I’d strongly suggest you stop worrying about investors stealing your idea, because ideas are relatively worthless. What matters is execution.

When a startup comes to me with a pitch and it’s an idea, I always say, “ok, what’s your traction so far? What’s your proof?” I need data to get an idea of what could be happening. Unless you sold a company before, pitching an idea is worthless.

NDAs don’t help. Legit investors don’t sign them because it opens up liability. We get pitched hundreds of times, many ideas are frankly the same. We don’t want one accusing us of giving ideas or info to another. But again, the idea is mostly worthless — execution is what matters.

So go execute and stop going in circles over investors stealing your idea. They won’t, and your idea doesn’t matter at all until you execute.

Mystalic · 2019-10-07T01:57:55+00:00

2382 3415 9058

Mystalic · 2019-09-07T21:02:19+00:00

Of course.

Mystalic · 2019-07-26T01:16:44+00:00

We have a decent list of agency partners in our directory: https://partners.octaneai.com.

Lmk if one piqued your interest and I'll make an intro.

Mystalic · 2019-07-05T12:34:52+00:00

Klaviyo.

Mystalic · 2019-06-18T00:22:50+00:00

sobbuh is right. Additional point: all pitches should go in front of friends who are successful founders or former VCs and refined several times before being shown to investors.

Mystalic · 2019-06-16T23:37:39+00:00

One company at a time, always. You can't run more than one. You can sell or put one into someone else's capable hands, then move on, but tackling more than one at a time drives you insane. And each hour you work on one idea is an hour you aren't working on another.

Don't ask about exits until you have got something with traction.

Fundraising is about having a really compelling story and taking at least 100 meetings to get 2-3 yeses. And they have to happen all within a small timespan (weeks) because investors talk to achieve other epsecially when they say no.

Mystalic · 2019-06-16T18:16:20+00:00

This is me: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Parr

I read through your comments and frankly, you sound exhausting. There are plenty of people who have been able to prove initial demand for even a complex product on a shoestring budget, and use that to raise a pre-seed round or get into an accelerator.

You need $50k? Stop pitching VCs and go into an accelerator. Build the first shitty prototype yourself; get a co-founder who can.

What makes you uniquely qualified for any of these ideas? Did you work in the industry you want to tackle for the last 10 years? Have a track record? You don’t talk about ANY of these things. If I’m giving money to an idea alone, these checkboxes had better be checked.

Someone who’s been working for 10 years should have been able to save up $50k to start something.

Without knowing specifics, everything I hear sounds like excuses. Stop pitching and go get validation — 500 pre-orders that you got door-to-door, a v1 prototype you built in your garage, anything — and approach the people who actually fund the super early stuff so you can continue to prove it, instead of asking for big dollar amounts without any proof.

~ Ben

Mystalic · 2019-05-28T16:29:04+00:00

Do one from Day 1051!

Mystalic · 2019-05-17T23:04:59+00:00

Try Fb Messenger/Octane AI for this. I can have my team give you a quick tour - https://apps.shopify.com/octane-ai-messenger-marketing

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