209: From Lost and Founder to Chill Work with Rand Fishkin

Free Time with Jenny Blake

“When you’re in debt to the truth, the interest rate sucks.” That’s just one of many so-true-it-hurts gems in Rand Fishkin’s 2018 book Lost and Founder, an accounting of his leadership journey through the often-Faustian bargain of building a company through venture funding, for all but a select few types of start-ups who do benefit from that route.

In this conversation, he shares why he dislikes the term lifestyle business, how he views some of his biggest business regrets in hindsight, his definition of chill work, and how he’s building his new business through open-sourced angel funding (and profit sharing) with a Delightfully Tiny Team of three.

More About Rand: Rand Fishkin is the co-founder and CEO of SparkToro, makers of fine audience research software. He’s dedicated his professional life to helping people do better marketing through his writing, videos, speaking, and his book, Lost and Founder: A Painfully Honest Field Guide to the Startup World. When Rand’s not working, he’s usually cooking a fancy meal for the love of his life, author Geraldine DeRuiter. If you bribe him with great pasta or fancy cocktails, he’ll pull back the curtain on big tech’s dark secrets.

📝 Permission: Hire an outside expert, a consultant or an agency, to do that thing that you know your business could benefit from.

🔗 Resources Mentioned

• Rand on the web, IG: @randderuiter, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Mastadon: @randfish
• Companies: Tiny Seed Capital, HubSpot, SparkToro
• Parable: “We’ll See”

📚 Books Mentioned

• Lost and Founder by Rand Fishkin
• All Over the Place by Geraldine DeRuiter
• Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business
• Pivot: The Only Move That Matters Is Your Next One
• Life After College

🎧 Related Episodes

• Office Hours with Spencer Rascoff: SEO Guru Rand Fishkin of SparkToro and Moz Reveals Why He Thinks Venture Funding isn't Always the Right Path for Start-ups
• Free Time: 016: IP Licensing with Lee LeFever

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