CEO of Sparkbuy (acquired by Google), Ontela (merged with Photobucket), and Robot Turtles (now in Target stores nationwide). Author of O'Reilly's forthcoming book "Faking It: the Startup CEO Handbook".
I can give you a crash course in great public speaking in 15 minutes. You will practice for a few hours, and then you will rock.
Your final funding round - your exit. I love helping startup execs sketch out a simple and effective strategy for negotiations to get maximum value for the shareholders and themselves. This is the approach I used when I sold Sparkbuy to Google and have taught to many entrepreneurs since.
Call me in the middle of your process: either trying to manage your investor pipeline or dealing with term sheets. I'll teach you the techniques I used to wrangle $30 million from 8 VCs and two dozen angels.
People aren't working hard enough. Or they're working too hard. Nobody likes each other. It's too cliquey. The solution's probably going to hurt, but it'll hurt less than the problem.
I created the most-backed boardgame in Kickstarter history (Robot Turtles) and the biggest 30-day crowdfunding campaign for anything, ever, with Glowforge. I love to help other people with their projects. I have a long list of tricks I will share, plus I can review your plans and help you optimize for success.
Great, insightful and really helpful. Thanks Dan for all the incredible advice..!
My call with Dan was the first time I was using Clarity, and now I am sure not the last one! Very thankful to Dan for all the advice he shared with me, which we could cover in just below 20min! Dan is a great guy with lots of experience, so I would definitely recommend to talk to him!
Dan approaches challenges with aplomb, reason, and grace in equal measure. Aside from being a brilliant visionary, Dan is also a first-rate communicator - and thus is able to convey his ideas (and his company's direction) clearly and eloquently. It's hard to say which is more compelling: his vast intelligence or his personable nature.
Dan is one of the best managers I have worked with. He partners with recruiting and makes hiring the right candidates effortless. His team respects him and people want to work for him. Don't you?
Dan always has interesting and useful insight into a problem, whether it be a technical, personnel or management issue. His wealth of experience makes him a valuable person to know.
You may already know of Dan as the founder and CEO of Ontela, the guy who raised a $10MM B round in the midst of the “great recession,” the VentureBeat 2008 Mobile CEO of the year, the Seattle entrepreneur who merged his company with Photobucket as a terrific outcome for all parties involved, or the one who lit up Ignite Seattle by sharing his love of RC helicopters and airplanes.
After working for him for 3 ½ years, I’m writing this to endorse him as the unstoppable driving force behind a company. Dan may be the closest thing to Steve Jobs Seattle has to offer. He is a consummate presenter and pitch man, a laser-focused fundraising machine, a natural networker and sales booster, a PR media darling, a top-notch product person, a tough negotiator, and a great strategic thinker. Beyond all of these skills, he has an amazing amount of personal energy and deep-seated desire to see his companies not just succeed, but truly stand out as exceptional in every way. He also has a love of experimentation and an ever present urge to see results fast. There’s no doubt in my mind we’ll see more successful businesses founded by Dan in the years to come.
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