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Today on Automate, Delegate, Eliminate we are privileged to chat to Jeremy Ring, one of the members of the first team at Yahoo!
Jeremy Ring was hired as Director of Sales at Yahoo! In 1996 by legendary founder Jerry Yang. After a profanity-laced telephone call with Jerry, Jeremy quit his current job - after only one day of being with that company - to begin a 5 and a half year journey with Yahoo! That would change his life.
Since leaving Yahoo! Jeremy has been a successful entrepreneur, a Florida state senator, and ran for CFO of Florida in 2018. He has also been a champion for students with his Students United with Parents and Educators to Resolve Bullying (SUPERB) program.
Jeremy is here with us today to talk with us about the rise and fall of Yahoo! From his 50-yard line view.
How did Yahoo! Differ from its competitors, what made it so profitable?
- Early on they were the first online company to partner with major brands.
- They believed in making a profitable company.
You joined the company after it was founded, were they still innovating?
- They were still innovating, but they were innovating for the time.
- They innovated in the content area.
In hindsight, were there any business opportunities that were passed up that could have saved Yahoo!?
- It’s a hard question to answer, as so many different acquisition opportunities came through the Yahoo! offices.
- The bigger acquisitions that were passed up were by the second team.
- The second team had the opportunity to acquire Facebook and passed.
- The decisions that were made that hurt the company were made by non-tech executives.
- Jeremy believes the biggest mistake that the first team made was to not monetize search.
What are some things entrepreneurs can do to help them recognize they may be looking through a lens that may be the wrong one?
- How you identify customers.
- How do you identify areas that need disruption?
How did the company grow while you were there, what were some of the difficulties in the beginning?
- 25 employees when he started there when he left there were around 3000.
- There weren’t many internal difficulties at the beginning.
- The company culture collapsed with the second team.
- The biggest challenges they faced came from Wall Street because they expected a more short term explosive growth, so they couldn’t spend time with clients that would be more profitable in the long term than the short term.
What was it like to see the Dot.Com bubble burst coming?
- They knew the storm was coming about a year beforehand.
- There was no way to reverse course and stop the burst.
- The biggest entities were not actually destroyed by the burst, just damaged.
- Yahoo! Was not destroyed, but they failed to rebuild.
What were the differences in the company between when you started and when you left?
- The company culture was intact, the culture collapsed after the dot.com bubble burst.
- The company culture during his time was great.
Where is Yahoo! today?
- They are owned by Verizon
- They’re about one step above Radio shack and Blockbuster
What advice would you give other entrepreneurs?
- Don’t be afraid to set new rules.
- See the existing opportunities and take advantage of the moment.
- Focus on your go-to market aspect, otherwise, it doesn’t matter if you have a great technology or not. Selling is equally as hard as building great technologies.
- Don’t over-analyze.
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