Neil C.

Meet Sumer Chawla, a partnership leader at Shopify. Sumer covers how he spent his time at the conference to learn from other modern partnership professionals and executives. Catalyst is a modern conference, we're bringing new experiences to the event and this year will be no different. Why? Because for us the conference is a product, we review it's features to make sure they meet the needs of our attendees. When one feature stops meeting the needs we deprecate it and introduce a new feature. Here's an example: In 2022, our very first Catalyst, we received feedback that panels did not provide much value to the attendees. So in 2023, we opted for lightning talks, think TED style talks but focused on partnerships. We had two goals for them, provide a learning experience and provide some folks who have never spoken at a larger stage the opportunity to speak in front of their peers. In 2024, we have a couple of new features that will up level how attendees connect with each and increase their on the job performance. Whether you are an aspiring executive or a current executive you'll walk away for tools to help you increase your career and life impact. This coming week, Chris, Tai, Brittney (our conference leader) and I will be in Chicago to finalize the program and we'll share updates from the windy city. We have more interest from teams attending Catalyst (they are choosing to do their team offsite at the event) than the past two years. We also have interest from Founders, CEOs, CBOs and other non-partnerships execs. Partnerships is on the radar or every exec and if you know someone looking for a modern conference please share info about Catalyst with them. You're all in for a treat and I'm looking forward to hosting you in Chicago!

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I stayed up coding until 4am so many nights for two years when I started Lightspeed Commerce — to me, this is part of the entrepreneur journey. Had a blast reflecting on those early years and discussing the challenges and opportunities of navigating a tech startup with Harry Stebbings from 20VC. Some takeaways: - Achieving strong product-market fit requires an iterative, customer-centric approach — especially with early users. Lightspeed wouldn’t have achieved profitability if we weren’t so close to our customers. - Companies can take different paths to scale, each with its trade-offs — some bootstrap profitably for years before taking VC funding. Sometimes you need the slow-burn process to create something truly phenomenal. - Founders must be willing to adapt their sales and distribution strategies as the business matures, especially after going public. If you’re a founder or entrepreneur, I think this episode will provide lots of value. Thank you to Harry and the team at 20VC for having me. Links to the interview in the comments 👇

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"Understanding and meeting the needs of our largest customers continues to be our biggest reason for success." These are the words of the founder of one of the fastest growing D2C tech companies in Canada. The advice seems simple. Almost too simple. His product roadmap revolves around his customers needs. And the one thing they do well is that they build looking from that pane of glass. "It's a balance. We have to manage our employee needs and our customers wants. We have to manage stress on both sides. And that's a big reason that we're consistently reviewing our largest sources of revenue and making sure that we continue to build features they need and an experience that works for them." It's surprising how easy it is to lose focus of the customer you serve in software development. I like this approach.

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Sidewalk Labs (Part of Google), another showcase of Canadian politicians bending over for a big US corp, with ZERO tangible results 💩 Roxana and I attended a "private investor demo" session in 2019. A block of wood was passed among the audience, supposedly the NEXT BIG BREAKTHROUGH in urban development! Demo concluded, by observing a piece of wood! Building blocks of future skyscrapers! The promise? With this, Google will build a "Smart City" for us, the peasants of Toronto, in Queens Quay 🏖️🏢 Sidewalk Labs' website now points to a newer Google scam, it reads: "Build Sustainably with Google Earth"! Bait and switch, but let enough time pass so no one remembers 🤢 https://lnkd.in/gd3B-a6m Guess now the investors and Ontario Government | Gouvernement de l’Ontario have shit loads of these wooden blocks, ready to shove up somewhere, to find a use for! All because the name "Bloomberg" sounds authoritative enough to our ears? Surely that's capital well spent, instead of investing in local talent! 🤔 Will Canada's tech ecosystem ever crawl out of Silicon Valley's shadow, and stand on its own? ⌚👀⛔

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💡 Why Every New Founder Needs to Hear This: Real Talk About the Highs and Lows of Entrepreneurship I had an amazing time on the latest episode of Collisions YYC with Jade Alberts and Tyler Chisholm! There’s something truly special about having real conversations with these two—discussing both the highs and the lows of being an entrepreneur. 🎢 In this episode, we dive deep into what it really takes to navigate the rollercoaster of startup life—how to manage those big wins, like landing a new client, and how to push through the tough moments, like missing payroll. We shared some hard-earned lessons on avoiding the common mistakes founders make, staying grounded through the chaos, and most importantly, knowing when to keep going and when it’s time to pivot. 🌱 For all the new founders out there: This journey isn’t easy, but it’s totally worth it. Prepare yourself for the challenges, and keep in mind that the highs and lows are all part of the adventure. 🚀 🎧 Tune in to hear these raw, real, and invaluable insights from Team Awesome: https://lnkd.in/e6CKrASG 💬 I’d love to hear your thoughts—what challenges have you faced as a founder? And how did you know when it was time to pivot or keep pushing through? #TeamAwesome #KeepBeingAwesome #Koridor #Entrepreneurship #FoundersJourney #CollisionsYYC #StartupLife #YYCFounders

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Here's a brief demo of KOTS, the first of fifteen new products from our team at Mindlace

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Custom stacks can lead to two very real problems: depending on custom development and increased tech debt. Combined, your pace slows and ultimately, your trade-off is innovation and growth. That’s why Mejuri went from a fully custom stack to Shopify. Before Shopify, Mejuri was on an entirely custom stack: custom ecommerce, payments service, and middleware that was built to connect their custom ecommerce site to their point of sale system [POS]. This led to a ton of challenges. They were spending too much time building and maintaining 3rd party integrations to coordinate channels, data, and functionality between systems. With limited resources and team members, the trade-off of building custom features was they were not able to address their mounting technical debt. Addressing those issues in-house, slowed down their pace of innovation making them unable to deploy features as fast as they needed to. That’s the ‘invisible’ cost component with a custom stack. You spend an inordinate amount of time building custom features at the cost of innovation. Brands can avoid that with Shopify. Shopify is a natively unified ecommerce and POS system so everything just works together really really well. It doesn’t require middleware or integrations. Your customer, order, and product data flows to both channels from a single source of truth. It’s simpler and allows you to move faster. Hear about from Mejuri yourself. Rohit Nathany, the Chief Digital Officer sat down with us to talk about the pain points they faced on a custom stack. As Rohit says, what better way to simplify than to have a unified ecommerce and POS solution? See the full interview here: https://lnkd.in/eyCSdVgf

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Cross Sell, founded in 2014, epitomizes the ideal B2B #SaaS product with its innovative “you might also like...” feature for Shopify merchants. Acquired in 2020, Cross Sell is a testament to SureSwift Capital's commitment to products that are both loved by customers and show significant expansion potential. From the start, Cross Sell garnered incredible reviews on the Shopify app store. With the leadership of second-time founders Ryan Kulp and Deven Soni, along with their partners, the app underwent a transformative journey. They carefully prepared Cross Sell to scale upwards, from a complete rebuild and redesign to enhancing support and revising the pricing strategy. When the time came to pass the torch, SureSwift was the perfect fit for an exciting addition to our Shopify app portfolio, aligning with our standard for quality and room for growth criteria we strive for. This growth potential we saw, along with our strategies, has led to a 30% increase in TTM revenue since our acquisition. Cross Sell's journey, from its original founder to its second owners and now with SureSwift, illustrates our dedication to finding, nurturing and elevating top-tier software solutions. For other creative SaaS innovators seeking a partner for long-term success, SureSwift Capital is ready to propel your vision forward. 

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Over the weekend, Tobi, the founder and CEO of Shopify, discussed the major reason investors passed on Shopify in the early days : market size. I remember that financing round, & I remember having the same concern, & making the same mistake. Living in the valley & driving on 101, the billboards & logo-adorned headquarters of successful companies provide a daily infusion of all the mistakes in I’ve made in guessing how a company or a market might evolve. Years later, I listened as Bill Gurley shared his thoughts about market size. He asked himself a question : whether the startup was increasing, decreasing, or maintaining the market size? (I can’t seem to find the link - but I have it in my notes!) I added that question to my diligence list when meeting startups. Now much later, having seen many companies create categories or reinvigorate aging ones, the question I ask myself has evolved. It’s not as the market size large enough? Instead, it the question is : do we believe this company can create the market? Market size is the output of all the players marketing, selling, building. Their efforts alter, distort, & juice the supply/demand curves of macroeconomics. It’s not a given - not an output or a steady-state CAGR. Often it’s the startups that engender the demand, change the market dynamics, & make markets massive by taking risks with products. When done right, these founders create category-defining businesses like Shopify (now worth $90b)!

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My guest this week on Cleaning Up Podcast was my friend Azeem Azhar, the man behind Exponential View. If you don't know Exponential View, you should. It's a podcast, it's a substack, it's a world view that we all need to think about. Question: what happens when multiple exponential technologies collide: compute, communications, gene sequencing, solar, batteries, AI? Answer: it gets really interesting. So listen now and see what you think! https://lnkd.in/gqizH3vP

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🚀 Elevate Your Shopify Experience with Advanced Order Tracking! 🚀 Say goodbye to "Where is my order?" queries and hello to enhanced customer satisfaction and increased revenue. With our out-of-the-box solution, empower your customers through a branded tracking page and proactive shipping notifications. 🌟 ✅ 24/7 Support ✅ Less WISMO (Where Is My Order?) ✅ Higher CSAT (Customer Satisfaction) ✅ Enhanced Post-purchase Experience ✅ More Revenue Features like Estimated Delivery Date (EDD), localization, branding, progress bars, map coordinates, custom shipment statuses, product recommendations, and more turn customers into advocates. Keep that crucial order lookup traffic within your store—boosting sales effortlessly! 💡 Make Data-Driven Decisions: Access insightful analytics on shipments, transit times, and notifications to refine your shipping and post-purchase strategies. Transform the way you manage orders on Shopify today and keep your focus on what truly matters—growing your business! 📈 #Shopify #EcommerceSuccess #CustomerSatisfaction #OrderTracking #DataDrivenDecisions Click for details : https://lnkd.in/eBxp3Qzm

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Is Shopify's Stock a Buy After its Recent Earnings? Shares of the cloud-based commerce platform, Shopify, are trading higher this morning following the company’s upbeat earnings results. Their strong performance was driven by growth in subscription solutions revenue, which rose from $444 million to $563 million year over year, thanks to more merchants signing up and the increase in pricing on its subscription plans. The company also enjoyed more fees from a metric called "gross payment volume," which measures the total value of orders processed through the payment platform. The increase in revenue helped the company surpass its net income expectations, reflecting significant growth from the same quarter last year when they reported a loss of $1.3 billion. This quarter’s net income came in at $170 million, or 13 cents a share, beating the 8-cent estimates but declining from last quarter’s 26 cents. Nonetheless, Shopify investors found the earnings report to be a positive signal, largely because of the company’s rosy outlook. The company expects its next quarter to grow by about 20-25% from last year, which isn’t magnificent, but it is notable considering the uncertain economic environment. Overall Numbers: Looking at Shopify’s fundamentals as a whole, the company’s current valuation of $85 billion is particularly high compared to its annual revenue of $7.19 billion (2023). Although Shopify’s performance and its ability to beat expectations are impressive, the company needs to continue boosting revenue significantly in the years to come in order to justify its valuation; otherwise, a correction might be due. Net income will also remain a big focus for investors, especially for a technology-based company like Shopify. Technology companies are often forgiven for posting negative net income in the early years of their life, but Shopify is now a seasoned name that should bring more consistency to satisfy investors.

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We are raising $250,000 to fuel the growth of our retail automation startup Afiari Inc. to onboard at least 10,000 paying businesses over the next 18 - 24 months. Firstly, what is Afiari and what are we building? Afiari is enabling retail (physical) businesses to sell online and automate operations from purchasing to point-of-sale. Our long-term goal is to be able to connect data points from points of sale back to manufacturing and this we will do by first, creating a path for digitization by providing the tools that will help retail businesses manage not just their inventory but also purchasing processes, supplier management, receiving invoice payments automatically, and of course selling their products via our marketplace. It’s an ecosystem and we are ready to push the boundaries of the market. So why should you invest in us?  The first is that, we don’t die! We have been in the space for the past three years, learning, experimenting, pivoting, and repivoting. We have also built out the solution that we are beginning to see adoption for, we now want to grow massively while generating real-time revenue from across our products. Today, we have 8 paying businesses and 22 businesses onboarded in total. Our strategy is to get enough businesses to use our solution as ERP for their businesses while we gradually derive the potential of online sales via our marketplace by driving demand to these vetted businesses. The final reason to invest is that we know that this is incredibly hard and that is what gets us excited. We don’t just want to build for the sake of it, we always work from the ground up and attack the problems from the root. It is a more difficult approach but it is also incredibly rewarding. So, if this makes sense to you, then let’s have a chat about it. I am available to meet in person or virtually depending on your location. Reach out to me via DM, email at [email protected], or call +2347062029656

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Ever wondered how Shopify's infrastructure handles the Black Friday tsunami? The numbers are mind-bending: Shopify delivered ~50 billion webhooks since Black Friday. But how reliable is the delivery latency for the real-time events? Through Hookdeck's infrastructure, we tracked Shopify delivery latency for hundred of millions of webhooks. The results? Impressive resilience: Our 72-hour analysis reveals: - Median (p50) latency: ~1s - Average latency: ~2s - p99 latency: ~7s We caught exactly 3 performance blips early during Black Friday, each causing a ~400% latency spike. These hiccups lasted only 2-5 minutes each. Since 11/30 14:00 UTC, it's been smooth sailing with remarkable stability. With modern ecommerce running on webhooks, delivery reliability directly impacts customer experience and merchant operations. These metrics show what true infrastructure resilience looks like in the real world - not perfect, but incredibly robust. #blackfriday #webhooks #shopifydeveloper

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We've seen this so many times. Your brand/customers/product is unique, but that doesn't mean you should reinvent the wheel with your commerce/marketing stack experience. When brands choose heavily-customized tech stacks, it usually leads to high implementation & maintenance costs. But more importantly, it makes it difficult to iterate down the line. You'll be stuck with your "custom" ecom site, loyalty program, unique UX for years - while your competitors will blow past you with "out of the box" tools.

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Our Toronto Tech Fest yacht party sold out in five days... Here's what it taught me about B2B sales. Just like organizing a successful event, a well-executed B2B sales strategy requires careful planning, consistent effort, and strategic actions. Here are the key takeaways: 🎯 Targeting the Right Audience: We didn’t try to sell tickets to everyone. We identified founders, investors, and builders who would appreciate and enjoy a yacht party experience. Similarly, in B2B sales, it’s crucial to focus on your ideal customer profile. Not every lead will be a perfect fit, so don’t waste time on those who aren’t. 📢 Engaging Communication: We kept our audience engaged with compelling social posts about the upcoming event. In B2B sales, regular and engaging communication helps keep prospects interested. This can be done by sharing relevant content, success stories, and industry insights. 🪩 Demonstrating Value: We showcased the unique aspects of our party: the water, the sunset, the music, the drink in the hand, etc. In B2B, it’s essential to demonstrate the unique value and ROI of your product or service. Use case studies, demos, and testimonials to show real benefits. 🛠️ Utilizing Tools and Technology: We leveraged platforms such as Luma and social media such as LinkedIn for promotion. Similarly, using CRM systems, marketing automation tools, and data analytics can streamline your sales process and make it more effective. 🏃‍♂️ Creating Urgency: Limited tickets and early bird pricing created a sense of urgency. In B2B sales, creating a sense of urgency through limited-time offers, incentives, and highlighting the cost of inaction can accelerate the decision-making process. 🤝 Building Relationships: We engaged with our community, letting them know they are valued. Building strong relationships through personalized outreach, understanding their needs, and providing tailored solutions is key in B2B sales. 🙏 Handling Objections: We addressed questions about the event promptly and transparently. In sales, handling objections with confidence and providing clear, honest answers helps build trust and move the deal forward. 🏁 Closing the Deal: Finally, we made the purchasing process seamless and user-friendly. In B2B sales, ensure that the final steps are straightforward and that you provide all necessary support to close the deal smoothly. Selling out our yacht party tickets taught us that success comes from understanding your audience, engaging them effectively, and providing clear value. Apply these simple principles to your B2B sales strategy to achieve remarkable results. Follow for more insights!

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🚀 Elevate Your Shopify Experience with Enhanced Order Tracking! 🚀 Say goodbye to constant "Where is my order?" questions. With our innovative approach, you can now provide your customers with a branded tracking page and proactive shipping notifications that enhance the post-purchase experience. ✨ Benefits Include: - 24/7 support - Less stress on WISMO - Improved CSAT scores - Seamless branding for better customer engagement 🔍 Keep Customers Engaged: An order is typically checked 4-8 times from purchase to delivery. Leverage this by keeping traffic within your store rather than losing it to third-party sites. Use smart marketing channels to effortlessly boost sales. 📊 Make Data-Driven Decisions: Gain valuable insights into shipments, transit times, and notifications to refine your shipping strategy and improve customer satisfaction effectively. Turn your customers into lifelong advocates by providing them an exceptional shipping experience! More engagement, more revenue—make Shopify work smarter for you! #Shopify #CustomerExperience #OrderTracking #ECommerceGrowth #DataDrivenDecisions Click for details : https://lnkd.in/eBxp3Qzm

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Just had to share this gem from Collision Conf in #Toronto. Among the #startups and VCs, I spotted a guy with a shirt saying, "Ask me about my CAC." Naturally, I asked. Sebastian Fallenbüchl, BASc., the wearer, shot back, "My CAC is getting lower as you just approached me." Genius. Seb’s witty remark was more than just a laugh — it was a reminder that business is about people. Metrics like CAC are crucial, but so are the connections and conversations that drive them down. Takeaway? Be #approachable. Humor and humanity can make all the difference. Thanks for the insight and the laugh, Seb. Here’s to more moments like these! #Networking #BusinessInsights

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My love letter to Canadian tech 🍁: here's how we unlock our true potential. After building companies in both Canada and the US, I've realized something about our startup ecosystem: We're sitting on a gold mine of talent that we're not fully unleashing It's not about ability – we have some of the brightest minds in tech. It's about creating an environment where founders feel empowered to swing for the fences. Here's what needs to change: //1. We need more investors willing to bet on potential rather than perfect data + sure bets. Typically when early-stage founders pitch in the US, investors focus on the founder’s capabilities and dreams. In Canada, investors (who often have insane leverage) require more data and less risk. Without apt funding and support, the Canadian way often creates "zombie companies" – stuck between survival and scale. //2. We need experienced founders actively mentoring the next generation. Not just government grants. We need networks of operators who have been there before. Ideally with an incredible outcome and willing to bet on the next generation. Real mentorship from people who've taken the hits and lived to tell about it. The US has this in spades – it's time we expand beyond siloed pockets of this in Canada. //3. We need to celebrate and amplify our success stories more publicly. Success breeds and inspires success. I remember when I first pitched to VCs in the US – they weren't just betting on me, they were betting on a pattern they'd seen work before. Same with founders who see people just like them take the unconventional path and take risk. We need a foundational, mindset shift to celebrating and supporting startups in Canada. //4. We need to stop rewarding safe bets and start celebrating big swings. Stop optimizing for base hits. Start celebrating home runs. The talent is here. The ambition is here. We just need to build the cultural infrastructure that makes big swings feel possible. // I've seen both sides of this story. And I'm more optimistic than ever about Canadian tech. Canada will always be home. To every Canadian founder reading this: Your ambitions aren't too big. Big outcomes are achieveable. The next wave of iconic tech companies can be built in Canada. But first, we need to unleash it. #startups #canada #entrepreneurship #tech

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