Jon Ferrara. He’s in CRM—a relationship management entrepreneur and noted speaker about social media’s effects on sales marketing. He’s reimagined the CRM by building a simply smarter social sales and marketing platform. His most recent venture is called Nimble.com. It’s the first CRM that works for you by building the updated contact data for you and then works with you everywhere you work. He’s best known as the co-founder of GoldMine Software, one of the early pioneers in the Salesforce automation and customer relationship management in software categories for SMBs. He’s recently been recognized by Forbes as one of the Top 10 Social CEOs and Top 10 Social Sales people in the world. Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Think and Grow Rich What CEO do you follow? –  Marc Benioff Favorite online tool? — Buffer Do you get 8 hours of sleep? — 7-8 If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – “Not to sweat shit so much”   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:17 – Nathan introduces Jon to the show 02:13 – There was no Outlook, CRM or Salesforce when Jon had the idea of GoldMine 02:31 – Jon started on $5K with no bank loans and VC 02:35 – Jon ran GoldMine for 10 years, had 5M customers around the globe, sold it and retired at 40 02:44 – GoldMine was a software platform 02:55 – GoldMine started as a floppy disk until it became a CD 03:28 – Jon started GoldMine in 1989 and sold it in 1999 03:38 – GoldMine passed $70M in annual revenue, with 250 team members worldwide 04:00 – ARR wasn’t necessary before when it comes to valuation 04:22 – Jon sold GoldMine for $125M in cash with no strings attached 04:55 – A year after GoldMine was sold, Jon was diagnosed with a head tumor 05:07 – “The most important thing you have around you is your health, next is your family, then your passion and business” 05:19 – Jon was 41 when they found the tumor 05:27 – “We are on this planet to grow our souls” 05:51 – After the tumor, Jon spent next 10 years of his life with his family and friends, adding value to people 06:15 – Jon got into photography and worked as the photographer for USC football for 10 years 06:42 – “You need to be your own advocate” 06:56 – Jon found a doctor who developed the technology to have a radiation beam reach the center of your head without touching any vital nerves 07:17 – The tumor disappeared after 7 weeks of radiation treatment 07:42 – The radiation is like burning the seed inside the watermelon without burning the watermelon’s skin 08:18 – Jon started in social media in 2006-2008 08:33 – Jon saw that relationship managers are contact managers 08:58 – Jon looked at CRM and saw the gap 09:07 – You have to use salespeople to use CRM 09:08 – “That’s why they’re called salesforce because you force salespeople to use it” 09:27 – Nimble’s team was formed in 2010, Alpha in 2011, and they turned the paywall in 2013 09:36 – “Just like with GoldMIne, I was early to the idea of an intelligent social relationship manager that works for you” 09:57 – Business is social and life is social 10:11 – First year revenue 10:21 – Jon got their first customer for Nimble the same way he got their first customer for GoldMine: 10:36 – Jon had a trusted advisor for his prospect 10:51 – Jon got his first $50K revenue in GoldMine from resellers 10:56 – Jon grew the $50K by mobilizing writers who write about technology and business 11:10 – In 2009-2011, there was no reseller because everything was cloud 11:27 – Jon looked for influencers 11:36 – Jon put in his own $3M to the company 11:48 – Jon also got some cash from Mark Cuban, Jason Calacanis and others 12:05 – Jon’s money went to the company’s capitalization 12:20 – Nimble currently has 100K customers and 10K paying companies 12:31 – An average of 3 seats per company 12:36 – Nimble is a SaaS business and is generating 80K website visitors with zero marketing 12:43 – Trial to paid conversion is 20% 13:05 – Nimble started at $15 per user