The First Customer - Embracing Open-Mindedness and Independence with CEO Tatsiana Kirimava

[00:00:28] Jay: Hi everyone. Welcome to The First Customer Podcast. My name's Jay Aigner. Today I'm lucky enough to be joined by Tatiana Kirimava. Did I get it?

[00:00:37] Tatsiana: yeah.

[00:00:38] Jay: Oh, there we go. CEO and founder of Orangesoft, a mobile app company. she's based in San Francisco, I believe. Tatiana, how are you?

[00:00:47] Tatsiana: Great. Great. Thank you. That's really a great time. All right. Before the Christmas last race

[00:00:55] Jay: Yes. This is like a very low stress, you know, podcast. We can just relax for 15 minutes and then we can go back to the nightmare of Christmas shopping and getting everything together. So thank you for joining me. I mean, look, I said your name, right? I think we could just end the show right there.

It's not going to get any better than that. So let's just, we'll end it right there. so tell me a little bit about where you grew up and did that have an impact on you being an entrepreneur?

[00:01:18] Tatsiana: Oh, you know, I've been asked so many times, like how you become a entrepreneur, like women entrepreneur. And that was all the time. giving me a chance to think about it one more time. And after I've been thinking a lot about it and understood that the biggest impact which I got, this is how my parents grow me, and this is how they raised me and why they've been so open-minded.

They gimme a lot of freedom, and I understood that I had such a huge independency. I made a lot of changes, during my, life. on my own and that allowed me to become a great entrepreneur because now I also have to make my own decisions. I have to run a lot of network around me and that was a big chance for me.

If we will talk about university time, I would say that only network had a great impact and now a big part of my classmates, they all over the world. And that allowing me not only know how to set up this network, also how to nourish this network. And that also been a huge impact for my entrepreneurial life.

[00:02:28] Jay: Love that. And where did you grow up?

[00:02:31] Tatsiana: it was mix of countries. it'd been Poland, it'd been Belarus, it'd been, in the US as well, a little bit. So it was a mix, crazy mix, I would say.

[00:02:41] Jay: how is being, you know, not born in America, affected you as an entrepreneur? Do you think it's been harder or easier, or do you think it's a mix of both? Like, what do you think being a non U S citizen means doing business in America today?

[00:02:57] Tatsiana: I think there are no difficulties. It's more about your personality. And,I think last thing connected with the place where you grew up, it's more about your mindset and which thoughts are mindset and which habits you have. It's much more important.

what are some of all right, how about this? I'll just throw this in there. give me three of your best habits and one of your worst. Habits. Oh, I would say that the worst definitely it was,the way how you prefer to see everything is extremely positive way. Like even when you're, doing estimation, how long you will need to do something, you're estimating it like, Oh, we can do it easily. We can do it fastly. And, you can Easy to decide yes on a lot of things only after the time you're like, okay, I've been too optimistic about it.

Maybe it is more hard and then I can't stop. And this is a good habit of my, mindset. I can't stop. I have to finish it. I have to do it in the best way, which is possible. Usually just a little bit more effort and it is possible. So here's the like, you know, controversial thing. At first, this Positiveness about all stuff, which you can start.

It is a bad thing. But on the same time, since I'm okay with finishing everything, that's a good stuff. And another 2, 3, 2 bad and too good, right? tough one. maybe also good one definitely is, network and my ability to communicate with other people. And, I had a really. a lot of experience with communicating with extremely old people and young kids and,my age people.

So that allowed me to understand different prospects of viewing different things in life and bad habit, I would say. Maybe it is also, something from my family as well. That we've been all the time open for every people around us. But you not always have to be open for everybody. Sometimes you have to choose where you have to spend your own time.

And after the years I know how to do it, how to handle it. But this is also a big part of my parents culture. Like, you have to be open for everybody. You don't have to.

[00:05:26] Jay: You gotta learn to say No. I love that. That's a great one. That's a great one. So tell me about Orangesoft, how you got started and who was your first customer?

[00:05:35] Tatsiana: Oh, that's, somehow connected because, I've been a tech lover from my teenage. I've been trying and testing, every new social media, social network. I've been trying a lot of new devices. So, for me, it was like logically, create an environment with other tech guys, people from IT industry.

And right after like first iPhone come to the market, then first iPad come to the market. We understood that he's growing market. We have to develop apps for, app store for Google play. And we know. Who can do it. I had a developer surround me, and this is how we found like our first client being from Netherland.

And that was quite easy, I would say, because they, there are not a big field of competitors, competitors during this time. And we developed our first app for this client, I think during several months. And the client being satisfied, we've been satisfied and they're. user has been satisfied, which is even more important and, just to say.

Thank you. That was a way of our gratitude. We decided to take a name, Orangesoft, because in Netherlands, orange, it is a royal,color of the royal family. So

[00:06:55] Jay: is nowadays, funny to say, because we've been focused on the U. S. market for a long time, but now we're trying to find a little bit more clients in the Europe again.

[00:07:06] Tatsiana: And it's great that our name connected with the Europe.

[00:07:10] Jay: What is the difference that you find selling to United States prospects versus, just international?

[00:07:18] Tatsiana: I think in the U. S. everything easier, like, because you're quite clear about what we're going to do, about what you want to make in terms of the business. I would say that in general, environment, business environment in the U. S. is extremely business focused. At the same time, in Europe, we have a lot of thinking about the, environment, a lot of thinking how it is inclusive or not, and there are a lot of things which is a good for the humanity, but not always good for the business.

And while we've been doing a software products for us, it was easier all the time to work with the. Companies and businesses from the U. S. And especially now, while we are focused on the health care domain, we know that in the health care area, in the S people and founders of these startups and companies, they really know how to make money and on this time, how to help patients, how to help to Doctors and scientists and everybody in this field, but in the Europe, I would say that people are extremely focused on the value and a little bit less about money.

And sometimes that's more difficult. I don't know. Is it clear?

[00:08:37] Jay: No, that makes a lot of sense. Yes. I think to boil it down, I think at least what I heard and what I kind of agree with, I think is that, it's kind of business at all costs in America where it's like, no matter what we're going to do this and we're going to, and then you kind of think about the environmental and social ramifications later, and I definitely, you know, from some of my European friends feel like they're certainly more. Mindful of some of those things like earlier in the process, so that does make a lot of sense. Talk to me about your, you know, so you work in healthcare, making mobile apps, et cetera. Like what, what's your lead generation process look like? What does it look like for you today? If you're going to go out and find new customers, like, what are you doing?

Like, who are you talking to? Like, what, give me your strategy for like finding new customers for your custom software development shop, because. I've always associated custom software development shops lead generation is kind of like whack a mole, right? Where it's like you got to wait for a founder to like pop up and like you have to whack him before like 500 other people with mallets whack the same guy, right?

So how do you find the guy or the girl or the company that you know? Doesn't have anything public about the project they're starting. Like they want to build this thing. Like, how do you find those people if they're not in front and on social media and everywhere else, which is a lot of other lead generation techniques for a business like mine, we work with established companies.

I don't have to worry about finding somebody who doesn't exist yesterday. Now he does. So tell me, how do you deal with that kind of changing dynamic landscape of finding customers for custom software, remote shop?

[00:10:09] Tatsiana: Great question because market, you know, different while we've been, starting our company, we've been focused on mobile apps, but today we're mostly focused on custom software development for healthcare companies, and of course, nowadays, AI, a big part of it and the way how we. had our first client and even like first years of our clients been different.

and before it was network first of all, but nowadays we definitely have to be Inside the communities. We're visiting a lot of conferences. This is how we're getting like all news about Industry, this is how we're exchanging some insights about the tech part and now especially about AI in healthcare.

It is a big part and focus of our marketing team. Nowadays, it is a content. We truly believe that it would be much more efficient for the future to share our expertise now through the content and people will have a chance to find this content and our investments in this area now will affect on our results even in the future.

I truly believe that the way how we're trying to target our company nowadays is experts in this field, only in healthcare, nothing else. In the past, we did a lot of things, but it doesn't matter, especially when we have AI now and you have to be focused and you have to know how to use it. So.

Conferences, content marketing, and being expert. While other clients will have a chance to talk about you, they will have a chance to, make a reference to you. I think that's, the best strategy for every agency nowadays.

[00:12:09] Jay: I love that. And I agree.

[00:12:11] Tatsiana: Great.

[00:12:11] Jay: so, how, like, tell me, talk to me about the moment or the meeting where you guys decided to finally niche down on something and it was health care, right? Because so many agencies and businesses Are terrified to niche down because they feel like they're leaving money on the table with other verticals and industries, et cetera.

And I don't subscribe to that. I very much believe that, you know, you need to be selling, hot dogs out of like, you know, after a football game where everybody's hungry, then like trying to sell stuff at a cafeteria where there's a million other options. Right. So tell me about how did you focus?

Like it's a big question in your business. I mean, that's what your entire business is based on now.

[00:12:51] Tatsiana: Yeah. And you're right. We've been scared for many years. We had a chance to do this, niche focus many years ago, but we've been lingering with that for a long time. We've been trying to like how we can skip some of our clients, how we can like, you know, say no to one of our clients. But after you're.

Getting deeper and your products, which you're implementing, which you're developing, they're going. more difficult. They are more strict for some rules for compliance in different countries. You can easily understand that you can't cover everything. You just can't be expert in every domain.

[00:13:36] Jay: you have to focus on something and there are no way to grow inside your team, like several product and project managers in one direction, another part in different direction that would be.

[00:13:51] Tatsiana: possible, but extremely expensive and offer some period of time. We understood that our approach, how we develop our products for our clients, we are doing it with the deeply understanding, usually we're acting like in house team. And this is expensive. So we can't compete with the Indian agencies and we don't want to compete with the some outshore, agencies.

For that reason, you have to choose if you, going to this market with the value prop for a specific domain with the specific expertise. You can compete with the other group of, agencies with the other group of consultants and, you're more, you have more freedom, while you're doing your strategy for the future.

And, this is more safer. And if I were to describe for somebody else, where you have to start your agency today, I would say that try to find not only your niche, try to find your sub domain in this niche, try to find the neuro, the better, and this is how you can compete others, other agencies who've been on this market for a long time, only the expertise.

[00:15:14] Jay: that's really interesting. I never actually, I mean, I guess in, in like indirectly I have, but it's a very interesting point to tie it directly to competition because if you didn't have that competition, then you could be more broad and more general and whatever. But I guess it is really just driven by.

The available options of people out there, they have so many. And if you're working, you know, if you guys are the only company that makes, you know, healthcare software for bionic arms or something very specific, then like, why would not a company who's going to build a bionic arm would come talk to you because you're the one that has that very specific, you know, expertise, but, that's very cool.

I love that. and you talked a little bit about onshore offshore, and I'd love to touch on that for a second. So our agency, you know, all we do is QA and we have an offshore component and onshore component, we kind of hybrid and all that sort of stuff. How do you guys do it? Do you have all onshore?

[00:16:05] Tatsiana: Are you offshore? Are you a mix? Like, what is, how do you deliver the, how do you pick which resource pool to pull from? Like, what is your roster look like when it comes to engineers project managers? yeah, I'd say that our biggest part of our team right now based in Poland, in Warsaw. So that allows us to provide a great price and at the same time, even stronger quality sometimes. we know that we have a great background in math and in physics in every hat of our developer. So, and that's extremely important for us.

And, I think after 13 years on the market, we, now have a quite great HR brand and that allowing us to hire great talents quite quick and easy on the Polish market. So for that reason, it would be even. easier for us to continue growing on this market as a place where we're the biggest office of the development.

But on the same time, while we're talking about other expertise, of course, it could be people who based in the US.for example, sometimes you can, transfer a huge MRI from the US to Poland, just to create a great test and great development process. Some of course, for some of our products and projects, we have to set up a team, in the US. Usually, that allow us to provide a great price for our clients.

[00:17:35] Jay: What are some of the challenges that you've faced once people, you know, you have your sales call, you get into a little bit, they get to the part where they're asking about if you're onshore or offshore, which I'm assuming probably comes earlier in your conversations just because of the accent. what are the biggest challenge, like what are the biggest challenges?

And then what have you found to be successful to overcome those objections that people have about offshore resources?

[00:18:00] Tatsiana: I think it's about quality. You just, have to show your value and your expertise then sooner than better. And we are trying to do it from the first tab, a while they are going to our website. We are putting a lot of effort to show our expertise through our website. We have a great team of,marketing team and also developers who are providing, our articles to our blog posts.

Second step, we're going to share our expertise. It is our pre sale calls. We're not talking only about price and that's it. Usually we are trying to duck much deeper than others. We are trying to figure it out about any issues we are asking. Sometimes maybe too much of our questions we have to cover through this process, but this is the way how.

Clients usually can figure it out that we are thinking a lot about them. We are know a lot of details. We know where they can face with the risks. We know where they will go through difficult part and through legal part or through compliance part. So we are trying to close our expertise during this stage, but then usually we are starting with our clients through the discover phase and on.

every stage you have to provide next, next period of your, you know, next period of your communication. And while you're going to the discover phase, we all the time telling our clients, feel free to stop after the discover phase, feel free to go to the market, compare with other companies or try to compare with in house team, but really, to be honest, after the discovery phase, they don't want to leave, they prefer to stay because now they have already not only, our expertise, they have a trust, which is much more important because through the small process of the discovery, you can share not only expertise here.

You also have to share how you can be on time, how you can deliver value and how you can be all the time aligned with the goals of their business.

[00:20:17] Jay: Love that.

[00:20:18] Tatsiana: Is it a clear answer or should I? Clarify something.

[00:20:24] Jay: Yes. And I feel like, I mean, I, you know, as a fellow, agency owner, you know, with some offshore resources, I feel like we could talk for a very long time about this sort of thing. But, and I think I might have to have you back on. There's like a lot that we didn't get to talk about, but I have one more question before we let you go.

[00:20:39] Tatsiana: for sure.

[00:20:39] Jay: non business related, this is just Tatiana being Tatiana, if you could do anything on earth and you knew you wouldn't fail. What would it be?

[00:20:49] Tatsiana: Oh, I would be honest with you. I had a chance to listen to your,

[00:20:54] Jay: I'm, so the mystery question is not a mystery question.

[00:20:57] Tatsiana: Yeah, anymore not a mystery anymore.

[00:20:59] Jay: answer? Let me hear it.

[00:21:00] Tatsiana: so I, I had a chance to think about it. And, you know, first thought, which I had on my mind, this is my answer here. I would spend all my life to fight with the cancer and the way how we can, you know, provide medicine or maybe prevent it.

And there are no way to fight with the cancer, if you're not trying to prevent it. So I would definitely spend all my life on it.

[00:21:28] Jay: Oh, and you wouldn't fail. You wouldn't fail. That's the part of the question. So you've,

[00:21:31] Tatsiana: the point.

[00:21:32] Jay: care to answer you. That's I love that. All right. Well, Tata, you're a fantastic. You're very impressive. I love your background. I love the company. I love

[00:21:38] Tatsiana: thank you.

[00:21:39] Jay: So, you know, keep up the great work.

if people want to find out more about you or Orangesoft, how do they do that?

[00:21:45] Tatsiana: Oh, the best way would say our website. Orangesoft. co and second way it is my LinkedIn. I'm all the time trying to contact with the people. I have been scared lately how many connection requests, and I sometimes worry that I'm missing somebody. for that reason, I just said that the great way, while people are trying to reach me out, they're going to the comments and they're replying on some of the latest posts with the comments.

[00:22:13] Jay: I love that.

[00:22:14] Tatsiana: Just to, get the attention and that's by the way, great advice for everybody who's trying to touch some potential clients. try to maybe communicate with them through their content.

[00:22:26] Jay: That's a great idea. And I do the same thing and a hundred percent sometimes works. Link your LinkedIn, in the bio. I'm not going to make people try to spell, your name, go on LinkedIn, but we'll definitely link you there. And it was fantastic meeting you and spending some time with you.

[00:22:40] Tatsiana: Thank you, Jay.

[00:22:41] Jay: great rest of your week, a great holiday season, and we'll talk to you again soon.

All right.

[00:22:46] Tatsiana: Thank you. Have a great Christmas too. Yeah. See you. Bye bye. 

​