Meeting Title: Brainforge MarTech Service Line Planning Date: 2025-12-23 Meeting participants: Zoran Selinger, Uttam Kumaran, Robert Tseng
WEBVTT
1 00:02:37.710 ⇒ 00:02:38.770 Uttam Kumaran: Hey.
2 00:02:38.980 ⇒ 00:02:39.840 Zoran Selinger: Hi, Utam.
3 00:02:40.440 ⇒ 00:02:41.469 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, how are you?
4 00:02:41.760 ⇒ 00:02:46.349 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, yeah, good. Just, you know, getting ready for…
5 00:02:46.650 ⇒ 00:02:49.289 Zoran Selinger: Maybe we’ll have some guests over for…
6 00:02:49.290 ⇒ 00:02:50.130 Uttam Kumaran: Oh yeah, nice.
7 00:02:50.130 ⇒ 00:02:55.250 Zoran Selinger: I mean, it’s kind of flu season, so everyone’s Kinda sick.
8 00:02:55.520 ⇒ 00:03:02.900 Zoran Selinger: So still, they’re… they need to decide if… they need to decide if they’re gonna come over or not,
9 00:03:03.150 ⇒ 00:03:12.770 Zoran Selinger: spend some time with us, it’s because it’s kind of the… the flu season came 4 to 5 weeks earlier than usual here in Croatia.
10 00:03:13.320 ⇒ 00:03:20.269 Zoran Selinger: It’s very weird this year, just very early. So, yeah. Unfortunately, it’s now.
11 00:03:20.380 ⇒ 00:03:24.339 Zoran Selinger: We’re still hoping for White Christmas as well.
12 00:03:25.560 ⇒ 00:03:31.059 Zoran Selinger: That was a normal occurrence in my childhood, but it’s not anymore. We rarely…
13 00:03:31.060 ⇒ 00:03:31.450 Uttam Kumaran: Pretty wild.
14 00:03:31.450 ⇒ 00:03:37.900 Zoran Selinger: Now, yeah, it’s too warm. We barely have snow, any… every winter.
15 00:03:38.470 ⇒ 00:03:44.339 Zoran Selinger: And we used to have a white Christmas every year when I was a small child.
16 00:03:44.860 ⇒ 00:03:49.030 Zoran Selinger: So, hoping there might be a chance, maybe, maybe.
17 00:03:49.300 ⇒ 00:03:54.150 Zoran Selinger: It’s already colder outside today, so we’ll see. We’re hoping.
18 00:03:54.150 ⇒ 00:03:54.570 Uttam Kumaran: Nice.
19 00:03:54.850 ⇒ 00:03:55.490 Zoran Selinger: Yeah.
20 00:03:55.490 ⇒ 00:03:58.420 Uttam Kumaran: It’s warm here, it’s like, it’s like 75 degrees here.
21 00:03:58.650 ⇒ 00:03:59.270 Zoran Selinger: Yeah.
22 00:04:00.420 ⇒ 00:04:08.639 Uttam Kumaran: And there’s no… there’s no snow ever, and there’s no cold ever, I guess, here, so it’s… I’m sitting, like, I’m at a coffee shop, sitting outside, so…
23 00:04:08.640 ⇒ 00:04:09.520 Zoran Selinger: I don’t know.
24 00:04:10.030 ⇒ 00:04:16.359 Uttam Kumaran: Actually, I just, like… today’s kind of slow, so I was like, oh yeah, let me just go, like, try to take meetings, like, outside, so…
25 00:04:16.920 ⇒ 00:04:18.809 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, yeah, that’s… that’s good.
26 00:04:19.079 ⇒ 00:04:35.749 Zoran Selinger: That’s good. I sometimes… sometimes if I need to, I don’t know, if I’m driving my parents to another city for whatever, it doesn’t bother me. I sometimes like to do some work in a coffee shop. Usually, I’m always.
27 00:04:35.750 ⇒ 00:04:42.129 Uttam Kumaran: Dude, I love… I’m addicted to working at a coffee shop, dude, but it’s, like, it’s tough because I… now I’m, like, in…
28 00:04:42.170 ⇒ 00:04:45.869 Zoran Selinger: 6 hours of meetings or so, so… Yeah. I can’t, like…
29 00:04:45.890 ⇒ 00:04:53.600 Uttam Kumaran: sometimes I push it, and I’ll be like, I just want to sit outside, but I used to work every day in the coffee shop, because I was in an apartment.
30 00:04:53.800 ⇒ 00:04:57.300 Uttam Kumaran: And I would work 6-7 hours in the coffee shop.
31 00:04:57.980 ⇒ 00:05:05.900 Uttam Kumaran: pay one by one coffee, maybe two coffees. They should have charged me way more, but generated a lot of value working there.
32 00:05:05.900 ⇒ 00:05:08.309 Zoran Selinger: I mean, if it’s not crowded, it’s fine.
33 00:05:08.940 ⇒ 00:05:12.640 Uttam Kumaran: I know, I know. I just like the ambient, like, movement, you know?
34 00:05:12.840 ⇒ 00:05:19.999 Uttam Kumaran: I like seeing people walk around, and, like, I kind of just need to, like, have some light distraction all the time.
35 00:05:20.270 ⇒ 00:05:23.890 Uttam Kumaran: But… oh.
36 00:05:24.300 ⇒ 00:05:25.460 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, yeah.
37 00:05:27.170 ⇒ 00:05:45.099 Uttam Kumaran: Cool, so yeah, I guess I wanted to get us all together. We’ve been sort of chatting about, like, trying to, you know, bring you on for a larger scope. I think we do have, like, a couple… I mean, maybe I’ll… Robert, I can let you speak on the Eden situation, but on my side, I certainly have, you know, opportunity that I could use help with on ABC.
38 00:05:45.100 ⇒ 00:05:54.650 Uttam Kumaran: I’m just interested in hearing, Robert, about, like, I think Zoran has just, like, got a lot on his plate, so I’m kind of… I want to think a little bit about
39 00:05:55.140 ⇒ 00:06:09.640 Uttam Kumaran: what happens short-term, and then I can also talk a little bit about what the new operating model is, and I believe you spoke with Clarence, who probably gave you a little bit… you may have spoke with Clarence, gave you a little bit of context of where things are going, but I’m kind of more interested in just, like, what the next…
40 00:06:10.210 ⇒ 00:06:16.310 Uttam Kumaran: 30, 60 days are gonna look like, and if we can cement that, but… Yeah.
41 00:06:17.020 ⇒ 00:06:27.400 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, on the Eden side, Zoran already knows, but, like, yeah, I mean, they’ve already spoken with him, they want his hours increased, they’re expecting somewhere around 30 hours a week from him.
42 00:06:27.400 ⇒ 00:06:40.760 Robert Tseng: I mean, so far it’s been less than that, and I don’t know if it’ll actually get up to that point. But not… it’s not just about increasing hours, but there is, like, they want him to also be more, proactive in, like.
43 00:06:40.840 ⇒ 00:06:51.350 Robert Tseng: in kind of being more strategic as well, because right now, he’s kind of just been, kind of running… he solved a lot of the urgent problems, and then, I mean, it’s kind of the same…
44 00:06:52.300 ⇒ 00:07:15.109 Robert Tseng: thing that I feel like a lot of other folks on our team have run into, where they get onto Eden, then, like, they’re good at executing, like, the… the most immediate need, and then it’s kind of like, okay, well, what’s… what’s… what does the continued work look like? There’s obviously some maintenance on the stuff that he’s set up, and just continually adjusting to the business requirements, but then also, like.
45 00:07:15.110 ⇒ 00:07:39.069 Robert Tseng: yeah, they, you know, they really view him as, like, the MarTech specialist, and so, being opinionated about what tools to bring in and what tools not to use, like, how to push back on some of the vendors, like, you know, those types of things, and even, like, doing… I mean, we’ve expanded his scope as well to basically take over anything marketing-related, so he’s even working with
46 00:07:39.420 ⇒ 00:07:52.709 Robert Tseng: their, like, lifecycle personnel, and, like, trying to help them to use the data that we… that we have. So, yeah, I mean, as far as, like, stakeholders that he works with, there’s probably something like 5 people
47 00:07:52.710 ⇒ 00:08:00.360 Robert Tseng: So, it’s quite a bunch, like, there’s Judd… well, Ryan… Ryan Mitesh are your two guys that you’re talking to almost daily.
48 00:08:00.360 ⇒ 00:08:09.499 Robert Tseng: Yeah. Judd is probably maybe just, like, a once-a-week kind of thing, and then Stuart is kind of more ad hoc, but, like, yeah, maybe it’s just… maybe it’s those four, four guys that you’re… Yeah.
49 00:08:09.500 ⇒ 00:08:29.219 Robert Tseng: that, like, yeah, I mean, that they’re always, you know, talking with you, and, yeah, you’re really embedded into their team. So, yeah, I think, like, the benefit of, like, you staying on the Brainforge side is that we can help draw boundaries, and, like, you know, just get sucked into doing whatever they want.
50 00:08:29.530 ⇒ 00:08:40.640 Robert Tseng: But also, like, you know, you obviously have the support from the engineering team, like, you’ve relied a lot on Ashwini, you know, the past few weeks to kind of deploy your solutions.
51 00:08:40.929 ⇒ 00:08:42.150 Robert Tseng: And then
52 00:08:42.150 ⇒ 00:09:06.200 Robert Tseng: Yeah, like, I think it’s just, like, to have, like, the technical, like, safety net from our side to be able to kind of help you through so you’re not, like, kind of left on your own to go and be the only guy working with them. So, I think, that’s how we’ve, that’s how we’ve, like, adjusted already, like, we’ve, you know, that change went into place last week, so, I expect things to kind of pick up in the new year.
53 00:09:06.290 ⇒ 00:09:14.380 Robert Tseng: Right now, we’re kind of still just kind of planning for Q1, but, yeah, I think that’s kind of the situation right now.
54 00:09:15.780 ⇒ 00:09:29.569 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I think on, I mean, for me, I’m interested, Zora, on how you feel. Like, I think we at least have one other client, ABC, but again, like, I feel like there’s… we could probably get scope at both CTA and maybe Element for MarTech stuff.
55 00:09:29.570 ⇒ 00:09:30.320 Zoran Selinger: Like,
56 00:09:30.320 ⇒ 00:09:31.730 Uttam Kumaran: A lot of attribution work.
57 00:09:31.900 ⇒ 00:09:38.110 Zoran Selinger: Yeah. But I guess I’m used to working on multiple clients. I’ve been in agencies my whole career.
58 00:09:38.110 ⇒ 00:09:40.970 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, but I guess what I’m more I’m asking is, like.
59 00:09:41.270 ⇒ 00:09:49.699 Uttam Kumaran: Is it… should we just, like, have… should we just put someone underneath you, and then starting to scale this, like, on a service line a bit more, versus…
60 00:09:50.500 ⇒ 00:10:01.529 Uttam Kumaran: look, you only have… you only have, like, what you have in terms of hours, right? So if we… if I end up with, like, hey, there’s 5 clients worth of work, what do we do here, you know? So, like, I kind of want to hear from you, it’s like, okay…
61 00:10:01.940 ⇒ 00:10:16.949 Uttam Kumaran: if we end up with, like, 5 clients, is this like, okay, Zora, I need you to think about how we can form a team around you? And similarly, how we’re now forming teams in data engineering, analytics engineering, product analytics, right? Do we feel like the three of us, or we feel comfortable, like, okay.
62 00:10:17.660 ⇒ 00:10:22.500 Uttam Kumaran: again, I’m just sort of using MarTech as a generic term here, but do we feel like there’s…
63 00:10:22.790 ⇒ 00:10:34.099 Uttam Kumaran: that’s the path we want to go, and… and okay, cool, Zoran leads that, but then now you… we can sort of put one or two people underneath you, and you’re interested in sort of owning
64 00:10:34.220 ⇒ 00:10:38.629 Uttam Kumaran: like, that service line? Or are you like, hey, actually, I just want to, like.
65 00:10:39.130 ⇒ 00:10:51.910 Uttam Kumaran: beyond a couple clients, because then in that case, I’m gonna have… we’re gonna probably bring someone else on to… to do that… go on to those clients to take on that scope, you know? Because that’s just, I think, something that we’re… we’re able to offer now, so…
66 00:10:52.010 ⇒ 00:10:54.419 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t know, like, that’s kind of, like, what I’m thinking about.
67 00:10:54.950 ⇒ 00:11:03.260 Zoran Selinger: Well, honestly, owning, implementing technical solutions, Sounds perfect to me.
68 00:11:03.440 ⇒ 00:11:09.359 Zoran Selinger: I… I’ve done, so now here, I’ve done, you know.
69 00:11:09.700 ⇒ 00:11:19.339 Zoran Selinger: getting into the strategic side, and I’m kind of afraid that I might not be working on stuff that is, let’s say, technical enough.
70 00:11:19.450 ⇒ 00:11:24.010 Zoran Selinger: Maybe, because I don’t want to go away from… from technical stuff.
71 00:11:24.240 ⇒ 00:11:41.260 Zoran Selinger: So I would like to be there, still. Not sure exactly what the scope of that is. For example, you know what confused me, recently? Not maybe a month ago. It confused me that someone else was setting up,
72 00:11:41.510 ⇒ 00:11:45.120 Zoran Selinger: Screen recordings. Mixed-bound screen recordings.
73 00:11:45.540 ⇒ 00:11:52.280 Zoran Selinger: Because I would… I would put that into… into my… category, into my work.
74 00:11:52.280 ⇒ 00:11:53.190 Uttam Kumaran: on, on Eden?
75 00:11:53.190 ⇒ 00:11:57.820 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, yeah. So… kind of, we need to… I need to understand…
76 00:11:57.820 ⇒ 00:12:07.140 Uttam Kumaran: See, but see, I’m also… I also wouldn’t… I’m also not clear that that’s… that’s something that you would own, right? So that’s why, like, totally, I think, between… but see, that’s also the thing where…
77 00:12:07.270 ⇒ 00:12:12.170 Uttam Kumaran: my larger point is that you can do a lot of things, so one is totally, I want to, like.
78 00:12:12.600 ⇒ 00:12:24.080 Uttam Kumaran: more well-defined this, like, service line of, like, what is in this, what isn’t, and maybe this is actually 3 things, and we’re sort of bucketing all of them too closely. And for me, I’m like, my preference is that
79 00:12:24.250 ⇒ 00:12:41.870 Uttam Kumaran: Zoran wants to lead this, and then I can just go hire, like, two junior people underneath you, and you’re… you… like, Eden still probably needs to feel like they have this support, but you can accomplish the execution through other people’s time, right? And this is, like, what
80 00:12:42.310 ⇒ 00:12:45.789 Uttam Kumaran: I’m not at all saying that it needs to be…
81 00:12:45.790 ⇒ 00:12:48.650 Zoran Selinger: Me, who’s actually doing the… the…
82 00:12:48.650 ⇒ 00:13:00.259 Uttam Kumaran: No, I’m saying I would prefer… that’s, like, if I had a vote here, I would vote for that, because you’re a great person, I think you could be a great leader for the service line, and I would rather you do that
83 00:13:00.360 ⇒ 00:13:09.719 Uttam Kumaran: and then own, own the 5 clients in which we’re doing the service. Similarly, if you think about… think about, like, who is a good barometer for this is, like, a WASH, right? A WASH is now…
84 00:13:09.850 ⇒ 00:13:22.580 Uttam Kumaran: overseeing, like, probably 4 or 5 clients where we’re doing the data engineering service, but he’s only probably directly working on 2, right? But he’s still, like, is overseeing, and so what we’re gonna drive towards is, like.
85 00:13:22.720 ⇒ 00:13:28.990 Uttam Kumaran: these, like, service leaders who are gonna own, you know, like, a service at Brainforge, and I kind of see you
86 00:13:29.130 ⇒ 00:13:40.019 Uttam Kumaran: more that, where you’ll still be able to innovate and, like, what technical solution we’re deploying across a bunch of companies, but again, like, the execution may be handled by you or a few people.
87 00:13:40.220 ⇒ 00:13:41.149 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
88 00:13:41.790 ⇒ 00:13:49.019 Zoran Selinger: I mean, I like that. I think that does fit me. I’m not sure, so, how, like…
89 00:13:49.600 ⇒ 00:13:53.569 Zoran Selinger: Even now, they see me as that at the moment, but.
90 00:13:53.570 ⇒ 00:13:54.080 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
91 00:13:54.080 ⇒ 00:14:01.460 Zoran Selinger: Robert, you’ve been pushing for a little bit more, maybe, strategic role. I don’t know if you see that as a part of
92 00:14:01.460 ⇒ 00:14:14.149 Zoran Selinger: strategic role, or this is, like, an engineer side. So I’m not sure where that fits in your view. If I’m taking over this technical implementation of marketing tools.
93 00:14:14.810 ⇒ 00:14:15.849 Zoran Selinger: Is that…
94 00:14:16.890 ⇒ 00:14:23.430 Zoran Selinger: That’s not under strategy, then. So where… what would I… we would need to shift some, I guess.
95 00:14:23.660 ⇒ 00:14:32.039 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, right now, like, I’m kind of still involved on the strategy side, so kind of like…
96 00:14:32.990 ⇒ 00:14:42.699 Robert Tseng: I mean, but I think you already impact strategy, like, you helped evaluate the tools, right? And, like, kind of deciding, like, what… what solution to implement.
97 00:14:42.700 ⇒ 00:14:48.370 Uttam Kumaran: That’s, like, MarTech strategy versus, like, the true, like, the data, like, KPI strategy, right?
98 00:14:48.950 ⇒ 00:14:51.490 Zoran Selinger: That… yeah, that’s… that… sure, that’s clear.
99 00:14:51.490 ⇒ 00:14:54.410 Uttam Kumaran: Because Eden is big, right? We’re doing, like, we’re doing strategy on, like.
100 00:14:54.710 ⇒ 00:15:03.230 Uttam Kumaran: 3 or 4 different divisions there, so I think more of the MarTech strategy is, like, what tools are we choosing, the roadmap, what KPIs matter.
101 00:15:05.090 ⇒ 00:15:28.929 Robert Tseng: Yeah, and, like, you have a good enough relationship with Mitesh that, you know, he shared his… you know, you were the first person he shared that roadmap with, right? I think he does trust you as, like, a true thought partner for him, and, I mean, I’m there to kind of back you up in case, like, you run into situations where he’s asking, you know, broader questions that are maybe beyond the scope that you’re used to, but I already kind of see you as, like, you… Martech strategy, like.
102 00:15:28.930 ⇒ 00:15:35.240 Robert Tseng: Any, you know, as they’re setting their goals, like, we get to have an input on, like, whether or not
103 00:15:35.270 ⇒ 00:15:49.189 Robert Tseng: you know, on what we were going to take on, what we’re going to push back and kind of help them with, so that, to me, is the strategic piece. Like, I don’t think it’ll be just, like… you’re not gonna… yeah, you’ll still be mostly technical implementation, I guess, but…
104 00:15:49.610 ⇒ 00:16:08.800 Robert Tseng: I think they do want you to have a seat at that table to kind of discuss, like, what the future of, like, the, you know, of MarTech is for them as they continue to evolve. So, that’s all I mean by strategy. Like, I don’t expect you to kind of take over, you know, other, other, other, other parts of the data strategy there.
105 00:16:09.350 ⇒ 00:16:13.330 Uttam Kumaran: But I think my point is that I see that as a sign that
106 00:16:13.690 ⇒ 00:16:30.949 Uttam Kumaran: a client, like, you’re… you’re really crushing this, and I’m like, okay, I need the magic on 5 clients. I don’t want… I don’t want Zoron just dedicated to Eden, you know? Like, I would rather you say, cool, I’m gonna… we’re gonna… maybe short-term it is the 30 hours there, but then I’m gonna go find you two people.
107 00:16:30.950 ⇒ 00:16:39.179 Uttam Kumaran: Who can then… you can scale your time to more like 5 hours, 10 hours, have those 2 people fill that remaining time, and then now we can start deploying the service
108 00:16:39.620 ⇒ 00:16:42.910 Uttam Kumaran: for other clients, right? You can come help us sell there. Like, that’s my…
109 00:16:43.130 ⇒ 00:16:46.079 Uttam Kumaran: That’s what I like, what I like, what I would want.
110 00:16:46.310 ⇒ 00:16:53.950 Uttam Kumaran: Sorry, I just want to say, like, how I’m feeling, like, really, really, like, distinctly, but that’s what I think I want to drive towards.
111 00:16:55.030 ⇒ 00:17:00.610 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, I mean… Yes, I like, I like that.
112 00:17:00.790 ⇒ 00:17:09.210 Zoran Selinger: And obviously, I would like… yes, I would like to implement and work on stacks for more… more clients.
113 00:17:09.619 ⇒ 00:17:23.039 Zoran Selinger: I like the cadence of how… how we progress, how… kind of how fast the tickets are going, and how fast we, assembled this for Eden. It feels good, and I want to do more of that.
114 00:17:23.359 ⇒ 00:17:27.610 Zoran Selinger: I think that is really good. I’m enjoying it a lot.
115 00:17:28.569 ⇒ 00:17:29.299 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.
116 00:17:29.300 ⇒ 00:17:29.840 Zoran Selinger: Yeah.
117 00:17:30.900 ⇒ 00:17:32.060 Uttam Kumaran: So what do you think, Robert?
118 00:17:34.640 ⇒ 00:17:51.300 Robert Tseng: Yeah, I mean, I think he has room to take on another client. We should just scale to ABC, and then kind of see how that goes. I don’t actually think Eden’s, like, a consistent 30 hours, or if it is, like, there are some things that, like, they ask of him that we don’t end up assigning to Soran. Like, it ends up just being kind of stuff that, like, maybe I’ll.
119 00:17:51.300 ⇒ 00:17:51.750 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
120 00:17:51.750 ⇒ 00:17:54.520 Robert Tseng: think about, or we pass, pass off… Yeah, yeah, yeah.
121 00:17:54.520 ⇒ 00:18:19.260 Robert Tseng: even without having, like, a technical junior person under him right now, like, we’re already kind of just, like, picking stuff off his plate. So, yeah, I think, like, he definitely has room to take on another one, at least. And I think it would be a good model, like, to kind of roll that on ABC, because, yeah, with Eden, he kind of jumped in, and he was, like, kind of the main guy to do it, but this time, as he’s doing it with ABC, let’s do it a little bit more, like.
122 00:18:19.260 ⇒ 00:18:24.480 Robert Tseng: with the documentation, you know, kind of what I was, like, saying last time, how,
123 00:18:24.740 ⇒ 00:18:48.999 Robert Tseng: yeah, like, I… turning, like, kind of building a strategy audit kind of offering around, kind of, his scope, right? Like, I think I made the pitch to Insomnia, they didn’t buy it on that then, like, I know what the pitch should look like, we could reuse that, template, and I basically gave that to Element, I gave that to Honey Stinger. Like, it seems like that pitch is good, like, people are receptive to it, but then, like, yeah, once we actually
124 00:18:49.000 ⇒ 00:19:13.309 Robert Tseng: you know, start, like, what is that actual… how do we build, like, a sprint around this, and that’s, like, become something that’s repeatable, and we can implement it across multiple clients? Like, I don’t think, like, the audits take that long, so he could definitely, kind of help build out that part of the offering. But to get to, like, Eden-level maturity, MarTech, you know, situations, like, I don’t know, maybe we’ll probably run into…
125 00:19:13.310 ⇒ 00:19:18.889 Robert Tseng: We’ll probably run into a limit there, but, like, you know, it’ll take some time to ramp up to that point.
126 00:19:19.620 ⇒ 00:19:29.830 Uttam Kumaran: But they also even… even… so I think that’s one decision made, so I think, Zora and I… I think at least, well, at least 40 hours in scope for you, so I’ll just confirm in contract that that’s clear, but…
127 00:19:29.830 ⇒ 00:19:30.160 Robert Tseng: Yeah.
128 00:19:30.160 ⇒ 00:19:43.809 Uttam Kumaran: you should be free to… you should be free to do that. The second point I want to make here is, let’s work together, Zoran, and maybe because I’m sort of been on the outside of Eden, we can work together to look at, like, what are the plates of capabilities that… that we have on the MarTech side.
129 00:19:43.810 ⇒ 00:19:44.480 Zoran Selinger: Okay.
130 00:19:44.480 ⇒ 00:19:51.850 Uttam Kumaran: And if you show me that, I can easily map it to active clients, and then me, you, and Clarence will work on
131 00:19:52.000 ⇒ 00:19:58.070 Uttam Kumaran: Thinking about, like, okay, what is the scope of, like, being the, sort of, service leader for that scope?
132 00:19:59.410 ⇒ 00:20:06.399 Uttam Kumaran: And let’s go from there. So, that’s, like, something, if we can work on that in the next two weeks, like, while kind of things are probably a little slow.
133 00:20:06.480 ⇒ 00:20:11.609 Uttam Kumaran: like, I can start to think about, okay, is the scope of what you’re able to do
134 00:20:11.670 ⇒ 00:20:26.759 Uttam Kumaran: fit in, like, 3 different buckets, or this all one, and then also it will help me think about who else on the team immediately has the capabilities of doing that, which means, okay, if you need to now be on 5 clients, you’ll have to find, how can I get you 10 to 20 hours of resources?
135 00:20:26.850 ⇒ 00:20:37.100 Uttam Kumaran: And then we can start thinking about, okay, like, do we need to go get more people, or… or, like, what is… what is the thinking there? So, I think that’s a good… that would be a great sequencing here.
136 00:20:37.540 ⇒ 00:20:38.759 Uttam Kumaran: If you’re okay with that.
137 00:20:39.600 ⇒ 00:20:40.920 Zoran Selinger: Yes, yeah.
138 00:20:41.190 ⇒ 00:20:43.779 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, let’s, let’s see,
139 00:20:44.460 ⇒ 00:20:52.190 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, let me think about, like, let’s see what we’re doing, what we implemented, kind of what’s our…
140 00:20:52.580 ⇒ 00:21:09.630 Zoran Selinger: also maybe preferred stack, and I don’t know, I don’t know, we, we’re not going to always be able to influence clients to implement our stack, but there’s always, there’s always,
141 00:21:09.630 ⇒ 00:21:23.029 Zoran Selinger: bits and pieces that we can jump into, fit into, and work around their tools that they already use. So, yeah, let me think about that, and I think it’s, yeah, it’s going to be clearer than
142 00:21:23.350 ⇒ 00:21:27.969 Zoran Selinger: about… How much more resources we need.
143 00:21:28.220 ⇒ 00:21:36.569 Zoran Selinger: Yeah. And ABC is going to be a good, good, case study, as well. And then we’re gonna have, basically, two.
144 00:21:37.220 ⇒ 00:21:44.830 Zoran Selinger: I don’t know exactly what you’re doing for… with other clients, if we can draw from that a little bit as well, but in…
145 00:21:44.830 ⇒ 00:22:01.539 Uttam Kumaran: For us, the biggest thing is, like, yeah, it’s like, we just need, like, this… what is the scope of the offers, and then we can formalize the offers, and then we’ll pitch it with you. And this is another thing I’ll talk to Clarence about, like, you’ll get paid on those, too, like, if you help us sell those. And so, like, that’s what I want to also enable.
146 00:22:01.540 ⇒ 00:22:19.110 Uttam Kumaran: is pushing more people on the delivery side to think about, okay, like, how do we expand existing client relationships? How do we take the magic that we’ve done, even package it in a way to sell it to existing clients? Additionally, there may be clients we go after where this is now all we do, right? And so this completely opened up another sector of the market where.
147 00:22:19.110 ⇒ 00:22:19.580 Zoran Selinger: graph.
148 00:22:19.580 ⇒ 00:22:24.140 Uttam Kumaran: again, typically we pitch our classic data and AI stuff, like, maybe we should lead with these, and so…
149 00:22:24.260 ⇒ 00:22:41.169 Uttam Kumaran: throughout the whole way, like, I want to show you how we went from just, like, waking up and doing everything for clients to starting to formalize it, sell it as a service, and now it’s grown, right? So we did that in data, we’re doing that in AI, we’re gonna do that in product analytics, we’re gonna do that in MarTech, right? And so.
150 00:22:41.350 ⇒ 00:22:58.070 Uttam Kumaran: basically, we’re trying to create the framework to start doing these across services, and appoint people that lead the service, you know? And what we’re gonna provide, what Braveport provides, is all of the structure and framework, like, on recruiting, on sales, on internal ops, on, like.
151 00:22:58.270 ⇒ 00:23:16.760 Uttam Kumaran: like, you know, everything from legal, and then, of course, like, what we’re hoping is that people who are the most opinionated and the most technically, talented are running that delivery organization, you know, for MarTech, and clients may just purchase your thing, they may also purchase 5 other services from Brainforge. Ultimately, the client
152 00:23:16.760 ⇒ 00:23:30.359 Uttam Kumaran: doesn’t see that as… they’re not, like, purchasing from 5 different people, they’re just purchasing a slew of services from us, right? But internally, the way we execute will be a little bit different. And so that’s what you’re gonna hear more from Clarence about, is, like, how we’re…
153 00:23:30.440 ⇒ 00:23:49.140 Uttam Kumaran: thinking about that, but again, what you… what you as an individual have guaranteed from Brainforge is all of that structure. You know, and how we take this from just a one thing we did from Eden to, like, two clients, and then five, to then rebuild a team around this service line. So even on things of pricing, how we do the offer, what are the deliverables, everything like that.
154 00:23:49.140 ⇒ 00:23:53.689 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, I was just about to ask about the deliverable. I don’t know, this is…
155 00:23:53.890 ⇒ 00:24:04.370 Zoran Selinger: just my impression right now, what kind of deliverable would be of this work. It is a… it is the beginning of the process.
156 00:24:04.400 ⇒ 00:24:15.669 Zoran Selinger: So I feel like the deliverable is the most… the most accurate, perfect raw data tables in all of these areas, like product analytics, web analytics. Yes.
157 00:24:16.090 ⇒ 00:24:18.810 Zoran Selinger: That’s the deliverable. We are getting
158 00:24:19.220 ⇒ 00:24:26.670 Zoran Selinger: Raw data that is perfectly accurate, or obviously close to perfect, and is joinable to all
159 00:24:26.840 ⇒ 00:24:28.659 Zoran Selinger: Every, every other thing.
160 00:24:29.000 ⇒ 00:24:34.419 Zoran Selinger: That’s in this system, all the other raw data tables. And then modeling can do wonders.
161 00:24:34.990 ⇒ 00:24:38.740 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s exactly what I’m saying, is that if you’re like, cool, we can’t… for example.
162 00:24:38.860 ⇒ 00:24:54.489 Uttam Kumaran: we used to sell product analytics very isolated, like, let’s just come in, we’ll just work with amplitude. Now we’re deciding that, ultimately, we won’t sell product analytics unless we’re already doing broader data work. Because the product analytics is too narrow, and that without broader scope.
163 00:24:54.690 ⇒ 00:25:14.110 Uttam Kumaran: the value is in there, but if we’re already in there doing modeling and data engineering, and then we layer on product analytics, it’s like a great add-on service, right? And so these are how we’re thinking about, like, okay, is this completely standalone, or does this have to always be paired with something else? And, like, what is the sequencing? So now that we have a slew of things we offer.
164 00:25:14.120 ⇒ 00:25:28.390 Uttam Kumaran: our objective is to go into a client and be like, we do, like, these 10, 15 things very well, pick what you want from the menu, right? Versus, we come and just do one, and then we do another one for one client, and then we have these, like, small offerings.
165 00:25:28.390 ⇒ 00:25:45.939 Uttam Kumaran: our goal is to go into client and do a lot for them, and have, like, ideally, like, fewer clients that we’re doing more for, right? And so that’s how we’re driving. So the more services that we have opportunities for, one thing you’ll find, and one thing we’re seeing, is that because clients like our work in one area, they immediately come and say, what else can you guys do?
166 00:25:46.240 ⇒ 00:25:46.900 Zoran Selinger: Yeah.
167 00:25:46.900 ⇒ 00:25:51.020 Uttam Kumaran: At that moment, I need to say, thank you for asking, here’s a menu.
168 00:25:51.390 ⇒ 00:26:04.119 Uttam Kumaran: I would love to introduce you to Zora and Awage, anybody, right? And I’m telling you, CTA has asked us about that, Default has asked us about that, ABC asked us about that, I’m sure Element will. All these people are gonna come.
169 00:26:04.120 ⇒ 00:26:12.280 Uttam Kumaran: be like, we love your work, what else can you do? Or we’re gonna go to the MBC, we love working with you, here’s a list of other things we can do, what do you think? Do you need any of this?
170 00:26:12.910 ⇒ 00:26:15.610 Uttam Kumaran: So, that’s… that’s how this is gonna work.
171 00:26:15.970 ⇒ 00:26:28.720 Uttam Kumaran: We’re no longer gonna… we’re trying our best not to take clients where there isn’t a long-term expansion mindset. As you can tell, we don’t do, like, quick project-based stuff. It’s all long-term relationships, you know?
172 00:26:30.290 ⇒ 00:26:34.449 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, I mean, that’s… that’s the most enjoyable thing we.
173 00:26:34.450 ⇒ 00:26:40.040 Uttam Kumaran: No, I know, and yeah, and also, it’s like, who doesn’t want that when it’s hard. It’s very, very hard.
174 00:26:40.040 ⇒ 00:26:41.129 Zoran Selinger: I believe you, I believe you.
175 00:26:41.130 ⇒ 00:26:58.939 Uttam Kumaran: It’s like, yeah, it’s just very hard. But, like, again, once we’re in, our job is to expand, and our job is to consistently outperform other consultancies. Like, so there’s… we’re gonna go into places where they have some people doing something over here, some people doing something here, and we’re like, yo, we can do all of those things.
176 00:26:59.150 ⇒ 00:26:59.980 Uttam Kumaran: You know?
177 00:27:00.330 ⇒ 00:27:06.659 Uttam Kumaran: better than those people on the same paper, you know, with our team and the way we do. It’s gonna be a no-brainer.
178 00:27:07.320 ⇒ 00:27:08.190 Zoran Selinger: Okay.
179 00:27:08.430 ⇒ 00:27:09.930 Zoran Selinger: Okay, I think…
180 00:27:10.180 ⇒ 00:27:27.769 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, it’s… it’s… it’s clear to me. If that’s kind of the direction that the deliverable would be in, I understand. I also understand that there might be our kind of preferred sequence of things, but you say,
181 00:27:28.040 ⇒ 00:27:32.139 Zoran Selinger: It’s also that plugging in to an existing stack.
182 00:27:32.140 ⇒ 00:27:35.930 Uttam Kumaran: It’s just, it’s gonna depend on what I see out of the scope, right? Yeah.
183 00:27:36.290 ⇒ 00:27:46.460 Uttam Kumaran: And then how are we gonna do the sales story? Like, is this something we can only do once we’re in on the modeling side? Or is this the way to get into the company and then we layer on the other stuff?
184 00:27:46.570 ⇒ 00:27:50.020 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll work with you. Maybe, like, we can… me and you can… I’m gonna have…
185 00:27:50.160 ⇒ 00:28:00.570 Uttam Kumaran: I just… I’m lucky to have more time this week and next week, so even if you want to spend an hour next week, we can do… I would love to spend an hour just going through this, and then talking about this service line.
186 00:28:00.570 ⇒ 00:28:02.399 Zoran Selinger: what’s the most reality? Oh…
187 00:28:04.370 ⇒ 00:28:07.150 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know if you’re on next week, so if you’re not, no worries.
188 00:28:09.430 ⇒ 00:28:15.260 Zoran Selinger: So I, I have a meeting with, with Robert, on the 1st.
189 00:28:16.050 ⇒ 00:28:19.409 Zoran Selinger: Let’s… yeah, let’s put another thing…
190 00:28:19.710 ⇒ 00:28:23.389 Zoran Selinger: Let’s put something on Friday, on the 2nd. Let’s talk.
191 00:28:23.390 ⇒ 00:28:24.150 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, great.
192 00:28:24.450 ⇒ 00:28:25.839 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, yeah, yeah, let’s do it.
193 00:28:28.220 ⇒ 00:28:39.160 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, let’s do that on the second. Okay, cool. I’ll definitely have something by then. I’m gonna use this nice whiteboard behind me to…
194 00:28:39.160 ⇒ 00:28:40.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, exactly, just brain dumping.
195 00:28:40.510 ⇒ 00:28:41.050 Zoran Selinger: Something.
196 00:28:41.050 ⇒ 00:28:54.950 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and think of… and don’t think about just the things you’re capable of now, even if you’re like, okay, logically we can… maybe, like, we haven’t done this before, but we can get into there, like, write everything, and we’ll sort of shape what the service looks like.
197 00:28:55.200 ⇒ 00:29:12.210 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, I’m going to go through all the clients that we have at the moment, and kind of try to see the conversation and tools that are mentioned, and so I’m going to fill in the blanks if I’m not doing anything right now, if I’m not aware of
198 00:29:12.320 ⇒ 00:29:16.859 Zoran Selinger: of the area we do, I’m gonna try to fill that in as well.
199 00:29:17.220 ⇒ 00:29:18.060 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, okay.
200 00:29:19.250 ⇒ 00:29:40.279 Robert Tseng: Yeah, and we’ve already put together a lot of this content, Zoran. We’ve put together the… we’ve put together multiple proposals on your work, you’ve done… you’ve come to service, kind of, my services meetings that I was hosting… I host every other week, so… and, you know, you’ve participated in the Figma exercises, so, a lot of the story, kind of.
201 00:29:40.350 ⇒ 00:29:42.789 Robert Tseng: foundations we’ve already kind of put together.
202 00:29:43.310 ⇒ 00:29:48.980 Robert Tseng: I think it’s just about synthesizing it and getting it in front of Utam, because he hasn’t participated in any of those things.
203 00:29:48.980 ⇒ 00:29:49.889 Zoran Selinger: Okay, okay.
204 00:29:51.520 ⇒ 00:29:52.140 Zoran Selinger: Okay.
205 00:29:53.300 ⇒ 00:29:55.900 Zoran Selinger: Very interesting. Very interesting, I love it.
206 00:29:58.150 ⇒ 00:30:04.379 Uttam Kumaran: Dude, I’m pumped. This is great. You’ve crushed it so far. I’m very, very happy I reached out way back when.
207 00:30:04.650 ⇒ 00:30:11.320 Zoran Selinger: I’m also very happy you reached out. This is… I’m glad you’re happy. I have thought that, the…
208 00:30:12.000 ⇒ 00:30:19.750 Zoran Selinger: I was expecting, you know, to find a… to find something where I would implement GTM all day.
209 00:30:20.420 ⇒ 00:30:21.040 Uttam Kumaran: No, what a dream.
210 00:30:21.680 ⇒ 00:30:22.220 Zoran Selinger: But.
211 00:30:22.220 ⇒ 00:30:23.750 Uttam Kumaran: You’re living my dream, dude.
212 00:30:23.750 ⇒ 00:30:24.290 Zoran Selinger: I’m not.
213 00:30:24.290 ⇒ 00:30:26.510 Uttam Kumaran: I’m doing any… I’m doing, like, sales.
214 00:30:26.510 ⇒ 00:30:28.410 Zoran Selinger: I was… honestly…
215 00:30:28.410 ⇒ 00:30:29.340 Uttam Kumaran: DMs, awesome.
216 00:30:29.340 ⇒ 00:30:33.999 Zoran Selinger: Honestly, I was coasting for too long on that kind of work.
217 00:30:34.700 ⇒ 00:30:36.180 Zoran Selinger: Kind of easy engineering.
218 00:30:36.520 ⇒ 00:30:37.270 Zoran Selinger: So, I think…
219 00:30:37.270 ⇒ 00:30:47.209 Uttam Kumaran: I think we’re gonna get you a lot of… I think we’re gonna give you a lot of great scope, and I think this is a great place to make a lot of money, and I think we’re gonna grow. You see how fast we’re growing, you know, so…
220 00:30:47.800 ⇒ 00:30:56.839 Uttam Kumaran: we’re… our biggest limiting factor is ourselves right now, not the… not the market or the economy or anything, so… I told… we’re… yeah.
221 00:30:57.120 ⇒ 00:31:04.649 Zoran Selinger: I told you in our first conversation that I’ve been in a few agencies where they just started.
222 00:31:04.750 ⇒ 00:31:21.449 Zoran Selinger: Where we grew to 100-plus people, and I love that so much. And I feel like this is another one of those stories where I might, in a couple of years, I’d be one of those people that joined, kind of, quite early, and then we grew.
223 00:31:21.970 ⇒ 00:31:22.860 Zoran Selinger: Very much.
224 00:31:22.860 ⇒ 00:31:26.459 Uttam Kumaran: It’s funny you say early. I’ve been waking up every day for 3 years.
225 00:31:26.460 ⇒ 00:31:27.930 Zoran Selinger: Yay!
226 00:31:27.930 ⇒ 00:31:28.960 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.
227 00:31:28.960 ⇒ 00:31:29.550 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, if I’m.
228 00:31:29.550 ⇒ 00:31:30.470 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, no, no, no.
229 00:31:30.470 ⇒ 00:31:35.689 Zoran Selinger: I don’t know, 20th, and we grow to 100 plus, then I’m one of the first ones.
230 00:31:35.690 ⇒ 00:31:37.360 Uttam Kumaran: No, but I don’t want you to just…
231 00:31:37.360 ⇒ 00:31:38.899 Zoran Selinger: Very enjoyable, as well.
232 00:31:38.900 ⇒ 00:31:44.700 Uttam Kumaran: But for folks like you, for folks like Awake, for other people, like, I want you guys to lead, I want you guys to have a big chunk of it.
233 00:31:44.800 ⇒ 00:32:02.910 Uttam Kumaran: You know, you… I don’t want… like, we can’t… we can’t get this company to the fifth level ourselves. So, it’s like, it’s required. Either you guys are gonna do it, or we’re gonna go… we’re gonna buy people, you know? So I always tell Robert and the team, like, I want to set the stage and give the opportunity to people that are here first.
234 00:32:03.280 ⇒ 00:32:08.460 Uttam Kumaran: But we don’t lower the bar for those… for the folks internally, meaning, like, we still set the bar.
235 00:32:08.600 ⇒ 00:32:10.520 Uttam Kumaran: But I want to give you first dibs.
236 00:32:10.730 ⇒ 00:32:24.089 Uttam Kumaran: And some people will raise their hand, some people won’t. For the open slots, we’ll go to the market and find people, but it’s much more important for me that, like, if we can find the people internally that want to pick up and run with the baton, then…
237 00:32:24.210 ⇒ 00:32:26.759 Uttam Kumaran: then we give that opportunity for Terminus, so…
238 00:32:27.240 ⇒ 00:32:28.020 Zoran Selinger: Yeah, okay.
239 00:32:28.020 ⇒ 00:32:28.530 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
240 00:32:28.710 ⇒ 00:32:35.329 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, I’ll follow up on… on Slack then, and then, yeah, if we don’t talk, have a good Christmas, and yeah, let’s catch up next Friday.
241 00:32:35.590 ⇒ 00:32:37.290 Zoran Selinger: Thank you, thank you. Okay, we’ll talk…
242 00:32:37.290 ⇒ 00:32:37.930 Robert Tseng: Alright, see you guys.
243 00:32:38.680 ⇒ 00:32:39.800 Uttam Kumaran: Thank you, guys. Bye.