David Fallarme

Tech marketing leader. VP Marketing @owner
Prev: Marketing @beondeck @hubspot @referralcandy

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

1/ There are 3 kinds of marketers: Artists, Soldiers and Gamblers.

Thread 👇

[Deano🧙‍♂️ @deanbloembergen]

Great products come from deep intimacy with the customer.

You have to be in the trenches - watching, feeling, experiencing the product the way customers do.

I joke with my team that they should know our customer so well they know what gum they chew.

Twice a year, we fly customers to our off-sites to spend a whole week with our team.

That week, the customer stops being an abstraction and becomes a real person with real problems. We encourage them to roast us, to build alongside us in our hackathons and to debate our roadmap with us.

Last month we were joined by a restaurant owner who has used Owner to grow his business from a single food truck to +30 locations and 9 figures in annual revenue.

His success wasn't an accident. It's the result of our team spending thousands of hours in the trenches with restaurant owners like him.

The best feeling in the world is watching something you built actually change someone's life. As a builder, that's what it’s all about.

If this video gets you excited to build with us at Owner for hardworking business owners, DM me!

[Darrin Henein @darrinhenein]

A few weeks ago we launched a new brand for @owner — an evolution that much better represents the incredible mission and technology that we're building. This was one of the first initiatives I lead as CDO here and was an amazing process in collaboration with @thenickpattison and his talented team at Primary. We couldn't be more proud of how we now show up in the world.

Owner has now driven over $1,000,000,000 in sales for local restaurants, and that growth is compounding every week. We've been on a hiring streak and have welcomed some insane talent to the design team in the last few months, and we're looking to bring on a few more builders — designers who sweat the details and can bring their ideas to life. Apply through our careers page if this sounds like you!

[Will Schreiber @breakfastbybill]

https://t.co/FCSpcgO7iD

[Will Schreiber @breakfastbybill]

Grader is the most rewarding product I’ve ever worked on. I get goosebumps showing restaurant owners their report and giving them the CMO they’ve never had before.

We’ve burned trillions of tokens to give small business owners the superpowers to fight back, for the first time.

Owner is the best place to change lives with AI. Join us.

[Adam Guild @adamguild]

Introducing Grader: the world's first AI CMO for restaurants.

It’s helped us drive over $1 BILLION in sales for our customers.

Grader outperforms human marketing teams. See how:

[Deano🧙‍♂️ @deanbloembergen]

https://t.co/hdiGxZWlHF

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@ejames_c Unlike a TC write up you are 100% in control of narrative, and the ceiling of your distribution is dependent on your editorial ability to tap into the zeitgeist, vs whether the writer likes you or not

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@EllenRhymes @owner @adamguild Adam is full of surprises 😂 so glad you’re aboard and so excited to team up (even more!)

[Adam Guild @adamguild]

I’m feeling blessed to share: Owner raised $120M Series C and is now at a $1B valuation 🦄

Mom-and-pop restaurant owners are being crushed by huge corporations.

We’re using this cash to arm them to fight back.

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This round was co-led by 2 perfect partners for us:

Alex Kurland from Meritech, who led DoorDash’s Series B, and Shalini Rao from Headline, who led Toast’s Series C.

They were also joined by an inspiring group of new investors: Fidji Simo (CEO Instacart), Jonathan Neman (CEO Sweetgreen), Garrett Langley (CEO Flock Safety).

& still more inspiring new investors...

Dharmesh Shah (CTO HubSpot), Josh Reeves (CEO Gusto), Shaan Puri (MFM), Matteo Franceschetti (CEO Eight Sleep), Anthony Pompliano, Sahil Bloom, Christina Cacioppo (CEO Vanta), Brett Schulman (CEO Cava), Matt Maloney (Founder & CEO GrubHub).

… just to name a few. :)

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Today, technology is being weaponized against small business owners.

Corporations like Domino’s dominate. Why?

Because they spend billions on tech, engineers, and marketers.

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Small business owners are forced to compete with corporations that have massive war chests.

But with Owner, they can do more than compete. They can win.

We’re building the platform that gives them the power.

We serve the people who serve our communities.

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I started Owner 7 years ago, after dropping out of high school halfway through 10th grade.

The first version of Owner wasn’t built for venture capital.

It was built for my mom.

She’s a small business owner who just needed a shot at success in the digital world.

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I remember watching her worry that we’d lose her business and our house. In a moment of desperation, she asked her weird :) nerdy 17-year-old son to help her.

I built a solution for her. That was Owner V1. When it started to work, I saw my mom transform.

She went from being constantly stressed about money to feeling hopeful and excited about her future.

The Owner team has now seen that same transformation happen for thousands of small business owners like her.

That’s what drives us.

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You can think of Owner as Shopify for restaurants—and, eventually, all local business owners. It gives them everything they need to succeed in the online future, in one place.

Owner is their website, online ordering, mobile app, CRM. It all works together as one system.

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Owner is also continuously optimized with what we learn from the thousands of restaurants and the more than 57 million consumers who have used our platform.

It’s the only system designed for one outcome: growing sales profitably.

It gives independent owners enough firepower to take on the big corporations, and win.

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Shoutout to the great team at @Owner —

You deserve the credit for getting us here.

I thank God every morning that I get to build Owner with each of you. We wouldn’t be here without you.

We have a special team. Each of you represents greatness.

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And shoutout to the best cofounder and CTO I could ever ask for, @DeanBloembergen.

His work ethic and genius are as impressive as his character.

I view partnering with Dean as one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.

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I’m proud of Owner today.

But I also feel scared that people will see our unicorn valuation and think “we’ve made it.”

So let me be brutally clear. We HAVE NOT made it.

And if we start to believe we have, we never will.

When investors value us at $1B, it’s because they see potential.

Our investors see the POTENTIAL for us to build a company worth tens of billions.

We have to prove them right.

And we must also prove right the thousands of restaurant owners who’ve bet their futures on us.

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We’re still underdogs. We still have a long way to go.

We didn’t come this far just to come this far.

It’s time to move faster, build better, and fight harder!

We have millions of small business owners counting on us.

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@macalvocruz @blader @adamguild lots of good stuff for founders on Adam's youtube channel: https://t.co/Q8Or31ITF3

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@shreyas I like how this is your LNO framework but applied to life as a whole

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@nurijanian Wow Some of those comments are r/iamverysmart vibes

[Adam Guild @adamguild]

Woke up this morning and saw that Forbes put @Owner on the Next Billion-Dollar Startups list.

It hit me hard. 🥹 I teared up, because this was a dream come true.

I started Owner as a 17-year-old high school dropout. I didn’t know anyone in tech. But I watched the tech world closely. For 7 years, I’ve admired the companies on the Next Billion-Dollar Startups list.

During all of the brutally hard times when we’d almost run out of money, or things would be going horribly wrong… I’d see this list and think: “One day.”

That day has come.

But it’s not because of me.

It’s because of our amazing team. We’d be nothing without our great people.

They deserve far more credit for where we are today. Owner has a really special team. I feel blessed to get to build with them every day.

This is an exciting recognition, but it changes nothing.

We’re staying hungry. We don’t take anything for granted. We work like the underdogs we are. We have to. Thousands of mom-and-pop business owners are counting on us.

If you’re passionate about helping mom-and-pop business owners survive and succeed, we're hiring across 12 roles now. Check out our careers page.

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@gregorykennedy This is an epic validation of Byron Sharp

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@tclarkmedia Check out what we’re doing at @owner

Just dropped this on the weekend. Look closely. It’s a case study!

https://t.co/dRwn1zSACt

[Tim Soulo 🇺🇦 @timsoulo]

I have no idea why it took me so long to do a podcast...

But it is SO MUCH FUN!!

https://t.co/1Q0grU6oBr

We just published "Season 1" of Ahrefs Podcast with 6 amazing guests:

01/@lkr
02/@AdamSinger
03/@randfish
04/@DomWellsOnfolio
05/@davelocity
06/@peeplaja

^ BIG-BIG THANKS to all these folks for taking the time to jump on a call with me and talk shop.

I'm new to this and I'm probably not as good at interviewing people as I think I am. But I'm hoping to improve with each new interview! 🙂

So please give Ahrefs Podcast a listen and let me know what you think! 🙏

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@siquanong It’s unbeatable for local searches though

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@mgonto Same thought

Didn’t see a PMM here

I saw a great creative producer though

[Adam Guild @adamguild]

Exciting news! Owner has raised our $33m Series B.

The round was led by Redpoint and Jack Altman.

Restaurant owners are being crushed online by huge corporations.

We’re using this cash to help them fight back.

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Just 5 years ago, you’d succeed as a restaurant if you provided great food + great service.

But that’s not enough anymore. The world has moved online. Restaurants must now serve up great food, great service, AND a great online experience.

Failing online kills many restaurants.

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Huge corporations like Domino’s have dominated in this shift to the online world.

They can afford to spend billions on tech, and they’ve weaponized that. Corporate chains are growing, while independent restaurants are dying.

The mom-and-pops need a platform to level the playing field.

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That’s where Owner comes in.

Our platform is their website builder, CRM, marketing automation, online ordering, and more — all in one place. Everything restaurants need to succeed online.

We’re like Shopify + HubSpot, for restaurants.

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Shoutout to Alex Bard (Redpoint) and Jack Altman (Alt Capital) for leading the round.

And to new investors, including…

Scott Belsky, Henry Schuck, Michael Vichich, Horsley Bridge, Activant Capital, TI Platform, Andy Pforzheimer, Cindy Bi, Arash Ferdowsi, Guillermo Rauch.

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Special thanks to our earliest supporters for their belief in us and help along the way, including…

Jason Lemkin (SaaStr), Alex Bard (Redpoint), Jack Altman (Alt Capital), John Andrew Entwistle, Joshua Browder, Cory Levy, Masha Bucher, Julian Shapiro, Max Mullen, Claire Hughes-Johnson, Max Altman, Parker Conrad, Kimbal Musk, Naval Ravikant, Ryan Petersen, Dylan Field.

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Finally…

Shoutout to the great team at @Owner. You deserve the credit for getting us here.

I thank God every morning for the opportunity to build Owner with each of you.

We have a really special team, and we’re just getting started. Excited to share what we build next!

[David Fallarme @davelocity]

@nicksaraev Concrete details, specifics, full picture that includes things that didn’t go well / the downsides