From the vault, we bring back one of our top listened-to episodes on the willingness to serve and the story of Omniboost Founder and CEO, Kees Zorge. Make sure to check it out and don't forget to subscribe and leave a review!
From the vault, we bring back one of our top listened-to episodes on the willingness to serve and the story of Omniboost Founder and CEO, Kees Zorge.
Make sure to check it out and don't forget to subscribe and leave a review!Kees Zorge is the Founder and CEO of Omniboost.
Omniboost creates smart connections between PMS/POS and accounting software to enable the automatic synchronization of financial data sets. Their powerful technology integrates data in no time and transforms it into actual financial statements that become readily available in leading accounting systems on a global scale. As a result, it automates your accounting and manages your finances easier and faster than ever before.
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Show Produced by: Niranjan Deshpande (Nick), Broken Frames Studio, www.brokenframesstudio.com
Creative Director: Maxim Sokolov, www.maximsokolov.com
Selling is evolving, are you? Humantic AI is a Buyer Intelligence platform for revenue teams. If you are interested in learning more about Humantic AI use Rob’s referral link https://app.humantic.ai/login/?referral_code=robnapoli
Special offer for #BearNation listeners interested in trying Brilliantly Warm (https://www.brilliantly.co/), use this 10% off discount code WELCOME10.
The 8 Biggest Mistakes People Make When Choosing a Coach (and how to avoid them!) use this link to get your FREE download: https://www.thaxa.com/p/the-bear-necessities-of-entrepreneurship
We have teamed up with Phin, a social impact company, to give back for each episode to the communities that we serve. To learn more or get involved with Phin for your company, visit:
EP 06_Kees Zorge Transcript
00:00:00:04 - 00:00:11:19
Kees Zorge
This is where it became slightly more difficult and a first time founder. So basically running into brick walls and hitting my head day after day after day or actually learning stuff.
00:00:12:17 - 00:00:33:07
Rob Napoli
Kees loves to create and think outside the box, not only when it comes to integrations, but also in building teams and companies as a whole. He is passionate about information technology based innovation and automation. He believes that there will be a day when we as humans will continue to better leverage the power of automation to help us work smarter.
00:00:33:18 - 00:00:57:04
Rob Napoli
He is convinced that there is a difference between offering a service and being willing to serve. Both principles include giving, but only one is generous enough to be an instrument of change. So I'm really excited to have you on the pod today case. Thank you for joining us. Why don't you why don't you give us a quick overview of of omni boost so that people know a little bit about the company here?
00:00:58:02 - 00:01:25:23
Kees Zorge
Yeah, glad to do to drop and super excited to be here. I'm going to be very, very honest because when I thought of Omni Boost, I need to be brutally honest. The idea did not stem from luxury. It was a bare necessity. We at first started as being programmers doing interfaces towards e-commerce platforms and touchscreen applications, and we were experiencing a lot of trouble scaling up the system.
00:01:25:23 - 00:01:55:08
Kees Zorge
So I thought of an idea, okay, we need to have a system in place where we can start integrating with a lot faster speed. And we were actually doing once again brutally honest. The initial idea did not get that many traction and whilst being on a golf course, a buddy of mine asked me, How are you doing? And I basically had to go to routines either stating I'm really crushing it, which was a blatant lie, or to say to tell the truth.
00:01:55:14 - 00:02:23:01
Kees Zorge
I did go for the letter and based on that, I got the opportunity. Thanks to Marco Hammond, got a decade to start using my technology for accounting firms, making sure that legacy legacy systems got connected to two accounting platforms and by accident. And once again, this was once more total honesty is that I had no grand vision about the hospitality industry.
00:02:23:10 - 00:02:54:12
Kees Zorge
I had sheer luck, came across a payment system that needed to be integrated with an accounting platform. We pulled it off within a couple of days. People were stating, you guys comps. We actually did very few. Kees got on a plane, signed his first deal, and three years later, here we are omni boost hospitality accounting and tech operational 50 countries we manage like 70 receiving accounting platforms with 26 plus partners and over 1200 integrations running through our pipelines each day.
00:02:55:17 - 00:03:06:20
Rob Napoli
That that is amazing right to here. Okay. We thought we could do something better. We tried It didn't quite go the way you plan and then correct. You know.
00:03:07:08 - 00:03:07:21
Kees Zorge
I was like.
00:03:09:19 - 00:03:11:07
Rob Napoli
Like, oh shit. What we do now?
00:03:11:07 - 00:03:15:11
Kees Zorge
Yeah. Yeah. But another idea down the drain. Yes. Yeah.
00:03:15:14 - 00:03:32:13
Rob Napoli
But what I love about that story, though, is that there is this moment, right when you're on a golf course and you're talking nobody and somebody else says, Hey, what about this market? Right. And what I think it's really interesting, I think about entrepreneurship, I think about innovation, is that ideas are going to come from anywhere and everywhere.
00:03:32:24 - 00:03:50:14
Rob Napoli
And if you had decided to go with your narrative, I am fucking crushing it, right? How many times and I know this is definitely it's a U.S. thing, right? And I know in Europe it's a little bit different culturally, but they start to do this is that you don't tell people when you're hurting, Hey, how are you doing today?
00:03:50:14 - 00:04:08:21
Rob Napoli
I'm good now. Shit, I'm not good. I just missed the train. I ran late. I'm sweating. I haven't had my coffee yet. I stink and I have to sit in this all day. Like, we don't want to say that we're not okay. Right. And as entrepreneurs, even more so because people already think you're crazy for starting a business and doing these things.
00:04:08:22 - 00:04:29:06
Rob Napoli
So for many of us and for many out there, entrepreneurs, we are afraid to say how we're really doing. But instead, what you did is something I took all the time. You spoke with intention, Hey, done this thing. It's not going the way I thought. And guess what? Boom! Lightbulb went off for somebody else. And now you know, amazing success.
00:04:29:12 - 00:04:51:04
Rob Napoli
And one of the biggest lessons that I'll tell you, which is why has intro we talked about service versus we're going to serve which we're going to get into and it shortly is that we speak with intention and when he had that mindset mindset shift to stop motion speaking with intention, push things forward that's when omni boost saw huge growth coming back to your story.
00:04:52:05 - 00:05:19:00
Rob Napoli
So prior to starting your own, I mean, you started another business, right? You had your company and then you turn it into a product. But before that you'd spent years and consulting and advising on integrations and the technology. What made you or guess what was your passion to get into the technology world and be thinking about automation and be thinking about how IT based innovation and automation can change the way we do business?
00:05:19:00 - 00:05:20:24
Rob Napoli
What got you into that from an earlier age?
00:05:21:24 - 00:05:51:21
Kees Zorge
Earlier age? Well, it's I have no tech background. I'm actually a master in the laws. I studied intellectual property and merger and acquisition and intended to go and work for for a law firm. But quite soon discovered that being an attorney wasn't cut out for me. So it started started at a corporate finance agency. And those guys had an investment in a in an entity that was doing early stage artificial intelligence.
00:05:52:05 - 00:06:18:04
Kees Zorge
And then I got hooked immediately. I was like, okay, no more law for case tech. This is it. So I tried to teach myself as much as possible. I got one lucky break, Get Again financial crisis hits, and I really needed to think about how am I going to stay with this corporate finance company or start our business on my own and decided, okay, now's the time now or never, and actually started the business?
00:06:18:14 - 00:06:51:05
Kees Zorge
And from there learned basically all things via Internet, Google, Yahoo, self-learning platforms and gradually starting building team. One developer in two developers in supports a wrap in etc., etc.. So that's where the story is. And what I love about tech is that it's never done. What's hip and happening today is ancient dinosaur tech tomorrow. And what you were stating in the intro, I do.
00:06:51:05 - 00:07:01:11
Kees Zorge
I think I've got quite some energy what people tell me. So I'm I'm like, okay, oh, new stuff, let's do it. And that keeps me going. Yeah.
00:07:01:18 - 00:07:25:11
Rob Napoli
Absolutely. And yes, for those that don't feel it yet, I'm sure it'll come out soon. You know, this case is first podcast is probably holding back but he is there correct that if not higher energy I am when we actually do calls together it is just like you could talk the loudest and the fastest sometimes if I was working in a whole different field, the different spaces and had this amazing opportunity to work for a startup, and then I was hooked.
00:07:25:23 - 00:07:46:00
Rob Napoli
Ryan I was like, Wait, I want to learn about this entrepreneurial ecosystem. I want to run my own business someday. And I think for many of us, especially when you think about entrepreneur minded millennials and Gen Z even further, we were taught at some point you go to school, you take the one step, the next step, and you go up this career path, a ladder, and what are you going to school for?
00:07:46:00 - 00:08:01:01
Rob Napoli
You have to do. And it's it's okay to have nontraditional career path. It's okay to go to school for something, think you love it, go out into the world and do it and hate it and then shift and shift so fast that you build a company out of it. Right. And so that's something that I love to see.
00:08:01:21 - 00:08:29:18
Rob Napoli
So we talk about the business, right? And and omni boost and creating some really cool things. So tell me, you know, the pandemic hit here in 2020, you're tough on everybody and you're supporting the hospitality industry. Hospitality went to a grinding halt. Tell me, how did you retain customers? How did you go about talking to customers? How did you handle your customers?
00:08:29:18 - 00:08:44:19
Rob Napoli
I mean, obviously you're you know, that hurt your business. But tell me about how did your team rallied to talk to the customers? Are what were some the challenges you faced with your customers during the pandemic in the hospitality space that went to basically at absolute standstill?
00:08:45:10 - 00:09:10:15
Kees Zorge
Yep. Yep. Well, yeah, it was the actually the best vertical to be in hospitality. So we were kind of scared. So, okay, what's going to happen and okay, how are our customers going to be surprised. But I'd like to revert back to your to your intro and this is one of our highest values in the company is having a willingness to serve and being hospitable.
00:09:11:08 - 00:09:47:04
Kees Zorge
And during COVID, we definitely showed the willingness to serve to be there for your partner's help out using our automation level. Though hotels were closed, they still needed to do tax audits, they still needed to do revenue reporting or whatever. So the necessity for an automation and technology like we offer still exists. And basically what we did is we stuck with our partners either to vendor, so the property management systems or the point of sale systems and the individual hotels.
00:09:47:16 - 00:10:21:17
Kees Zorge
So that basically the only churn to be met by where do you hotels that couldn't make it went bankrupt. But actually we grew to business even during the pandemic. It actually showed that the the necessity for a product such as omni boost and it has a viable product market fit and it actually relieves our customers. They don't have to focus on the boring part, which is cold accounting and and nearby technologies and actually focused on their business and being hospitable and help their customers.
00:10:22:09 - 00:10:27:02
Kees Zorge
So basically offering offering them in a huge peace of mind, I think.
00:10:27:12 - 00:10:52:08
Rob Napoli
Yeah, no I love that. That's amazing because to think about this right go through a pandemic hospitality industry basically shuts down. It's been really easy for you to throw in the towel and said you went and partnered with all your businesses and and clients and said, Hey, we're here. We have a license to serve. And through that, you know what we saw the pandemic is something very it was very eye opening.
00:10:52:23 - 00:11:13:13
Rob Napoli
Most product innovation, especially in the software and technology space, has been derivative and it's small iterations like another layer. So you're starting to just tack on tack on tack to make every little thing one step faster. It's like, Oh, you made this cool product. Let me just like do one other thing to make it one step faster. And the pandemic hit and we were cutting back on budgets.
00:11:13:13 - 00:11:32:00
Rob Napoli
Businesses realized what is necessary technology versus accessory technology. What is a need is a once or a nice to have. And it showed omni boost being not only necessary, but the only channel was the companies that didn't make it. So you weren't losing clients. They were saying, Hey, we want to partner with you. We want to be with you.
00:11:32:00 - 00:11:51:08
Rob Napoli
In fact, you grew the business. I think that's an amazing thing. So let's talk about this, right? This is and this is one of the things I love about is the philosophy of you as the founder and one and is the business. Right. So let's talk about where did this idea come from, Willingness to serve versus being a service based business and how do you define the to?
00:11:51:08 - 00:12:00:18
Rob Napoli
Right. And what what is that layer of service based business into willingness to serve or how would you define it as you have for yourself, for your organization?
00:12:01:08 - 00:12:21:21
Kees Zorge
Yes, a very good question also starts with the partnerships that we have and this is what I like to stress out to all of my partners was being on the part of the goals or whatever. I actually value the word partnership. So our partners and there are a couple of examples, but our partners did get hearts at heart.
00:12:22:12 - 00:12:58:03
Kees Zorge
And basically a partnership with your friend is it's like a marriage. You're in it for the good times, but also for the bad times. So if they needed our help, we were there and it doesn't immediately reflect its on revenue growth or whatever, but just making sure that we are in touch, so for lack of a better word, shit together and making sure that okay, let's keep these customers, let's keep on product integration and we're in it together, That's that was the basic thing that I wanted to get across when we're there and we're here to help and that's actually the entire set.
00:12:58:03 - 00:13:17:07
Kees Zorge
But we have as the willingness to serve also for my support team, you can do support stating, okay, click back like that and get it done and open with. You could also take the next step, a step where you have the feeling, okay, this customer doesn't understand what's happening. They need some additional help and okay, let's jump on the call.
00:13:17:07 - 00:13:40:23
Kees Zorge
Do two or three iterations more just to make you feel comfortable and move ahead. And that once again, doesn't immediate lead and transfer resulting in a revenue growth. But you're you're helping each other. And this is one of my core values from basically what I learned in life. You need to be there and you don't have to give everything away.
00:13:40:23 - 00:13:58:17
Kees Zorge
And it doesn't mean you're you're a pushover. I think even the contrary. But yeah, yeah, it's in my genes, my DNA. I want that. I want that. I want to offer help and reach the dude on the horizon together.
00:13:58:20 - 00:14:21:15
Rob Napoli
Yeah, I love that. So it's that extra. It's that extra mile service, right? Yeah. And everyone talks about being service oriented, right? And by nature, many of our businesses are service oriented, especially when you think about what we do. But that extra layer of are you really willing to serve? Can you go the extra mile, those small iterations of small things to stand by to check in?
00:14:21:23 - 00:14:38:04
Rob Napoli
And, you know, it's even so much of like, hey, how you doing? Right? Like just reaching out to your clients and handling all that. And so I love this idea of willingness to serve. And we talk about it's such an easy thing to talk about. And yeah, for.
00:14:38:17 - 00:14:39:18
Kees Zorge
A first is acting.
00:14:40:00 - 00:14:51:19
Rob Napoli
Right, but acting right. And so how do you tell me a little bit how do you talk about this is big, it's in your DNA sequence. So how do you instill that in your team? Right? You've got a team of, what, 30 now sitting around.
00:14:52:01 - 00:14:55:17
Kees Zorge
Growing. Growing, Yes. So slightly smaller, but growing.
00:14:55:17 - 00:15:08:04
Rob Napoli
Getting closer, getting close to 30. So how do you instill that in your team on a regular basis? How do you how do you walk the walk for willingness to serve and a signal to your team?
00:15:08:04 - 00:16:01:12
Kees Zorge
This is where it became slightly more difficult and a first time founder. So basically running into brick walls and hitting my heads day after day after day. So actually learning stuff. Yeah, it all begins with the proper hire. So and we sent out a post just recently is that we were looking to expanding the team and that we didn't care about resumes, we care about people the way I get people and based on that's you you quite soon understand what type of person you're you're getting into, into your team, having their skills, be blatantly honest together and, and also us having being coached by you about the servant, the willingness to serve our our C-level
00:16:01:12 - 00:16:28:20
Kees Zorge
team actually discovered we we we like to go for a servant leadership and and this is what we instill and in our team members as well, they come in, they don't immediately grow to a C- level position or VP or whatever. But if they want to grow and become well, go up on the chain, they need to show themselves that they have that servant leadership.
00:16:28:20 - 00:16:40:14
Kees Zorge
Dana Principle as well. That's what they need to show. And the best way to learn is to start on support. And I can tell you, I even still do support.
00:16:40:14 - 00:17:05:13
Rob Napoli
So so essentially, you know, it starts with the way you recruit. So the way you write a job description, the way you go through your recurting process, the way you interview your candidates, and then once you bring them in and I love this, I mean, you know, so your point is, everyone, you know, even if you bring somebody in to be the chief operations officer or chief product officer, maybe they don't do the support cause they sit in support meetings and they learn, Yep.
00:17:05:13 - 00:17:31:18
Rob Napoli
And that's listening to the customer, which is something I know everyone on your team comes in and does. At some point they sit with a support team and handles some calls and learn from the customer. And that's where that willingness to serve comes out right? For those listening out there, one of these key lessons that that I've loved in working with the Kees team is that, you know, having everybody listen to the customer, we talk about the voice of the customer and we talk about, oh, we listen to our customers.
00:17:31:18 - 00:17:54:14
Rob Napoli
But I always say, do you really, as everyone on your C-level team sat in the support chair and listened those calls and been on the phone to the customer and actually doing that job. And that changes the game of how we think about our willingness to serve not only our customers, our future customers, but our our employees are looking across every everyone we touch.
00:17:54:14 - 00:18:20:16
Rob Napoli
And that actually expands out. That's one thing I love when we talk about your team. And yeah, I've helped coach the team and really focus on, you know, not teaching them how to win. We're talking a lot about servant leadership and we're talking about how do we vocalize that servant leadership. And so a lot of the work that we've done really is taking the internal value of willingness to serve and how do we make that talk about externally, which I think has been a lot of fun to see the team grow and do.
00:18:21:02 - 00:18:36:21
Rob Napoli
And as we've been going through these conversations, you know, we've talked about team growth. You know, we're pushing that 30 number here soon. You're looking to hire more people and you're heading this growth stage. We've got a lot of growth coming in, you know, during the last year. So talk about what are some of the challenges of scaling, right.
00:18:36:21 - 00:18:55:03
Rob Napoli
As we have hit this this growth stage, as we're looking at growth, Yeah. You have talked a lot about this one, too. I want to I'd love to share with the audience here what is one of the biggest challenges that you've had as the business goes from that quirky little dutch start out to like, Hey, where we're starting to hit growth stage we're no longer trying to be?
00:18:55:13 - 00:19:14:03
Rob Napoli
Yeah, there's two things. There's startup in the term a startup business, and then there's like the startup culture, right? We want to keep that startup culture to an extent. We're no longer startup. We're trying to be a growth stage company. When you hit that, your culture changes, right? Yeah. What you do at five is not like 15 or 30.
00:19:14:03 - 00:19:19:15
Rob Napoli
So tell me, what are some of those challenges? Let's talk, let's, let's share some lessons you've learned, you know, a little bit the hard way.
00:19:20:02 - 00:19:47:04
Kees Zorge
Yeah. So this is actually the the hard way because I was well, I was expecting this question. I was like, okay, what challenges did I face? As I stated, I came the first time founders. So learning by doing the hardest lesson that I have learned is that I definitely needed to learn to let go and delegates and show trust also based on the the servant leadership.
00:19:47:15 - 00:20:37:17
Kees Zorge
Based on that, you can start building your team quite faster. We also decided since we were on a on on the growth spots and growing rapidly internationally to focus on hires on the C- level team. So we got a chief commercial officer in from our airbase, more or less a more corporate guy, but feeling very comfortable with the startup culture and experience product officer I find it the company with my with Peter, my the CTO, we the both of us once again still being newbies and yeah, learning our lessons pretty fast that we need to, to get people in who can do things on other areas, especially these way more better than we can and
00:20:37:17 - 00:21:01:17
Kees Zorge
learn to trust them. And together as a unified front, we started to build a to build a team. I also thought of, okay, we are, we're early stage and this is where I disagreed with a lot of coaches. I actually got two friends, very good friends in joining the company. One of them was like, okay, Kees we are in the past.
00:21:01:17 - 00:21:22:05
Kees Zorge
We did all kinds of nice things, all of a sudden you don't have the time anymore. I was working for the government stating, Okay, guys, you know what? I've got so much leave pending, I'm stepping in. I'm kind of I'm coming in. I'm going to help you. That was amazing. And another friend is now leading, starting to lead the support team.
00:21:22:13 - 00:21:51:12
Kees Zorge
And based on that, the trust, you can actually quite organically start growing your team and everybody still feels comfortable. We for sure we had our license. There were people in the team could manage sometimes the pressure and the growth, but be separated in a very, very, very cool way. Even hired him back for, for, for adequate consultancy or whatever when needed.
00:21:51:22 - 00:22:11:19
Kees Zorge
But yeah, still being friends and yes, we're growing and it's no longer the funding game. Hey guys, we're changing the world now. We're actually becoming a company that does come with standard rules and agreements, if you will, but we still need to have to keep the fun.
00:22:12:03 - 00:22:30:21
Rob Napoli
Yeah, I love that. And, and, you know, some of the key lessons that that were brought out as is really around learning by doing right and so early early and you're the first and founder and this you know a lot of folks who you know you see these companies that are like oh, they're a four time startup founder or whatever, That's awesome.
00:22:31:08 - 00:22:49:05
Rob Napoli
Even if the four time startup founders and they go through challenges on the next venture, it's never. And things get inherently easier because you learn by doing. But there's always challenges and I think has learned by doing, you know, as a founder, you should be wearing every hat at some point. Sales, marketing, support. Granted, you're not the best at all that you're not supposed to be.
00:22:49:05 - 00:23:10:17
Rob Napoli
You shouldn't even do any of it. Sometimes, though, you should be a part of it. Learning it and making sure you understand how that bigger picture works in and then, you know, recruiting, hiring, building the right team, bringing in people that are smarter than you to do the things that need to get done. Delegate that right. A lot of founders are control freaks.
00:23:10:17 - 00:23:30:17
Rob Napoli
They want to have their hand in everything. It's not possible. You don't have enough hours in the day and it's a big piece of trust which ties back to separate leadership. Right? How can your employees be willing to serve our clients if they don't have the trust from you? You need to get them the trust and the space and the grace.
00:23:31:11 - 00:23:52:04
Rob Napoli
Yeah. To go do their job and serve properly. Right. You instill that, you teach it, talked about it from the other process and then you instill it. So I love that. And you know, a lot of challenges, especially when you when you go from that startup culture into becoming a company and growing and you know, you've had some losses with people leaving who didn't, you know.
00:23:52:04 - 00:24:12:13
Rob Napoli
And it is I mean, there's a book The Hard thing about Hard Things talk about sometimes those that are with you early are there because they like that early. And as you start going, they're not the same people that take you that next level. And there's different phases that a startup goes through. There's different personality. Some people want to work in a startup, they come, they take a shot at help and I need to go back to corporate, right?
00:24:12:13 - 00:24:18:15
Rob Napoli
And so you see these different things happen. And so, yeah, that's a big challenge especially. And then your stage where.
00:24:19:13 - 00:24:21:19
Kees Zorge
Everything's so much fun building this.
00:24:21:23 - 00:24:50:15
Rob Napoli
Yeah, Yeah. So I love that. So, you know, you talked about, well, working internationally and you know, some of about when as you're kind of managing international clients, how do you go about handling that and what are some of the that that turnaround that challenge. What I saw the things that you've enjoyed about scaling internationally and those lessons that you've learned that you feel has also just increased that that mindset of willingness to serve?
00:24:52:01 - 00:25:16:21
Kees Zorge
Yeah, the growth internationally luckily came also via via part steps and at first stage is managing all those different time zones with a very small team. I always joked with customers if we were on a chat or video call like this, and if you take a look at my eyes, it will will reflect time spent on on the goals.
00:25:16:21 - 00:25:48:19
Kees Zorge
But yeah, since you're you're growing your company, your passion and the entire team sharing the same passion it's it's yeah it's some sort of a mission you're on the proud that you have when going to New York City and have your incorporated as you say erectus or possibly wrong word or Incorporated. Yeah I I'm still a Dutch guy so sometimes I choose the wording.
00:25:48:19 - 00:26:14:12
Kees Zorge
That's not entirely correct. There should be some fun over there as well. And then having the proud being so proud of your own, incorporate setting up the team day. And once again, we were thinking way too easy about this. As you stated in the beginning, we're Dutch, so we have another time mindsets and we're, we're very Calvinist. So the don't, don't do that large things.
00:26:14:12 - 00:26:46:02
Kees Zorge
And so just keep calm and keep, keep being Dutch. Luckily I'm myself I think quite enough energy for showing the enthusiasm about that about the product but soon coming to realize, okay, we need to start building international teams as well and then reverting back to what we focused on is having to see levels in their own network, their own partners, making sure that we can start building teams in the US.
00:26:46:02 - 00:27:17:08
Kees Zorge
Unfortunately, we were literally we had the last flight out of JFK from Brussels Airlines when everything closed, and it was last year, March, but now on the verge of of hiring the first members of the team in the states, making sure to be settled that also come to the awareness. It's it needs to have full attention. So there needs to be a dedicated team and we very soon realized is okay, we need to have foot on the ground there.
00:27:17:17 - 00:27:34:12
Kees Zorge
So I think that's going to happen. Luckily, I love the states, so I can't wait to come back. But also based on that's also expanding to the UAE and APAC by end of this year and basically taking the same approach.
00:27:35:10 - 00:27:49:00
Rob Napoli
I love that, you know, to to here, you know, you've got some international partners and growth and then, you know, having a true plan. I think a lot of companies a lot of like, oh, I'm going to go to the US because it's the biggest market in the world.
00:27:49:05 - 00:28:02:01
Kees Zorge
Initially we had the same approach and this was thanks to Belgium and meeting guys like you staying here. Okay. But if you're going to take this approach, it's up for failure. Yeah.
00:28:02:10 - 00:28:21:22
Rob Napoli
Well, that's Valerie and Laurence over about you. I mean, the reason they put this on is that they understand this, too, is that everyone says, Oh, the US market, it's it's a $2 billion market. Even if we get, you know, 5% that's multimillion or, you know, we're awesome. And it's like, well do you realize the how hard that is to get 5%?
00:28:22:05 - 00:28:45:21
Rob Napoli
You know, how much competition is on the market. You're fighting for the fact that you got to build brand awareness, brand equity trust. Right. And so so it sounds easier than it is. And so having a dedicated plan and then also, in a way, you're going to tax the UAE, which I know you know, your chief commercial officer worked for a large airline in the US, Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
00:28:45:21 - 00:29:04:20
Rob Napoli
And so you have those connections in the UAE. So to be able to really build out these plans, you know, and set up a clear strategy. And what founders need to understand is that when you go to a new market, especially a market like the US, you have a clear strategy and a clear team dedicating 100% of time you can get.
00:29:04:20 - 00:29:17:18
Kees Zorge
This is actually where where we learned from you. Yeah, you can put your money where your where your mouth is, share it with some customers or what we actually did. And that helped growth a lot.
00:29:18:05 - 00:29:36:20
Rob Napoli
Right? I mean, I'm from Missouri. The show me said I was I was joke is like again you know and I get this is America have you know when I lived in Europe it was like oh Americans they're kind of boisterous. They like to bullshit a lot. And, you know, I can show the best of them. But when it comes down to it, I was, you know, talk about is is show me.
00:29:36:20 - 00:29:50:13
Rob Napoli
Right. It's don't tell me, show me. And actions speak louder than words, especially when you're a founder and you're building business. Because myself included founders, we have a million and a half ideas. We get excited about ideas, putting those ideas.
00:29:50:13 - 00:29:52:08
Kees Zorge
Very much so. Yeah.
00:29:52:23 - 00:30:10:20
Rob Napoli
Tough to do. So I love it. You know, exciting. Exciting to see. You know what? What you're betting, you know, when it look when you look at the next six months, right. We look at age to hear of 2021. I know you've got, you know, as soon as you can trip to the US coming to get that settled, you've got to do a combination of building.
00:30:10:20 - 00:30:22:23
Rob Napoli
What are you what are you most excited about? About 2021 for the business, for omni boost and things that are coming, whether it be trip product.
00:30:23:09 - 00:31:02:24
Kees Zorge
But it's so my job is world is opening up. I'm so happy to see happy customers again opening their doors out of being hotels and restaurants. We've got new products launching together with a large, large box vendor where we connect multiple system, where we're doing high level accounting on aggregated data said launch and insights products. There's so much spending right now, so I'm hyper about basically the entire hospitality industry and yeah, once again doing amazing things together.
00:31:02:24 - 00:31:35:24
Kees Zorge
And what I especially love is what I've seen happening with my team. We came up with a couple of products and that actually are in total unity. So we do accounting, but it's also tech and it's also FMB and also all those strategies coming together in one ETL based dataflow. And that's so, so amazing. So we're looking forward to doing more chase, helping change, growing on aggregation datasets and just taking another type of approach.
00:31:36:07 - 00:32:06:15
Kees Zorge
And we be stemmed from the finance, we come from finances. So we read all it's based on finance. How much time do you spend on room cleaning versus total payout for for stuff something entirely different than only, Okay, 50 minutes. And I, I mean, this is where you're where you can hear the enthusiasm. We've got a, a boss connector It's yeah it's scaling as da da da da.
00:32:06:21 - 00:32:08:01
Kees Zorge
So it's going pretty fast.
00:32:08:04 - 00:32:48:01
Rob Napoli
So for you know, for the that can't see Kees face or now is like blushing with just like pure joy talking about the product side of things. And you know, he wasn't kidding when he said he saw this idea of automation and was hooked. Right. So omni boost their financial data integration, they the reason they're called omni boosts and their logo has a rocket ship as they're building tools and tag that are boosting speed, efficiency and helping the hospitality industry do more with less by saying, Hey, we're going to save you time, energy and effort because we want to create better products to take hold, slow and outdated and boring, and to do something that you
00:32:48:01 - 00:33:05:21
Rob Napoli
can do quickly, easily, and aggregate data. So I love hearing about that. I'm excited. So, you know, keep an eye out for omni boost growth. You're going to be seeing you're going to be seeing the launch of their US business unit here the next hopefully 6 to 12 months. You're going to see the UAE growth in the next 6 to 12 months.
00:33:06:04 - 00:33:25:08
Rob Napoli
They've got new products coming out of the market. So definitely a company to watch for. And there's a reason that they're on a rocket ship to the next level. You know, they went through we talked about it. They went through early stages banging the head against a wall, trying to figure out what to do, issues with scaling from let's get out of being a startup to a real company, Right.
00:33:25:09 - 00:33:40:20
Rob Napoli
Kind of growing up a little bit and, you know, now looking from growth to hyper and if I'm not mistaken, your seed funded right now is there are plans for a raise soon. Have you talked about it? You're thinking about possibly going for a for a raise here in the near future at all?
00:33:41:16 - 00:34:13:00
Kees Zorge
Yeah. So we're definitely going for the next pre. So there we have conversations growing even got acquisition offers in so give us a pat on the back basically actually Chevron guy we're doing some amazing stuff and yes, we're going for a series A making sure that we're going to push to the next level and that actually means building the teams faster and getting getting more things done.
00:34:13:00 - 00:34:28:18
Kees Zorge
Like you stated, you can do so much within a day so that we have a definite need for four, but more or less, more people, more hires. That's where most of the the funding part is is coming in for love that.
00:34:28:18 - 00:34:56:08
Rob Napoli
Well, you know, best of luck with that and I'm sure we'll be talking about it bet while definitely have to potentially think about bringing bringing you back around to to talk about challenges of fundraising especially as we go series A Yeah from seed this series there's always there's pre-seed seed in or started out with angel investing and then the next level though is how do we get series A funding which is a whole other ballgame because you have to have certain RR set up, you have to observe things and your due diligence process.
00:34:56:08 - 00:35:20:16
Rob Napoli
I mean there is that that level of growth from seed to series A is a whole other conversation itself, So I have to talk about it at some other point, but I'm extremely excited. Yeah. So I'm excited to see the growth and in our listeners for those listening and take a look at omni boost to follow along, I've got some big things done so kees I'm so glad that we've been able to be here.
00:35:20:17 - 00:35:57:16
Rob Napoli
I've been able to be your first podcast experience and getting you on. So as you know, thanks. I have some questions that I and every yeah. Interview with and so I want to hit these out and give these for you. So I'm going to throw you a little curveball because the first question with a different if you are back at the beginning, right, and you're starting a business all over again now, if you get at what would be the one piece of advice you'd give your younger self if you could do it all over again, what's the one that you know, you could you could go back in time and tell your younger self one
00:35:57:16 - 00:36:00:12
Rob Napoli
thing to help you don't to pay.
00:36:02:15 - 00:36:14:02
Kees Zorge
Top of mind right now. Don't be afraid. That was the part that got me stuck for quite some time. Yeah, I don't want to quote Nike, but just do it. Don't be afraid to follow your gut.
00:36:14:15 - 00:36:40:14
Rob Napoli
Go instincts. Right? You know, most now this is a podcast for the entrepreneur minded. And if you have and what we've learned also from what I saw when they built this is that there was a need for this. Right? There is a problem. That creative solution, remember, is first kind of product idea didn't work, it didn't fit and nobody else said, boom, hey, this might work for this other problem solution, right?
00:36:40:19 - 00:36:52:24
Rob Napoli
When you have it instinct that something you're building because the conversations you're having or what you're seeing that it's a big problem that multiple companies are multiple people in the market have don't be afraid to explore that. Go after it.
00:36:53:07 - 00:36:54:03
Kees Zorge
So yeah.
00:36:54:17 - 00:37:02:07
Rob Napoli
What advice would you give Gen Z or millennial entrepreneurs right now, those that are just starting a business other than just do it?
00:37:03:21 - 00:37:25:01
Kees Zorge
Well, I got a slight variance on this one actually. I was is based on a graffiti. I saw I saw New York City across a fire department. I saw graffiti stating, if you can dream it, do it. And I, I yeah, I just had to take a picture because this actually is the course since it's a sentence of everything that you do.
00:37:25:11 - 00:37:28:23
Kees Zorge
If you can think of it, you can create it, do it.
00:37:29:17 - 00:37:54:19
Rob Napoli
Absolutely right. You know I think therefore I am it's it's what makes us rational beings, right? Emotional beings. And so I love that. And the other thing about this is those two messages. If you can dream it right, do it. Don't be afraid. And what I mean by that is intentionality. Right back to the beginning of this. When we heard in Kees story, he was about to say that iconic golf course, I'm crushing it.
00:37:54:19 - 00:38:15:24
Rob Napoli
And instead he said, you know what, Things aren't going as planned. We have this great product. We don't know why it's not working. Well, maybe you're in the wrong marketplace, Right. Intentionally speaking, how he's doing, what he's feeling is that was that moment change. Same thing. It's you're getting started. Be intentional, be authentic. You can dream it and you know, there's a problem called fix it.
00:38:15:24 - 00:38:29:07
Rob Napoli
Go build it. Yeah. What is what is one book resource or show that you would recommend right now on future entrepreneurs or those that I think about being an entrepreneur should read, watch or consume
00:38:29:07 - 00:38:51:09
Kees Zorge
Now, for me it was mindset by Carol Dweck about growth mindsets, and I could very easily reflected back to the business because it's it isn't, it isn't that bad if you make a mistake, but you need to learn Do you need to learn from it? And growing her book actually states, okay, you've got the fixed mindset and you've got a growth mindset.
00:38:51:21 - 00:39:12:11
Kees Zorge
And I try to teach my kids, failure isn't bad. Learn it, show grit, do it again, do it again, do it again, learn master it. And this was a real eye opener for me to shy away from the fixed mindsets. Hooray for growth mindset.
00:39:12:18 - 00:39:30:01
Rob Napoli
I love it. You know, it's so funny that we get so afraid of certain things, but in life you know, I come from a sport background and when you play sports, the only way to get good to master your craft is to do it and fail. But it comes to business. When it comes to life, we tend to have a fixed mindset.
00:39:30:01 - 00:39:46:23
Rob Napoli
We're afraid to go outside our comfort zone. Yeah, if you want to succeed in business, you instead, if you want to be an entrepreneur, right? We talk about entrepreneurship, the the the actual what is an entrepreneur? And there's entrepreneur mindset right in the mindset. He says. You have to get out of here, get out of your own way, right?
00:39:46:23 - 00:40:10:20
Rob Napoli
You need to be okay. You need to be comfortable with being uncomfortable and going exploring. So I love that and I love that about too. It's a great book. I've read it and it's like a game changer in terms of just the way you see it. So Kees in your last message or last words are, you know something you want listeners to take away from this episode?
00:40:12:17 - 00:40:45:17
Kees Zorge
I had the key thing that you said it yourself already. Just have faith in yourself. If you have an idea and you want to pursue, it's just do it. And there isn't anything bad for initial failure or whatever. Believe in yourself. And it might sound corny, but show some grit, show some perseverance and stick to your guns. And you've got to you've got a whole bunch of people telling you that the ideas worthless and it's not going to get traction.
00:40:46:02 - 00:40:51:09
Kees Zorge
That's the core thing that I wanted to convey. Believe in yourself, follow your.
00:40:51:09 - 00:41:10:00
Rob Napoli
Dreams. I love that. Right. And, you know, they say about the best laid plans, they're always going to go awry. So, you know, you need to be adaptable and good is better than perfect, right? Get it out there. Learn, iterate, test. Yeah, Keep going. Love it. All right, Kees. That is it for the day. Where can they find you?
00:41:10:17 - 00:41:23:09
Rob Napoli
How can people listening to this show find Kees? I'm not going to try to say your last name again, so I'll mess it up again. Where can we find a Kees where they look for you and follow you? The company. What should we be looking for?
00:41:23:09 - 00:41:52:03
Kees Zorge
Mostly LinkedIn Kees Zorge or our website. ww.omniboost.io If you ever want to come to visit us in the Netherlands, most people think they land, skip all and come over to us. No, we're actually more way down in the south in their rural area. But you're, you're more than welcome. And just check out the things that are happening very around New York City already there.
00:41:52:20 - 00:41:59:05
Kees Zorge
Dubai, Singapore. Keep on looking. We'll be there. We're going to be everywhere.