It's our first employee's second anniversary. Here's what we've learned.
Team Letter | May 2, 2024
May 2, 2024
Hello Alpaca Team! It’s an important day – it’s May 2, 2024 and that means that TWO years ago today, things started to feel like a real company around here. We moved into an office. We set out to build a website. And I welcomed the one and only Kimberly Bailey, Employee #1, to Alpaca. I believe my exact words were “you’ve been warned!”
Last year on her one year anniversary, Kimberly and I sat down with a list of all that she had done in her first year. It is an IMPRESSIVE list – building the brand, the website, the story of our company, the imagery, the team spirit – you know the list, and it is unending. All of it was great work. But she looked at the list, sat quietly for a moment, and then said this: “Okay. But nothing on this list drives revenue.”
This is possibly the most perfect way to explain Kimberly – when faced with an impressive list of her own accomplishments, her reaction is “I want to do even better.”
I am late in publishing this letter today because my day has been filled with sales calls, proposals, deal-making, and building revenue for this company. Why? Because over the past year, Kimberly has reframed her focus, set down her camera, hired a team, and become a force for revenue at Alpaca. We have built the revenue engine, and it is starting to work.
I’m going to say it again because it bears repeating: in the past year, Kimberly has been critical in rebuilding and reinventing the way that we make money in this company, and therefore, what this company is.
Let me walk you through a few of those accomplishments:
We are my favorite brand at every education event we attend.
I stand by this statement, and it’s because Kimberly and her team have built a fantastically fun and joyful presence for education conferences. It’s ALSO because we’re choosing the right conferences, where we’ll both fit in and stand out. It’s ALSO because we don’t sit down. We show up ready to win. We capture emails and we put them directly to work in Hubspot. We book meetings from the booth. And we execute it beautifully. It’s why we hear “this is the BEST booth at the whole show” every single time, and it’s because Kimberly leads by example.
Our company is positioned beautifully.
In a conversation with a potential investor – an entrepreneur I respect deeply who has built companies totaling value of $1B, he said: “very few startups of your age are positioned so clearly and perfectly in your market.” That is very much due to the fact that Kimberly goes the extra mile to get to what I call the “real best” option. She pushes us to stay in it, keep writing, keep thinking, keep asking, keep tweaking. Until it’s not just good, it’s US.
We are selling something people need, to the people who need it.
Sure, it sounds obvious. But a year ago, sales at Alpaca was anything but clear – what we were selling, how we were selling it, who we were selling it to, and how much to charge. It was a mish-mash of school signups, parent pay platforms, sponsorships, partnerships – holy crap it was complex and crazy. How did we fix that? Well, Kimberly signed us up for 5 conferences in 3 months and put us in front of literally thousands of educators, administrators, superintendents, school board members, and HR professionals. We listened like crazy, we talked to our potential customers, we heard words like “employee engagement” and “pulse surveys” – and we knew where to go. Today, selling is easier (and honestly, SO FUN!), the results are better, and I couldn’t be more excited for what’s ahead.
I have learned A LOT from Kimberly this year, and I think we all have. My biggest takeaways are:
Get audacious about getting better at building a company, whatever that means for you.
Brand is about vision AND execution. Not one, both.
Keep going until it’s not just good, it’s US.
Get in your car and get in front of your customers no matter what. And then do it again.
Never sit down at conferences.
Napping until 11 pm is a perfectly lovely way to spend Valentine’s Day with a coworker.
Chase the goal. Win it. Chase a new one.
Kimberly, THANK YOU for your extraordinary contributions so far. I cannot wait to keep building this with you, and we have SO much exciting work to build. I love you, we love you, and we cannot wait to see what we’re celebrating on May 2, 2025.
With love & respect for your audacious autonomy, steadfast focus, and extraordinary leadership.
♥,
KB