Turning a molehill into a mountain: How I turned a little problem into a huge business deal Part 1/2

“Dennis, let’s just buy the damn bikes.”

In April 2020, I was pacing the 18 square meters of my Kreuzberg flat living room, obsessing over how to get one of my employees a Canyon racing bike through a leasing service called JobRad. This was right after me and my business partner, David, had started Valuent to advise companies on how to implement a Salesforce CRM–and he was ready for me to move on.

But, well, the bike was awesome! And I had got in the mood of getting one for myself — a black machine like something right out of Blade Runner that would fit perfectly in the Berlin cityscape. And JobRad was doing something cool–we could get the bikes at ~70% cost if they’re leased through JobRad, thanks to tax incentives (similar to how company car leasing works). But, when I tried to make it happen, Valuent was rejected. I tried to cut a deal with the leasing bank directly, and multiple ways of getting it done with JobRad, but none worked. Since we had enough money on hand, it wasn’t about the leasing aspect but the legal contractual setup that secured the tax advantage. At only five months old, we didn’t qualify for this special arrangement. That’s when my teammates started telling me to drop it.

“Dennis, we are trying to start a company here. Forget about the freaking bikes!”

I can’t say what made me refuse to drop it. But my previous work at Rocket Internet–the first company I worked for after University–had something to do with it. The founder Oliver Samwer is notorious for copying US business models, and writing a letter to his staff titled “Blitzkrieg” that says something along the lines of “I am the most aggressive guy on the internet, I need you to be more aggressive, hire more Goldman, more McKinsey…” An iconoclast in the German startup scene. Now and then, his thick German accent reverberates on the back of my mind: “Don’t take no for an answer, ja.”

It just made no sense to me that we couldn’t take advantage of that deal, but I had only hit dead ends. So, I Googled “CEO JobRad,” and on page three of Google search results I found an old press release with a mobile phone number. I dialed.

“Hello, this is Holger Tumat.”

“Holger, this is Dennis Knodt, founder of Valuent. We have a problem. We would love to do business with you guys, I am sure it’s a win-win but for some reason it’s not working out and it makes no sense to me, so I thought you as CEO should know this, because if I was the CEO of JobRad I would certainly want to know. And I was hoping you could help me. Is it a good time to talk now?”

“Hi Dennis.” He sounded confused but patient. “I do have a few minutes. What’s the matter?”

So I shared the situation, from founder to founder. I got excited about their genius marketing with the checkout option on Canyon bike next to payment options like Paypal, that introduced our employee and then ultimately got us to chase them.

“We are the exclusive bike leasing partner with Canyon,” Holger told me. “I’ve known the founders for many years and we have a lot of respect for what they do. They make great bikes, I just recently got a mountain bike from Canyon that I love.” I could hear that Holger was proud of the long-standing relationship his company had built with Canyon. “We don’t really do marketing. We can hardly cope with the demand that we already have.” Both our smiles could be heard through the phone.

“Tell me a bit more about what it is that you guys do,” Holger probed.

“We help companies scale their sales, service and marketing with the help of Salesforce.”

“Ah cool, I wrote my diploma thesis on Customer Relationship Management. But at JobRad we already use Odoo.”

I didn’t say shit. But I felt an opening.

Then Holger said, “You know what, I think I can help you.”

And that was it.

The following weeks Holger really did follow up and eventually we got the damn bikes–one for the employee who brought this to me, and one for me! When the bikes arrived I had already purchased all the equipment before. It’s one of those bikes with clipless shoes. Took me about 1.5 hours of falling onto the Neukölln concrete and getting up again before I reliably got the shoes to clip into the pedals. From that first phone call that Holger and I had, I kept him closely in the loop and shared my appreciation for their help via iMessages.

I also took notes on my conversations with him and his colleagues, something I learned from my grandfather, including dates and names, because that creates commitment. I think people underestimate how much stronger a case you can make when you can name the exact names, roles, times and dates that you spoke with someone. I think it conveys a level of determination and mission that few people want to get in the way of. So they might as well support you in getting it done, so everyone can move on.

We quickly moved from using the formal German Sie to the informal Du. I liked Holger, he was cool. I loved how he shared his founding story in our first conversation. How he went to the Venture Capitalists and when they said, “If you don’t work out, we replace you,” he knew he wouldn’t work with these guys. How they had to crowdfund the platform, which was the most expensive form of funding that they had and how they had now paid back everyone and owned the entire company except for a small share that they left with an early angel investor. I believe in surrounding myself with people I admire, who have something about them that I would like to make my own. So why bother trying to sell him anything? No need. I already got more than I was looking for.

Then, in June, Holger messaged again: he had an idea for an exchange. “We are completely overwhelmed with customer requests. We have a huge backlog, our team is overwhelmed and frustrated and our customers get a shitty experience. They often call to ask where their bike is.”

We both laughed, knowing how I personally followed up with him every other day when we were waiting for our bikes.

“Is that something that Salesforce can help with?”

You know the answer.

“Then I have a second idea. This is a secret, but we are thinking about expanding internationally. The first market that we are considering is Austria. So if we decide to go into Austria, we’ll need a digital platform to support the end-to-end leasing process. I need digital signatures, we need to make sure it’s legally binding… Supplier invoices, credit notes… Customer portal, complete automation for companies with less than 100 FTE… While I want you to start small, I want you to give me feedback whether Salesforce can ultimately support the entire business process, customization is ok, if that is necessary to fully automate the process. And our Odoo resources are focused on Germany, so we will not have capacity to support Austria. Knowing our business, do you think Salesforce would be able to handle this entire process end-to-end?“

My response started by sharing David’s story of digitizing the entire end-to-end business process for his startup including invoicing, and resource management of doctors and surgery rooms. I told him, “You know what, Salesforce might be able to help you. But we need to dig deeper. I’ll be in touch.”

When I hung up, I was thrilled. Helping entrepreneurs realize their vision is what David and I originally set out as our “why” for Valuent. But as Valuent grew, much of our work was with managers and sales leads. Hearing Holger’s vision directly for how Salesforce might transform his business reminded us why we got started, and inspired us to go back to the roots.

Soon it was summer, and Berlin radiated with waves of heat that mingled with the city’s exhaust fumes. It was peak Covid during this time, and our work was already remote–why not go to France? We were a small team of four. So we packed our things, got really good rates on a new Mercedes V Class rental van (finally something good from Corona travel bans), put our bikes into the back and drove to Fayence via Zurich. (Short stop on Lake Como where you’ll find one of the best truffle steaks of your life.) Our ride took us alongside the French Riviera straight to the beautiful holiday home from which we’d continue building Valuent for the next two weeks. And of course in the cool of the evening and on the weekends, we’d take our bikes for a nice mountain ride.

During the trip, I decided to message Holger. We were only on this epic adventure because of him!

“Moin Holger,
Hope you’re doing well. We are now in France for a couple of weeks working remotely :). Immediately drove up the mountains on our first bike tour 🚲 🏔and got dehydrated. But now it’s good again because I got some Sodium 🧂 and will take shorter rides for the time being.

How is everything on your end? Any update on Austria🇦🇹?

Best regards from France🇫🇷
Dennis”

Holger’s response from that night still excites me:

“Hello Dennis, viva la France (et le vélo)! How wonderful, the digital nomad life. Today we decided to expand into Austria. Now we make the personnel decisions, then we’ll gladly reach out regarding the Software. Are you in France by car? Does the return trip possibly take you past Freiburg? You are most welcome! Coffee, wine or whatever… LG Holger”

Genius. I ran to David. “Dude, Holger wants to meet us. We’re driving to Freiburg on our way back.”

“Really? Dennis, that’s like a couple of hours of extra driving…”

David is a great man with an airplane-dry sense of humor, but he is not a man of beautiful detours, so I did my best to convince him that this would be worth it.

I told Holger we were coming. Then, I logged in to our Salesforce Partner portal to submit the lead.

In Part 2, I’ll tell you how this detour through the French countryside changed the trajectory of our business and accelerated our growth by two years…