Matt is a serial entrepreneur and hustler, getting his start at Boston University and becoming somewhat of a legend as a club promoter in the area. After building a reputation, he began to engage with local companies who wanted to advertise at his events and leverage his network of 75 college student promoters to help promote their businesses. That was the foundation for his first marketing agency, The Magma Group. After a couple of twists and turns and the dot com crash in the early 2000s, he ultimately started a second agency called Mr. Youth (which later rebranded to MRY), a full stack marketing agency and one of the first to run social marketing for big brands. As a part of MRY, he built software called CrowdTap to help manage and incentivize a massive network of college reps, not too unlike the network of college promoters he had built in his early days. CrowdTap was the foundation for the business he runs today called Suzy.

Today at Suzy, Matt and his team have built a software platform that enables companies, both large and small, to rapidly access and engage consumers in real-time to help drive better business decisions. The Suzy team and business are growing like crazy, launching like a rocketship in 2018 and now supporting over 100 employees and 250 enterprise customers. In a digital-first landscape with rapidly changing consumer sentiment, companies like Suzy are the future of market research.

Tune in to hear Matt's story!

EPISODE TOPICS: 

• (2:30) Suzy snapshot today

• (3:37) Background and founding story

• (12:10) Social marketing in the early days

• (15:41) Product current/future state

• (18:29) Millennials

• (22:07) Startup marketing opportunities

• (24:00) Future of DTC brands

• (25:37) Competition

• (30:40) Hiring

• (35:21) Investor and mentor advice

• (37:02) Advice to younger self

• (38:41) Matt's wellness stack

• (45:12) Exciting trends

• (47:33) Matt's startup manifesto 

• (48:46) Matt's founder nomination