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Noble Conversations
Road to 3 Million Users as a One-Woman Dev Team | A Noble Conversation with Nadia Odunayo
Today, we sit down for a Noble Conversation with Nadia Odunayo, the Founder and CEO of StoryGraph, a book-tracking platform that helps readers track their reading and recommends books to them based on their moods.
We cover:
1. What makes StoryGraph different from other book tracking platforms like GoodReads
2. What the StoryGraph's CEO is currently reading
3. How she built her company to almost 3 million registered users as a one-woman dev team
Welcome to the Noble Conversations, a platform focused on building the society of our dreams by engaging in noble conversations with those who are making community and global impact. Now you know we don't disappoint. Today's guest is definitely one of those people. Her name is Nadia Odu Nayo and she's the CEO at Storygraph. Now, Storygraph is the biggest competitor to Goodreads, and it's different in the sense that it doesn't just allow you to input what you've read in the past, what you're planning to read and then what you're currently reading now. It helps you see four main things that I personally also enjoyed. One of them is being able to see what kind of books you typically read and what's the split between those books. So, is it nonfiction or fiction, and what percentage is fiction? What percentage is nonfiction? Two, what kind of moods of books do you typically go for? So, is it informative, reflective, inspiring, entertaining, and what's the split between those those moods? Three is pages. Do you typically go for books that are over 300 pages or under 300 pages, for example?
Speaker 1:Four is pace. Do you typically go for fast paced books, slow paced books and all that? Now, for me, the kind of reader that I am I recently discovered this is I like to read books that are reflective, inspiring and informative, and my books are typically non-fiction books Some of you might guess that already and they're typically under 300 pages. I'm not a huge fan of books that are over 300 pages. If I can't get the information in under 300 pages, I just find summaries, unless it's a book that I really, really want to read and I really really am looking forward to Now.
Speaker 1:Today's no Book Conversation is going to be focused on the road from 1 million users to 2 million users as a one-woman development team. Join us, nadia. Thank you very much for joining us for Noble Conversations today. This is a conversation I've been looking forward to for a long time, and I've been exposed to Storygraph for about a year now and I really enjoyed the product, like I mentioned before we started this conversation, and so just being able to talk to you about the product here you know it's history, where it's at now and where it's going is definitely something that I'm excited about. So, before we dive in, I want to ask when you think about yourself right like how do you view yourself in your work and outside of your work too?
Speaker 2:Oh, first of all, thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. How do I see myself? There are so many things that I can think of. I see myself as well. I'm an ambitious person, and I think the thing that I love about myself is that I'm a generalist. So I love doing a lot of different things, and I think that's why I was drawn to entrepreneurship, because I feel like it enables me to realize my full potential in a bunch of different avenues. I'm someone who's always trying to get better at stuff and just trying to make sure I'm having fun along the way, and so I think, through running Storygraph and my dance and my creative projects and just the relationships I cultivate with my family and friends, I think I'm always just trying to be the best I can be, improve and make others happy and enjoy the journey alongside with me okay, so you mentioned you're a generalist.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, so I'm, I like to think I'm a generalist myself. How do you balance that with? Because, like, you have multiple things that you're interested in, like dance, you know storytelling through um story graph, and just different things. So how do you balance that, with different things pulling on your attention in different directions? Because that's something I struggle with, because I think of one thing today. I'm like, oh yeah, let me start working on this, and then tomorrow I think of another thing and then I start working on that and yeah, let me, let me, let me, let you answer that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's something that I'm always grappling with and I go through phases in my life. So when you asked me this question, the first thing that comes to mind is when I was in bootcamp software bootcamp. So after I graduated, I won a free place to do a coding bootcamp, which is how I got into development, and a few weeks in to this 12 week course, the head coach pulled me into a room and he said you are so talented, you could be so amazing, you could be really good at this coding thing. But I feel like you're always looking at new shiny, new shiny. You're doing this thing over here, you're trying to start that project over there, you're chatting to this person over here, and I remember taking a moment and realizing, yeah, I was doing so many things. I was running a blog, I was. I had the story graph then, but it wasn't what it is now. It was a creative writing, e-publication, and so that gave me a moment to try and be like let me focus in on this coding thing, get really good while I'm here, and then I can work on all my side projects after. So it's definitely a thing that's been a theme for me, and I think that one thing that helps is every week I reflect.
Speaker 2:I have different checkpoints, so I have a weekly checkpoint and I have a monthly checkpoint and I have a quarterly checkpoint, and then I do annual goals as well, and I think these are great ways to just make sure I've got the balance right.
Speaker 2:So, for example, every week I'll say what went well in the week, what do I want to improve, what are my week's goals, and I do the same thing monthly and quarterly as well, and I think that means that if the balance is off kilter, that I can kind of adjust. But I do think I've also just accepted the fact that I'm not going to be the best developer, the, the, you know, the most advanced coder, but that doesn't matter. As long as I'm building a product that people can use and is secure and fast, that's okay. And I'm not going to be the most amazing dancer that I can be, but I can be very good and I so. I think that's also part of it as well, coming to terms that, coming to terms with the fact that, yes, I'm not going to be the most excellent, that I can be in everything, but I'm going to have a lot of fun.
Speaker 1:Okay, I mean, I've seen you dance and to me you seem excellent.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so definitely one reflecting, you know, on a frequent basis. And then two accepting the fact that, as a generalist, you may not necessarily be the best at one specific thing, but you just enjoy exploring different things. Yes definitely Okay.
Speaker 2:I also found that I had a moment of reflection at the beginning of this year where I felt like I was always go, go, go, in that you know I have a lot of things I'm doing and so to do all of those things, I kind of need to, you know, pretty much do them back to back and I need to, like I, live by my calendar, so I'll often plan things out. I've got my morning routine and coming into 2024, I remember thinking, wait, I'm just go, go, go. Am I actually happy? I'm happy, go, go. Am I actually happy? I'm happy, like I feel happy. But am I doing the right things? Have I got the balance right? And so I started going on a morning walk, every walk, every morning, and that's also just been a great way to get extra thinking time on a daily basis. So that's also something that helps when you're a generalist and you've got a large bucket of things that you do okay, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 1:that's helpful Morning routine, being able to like reset your mind and just checking with yourself and see, okay, like, how do I feel about what I'm doing? So, looking at storytelling because you mentioned, you dance, but you also are passionate about fiction and storytelling. Why is storytelling important?
Speaker 2:I just think it's the key to everything Learning things, becoming a more empathetic, understanding person, remembering things. We, I think humans, we're just storytelling creatures. We like telling stories, we like sharing stories. So I just think and it's just fun, right, it's interesting you're like where is this gonna go? What's gonna happen? The idea of like discussing books and stories with people, people having different perspectives that you didn't even realize. And I think, as we live our lives, we're we're living stories, like that's what we are living, and so, um, I just think it's just the core of everything. I also think to make an excellent product, to give an excellent talk, even as I'm doing this interview now, I think it's better when I weave stories in, when I'm trying to teach somebody something. If I can use an analogy or a story, then I think the teaching is more effective. So I just think storytelling is just such a core device and it runs through more places than people think.
Speaker 1:No, that's helpful because I think you know. The times that I've been able to connect to what someone is saying is when they're actually telling a story. You know because you can make your point, but then if you don't include a story, then it's hard to actually, like you know, follow or, to an extent, be able to see where someone is going. So you started Storygraph right and it helps readers track their reading and choose. You know their next book, whether it's based on their mood or their favorite topics. What makes Storygraph different from other book? You know book tracking platforms like Goodreads, for example.
Speaker 2:I think that originally, when I started it, I had a very clear user base or type of reader that I was targeting and I think, in general when you're starting a new product, particularly in a space where similar products exist, it's very important to find your niche.
Speaker 2:And so originally the niche was mood readers. People who struggle to pick up their next book will pick up one book, put it down, start another one, and they just needed help making the decision about what to read next. And so I didn't even identify as a mood reader. So this wasn't a pain point that I thought I had, but I could see that there was a gap to build something for mood readers. So that's how we originally stood apart, and as we've grown, I think the thing that keeps us differentiated from other people is just my focus on customer research and customer interviews and just being really in tune with what readers want. So it's less so about a specific niche of customer, because we're much more general now. We have millions of people who go on the app every month but it's more about okay, what are the pain points people have with the product, how do we solve those? And then let's keep going on that iterative cycle and we just continue to iterate and improve, and I think that's what sets us apart now.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you mentioned that you didn't necessarily identify as a mood reader. So how did you find, how did you know that that was a problem? Was it maybe through one of your friends, or like? How did you find that problem?
Speaker 2:friends or like how did you find that problem? I so, when I beginning of 2019, I had four years of runway and I was just working on two side projects that I had. So the plan was to work on a reading app side project and a running app side project, and essentially I started with the reading app on the first day. It was January 3rd 2019 and I've just never gone to the running app. I've just never picked that up again.
Speaker 2:But I spent a week building this side project. It was an idea I already had that was a companion app to Goodreads, and I had such a great time that I said to myself wow, I want to build, I want to stay in the book space, I want to make sure I can find something that is needed in the book space so that I can build a life working in books. And so at that point I said I need to go and talk to readers to figure out is there something, is there space for me to build something? Because the worst is building something that nobody wants. And so I started reaching out to readers that I knew friends I had, but also a friend told me about Bookstagram, essentially the books corner of Instagram.
Speaker 2:And so I went onto Instagram, I created an account and I started. I searched the Bookstagram hashtag and I started following people on that hashtag and reading all of their posts. And that's when I started to see this repeated theme of I'm a mood reader and I just want something a book that makes me feel like this book, or I want something warm and comforting, because I've just read a really sad book. So this was the language that people were using to talk about books and they were coming to Instagram to ask other people and I thought what if there was an app that could answer these questions? And originally, even when I was getting people you know the first five to ten people who were interested in it even when I was getting that engagement, I was nervous because I didn't identify as a mood reader and I thought can I build a product that is not for me? But then you know how with startups they often say, you often hear the lingo of um, what's your unique hypothesis or what? Do you believe that nobody else believes it?
Speaker 1:was beliefs. Yeah, yeah, that thing, yeah zero to one.
Speaker 2:That's where it's from exactly. And I I thought oh, I think that everybody is actually a mood reader. So the more I spoke to different readers and the more I thought about my experience with books over the years, I said I think everybody is a mood reader and because there are some books that you might read at a certain point in your life that you just don't get on with, but if you picked it up some years later, when you're in a different mood, you might love it, and actually that's because you're a mood reader, and everyone is a mood reader to different extents. And so that was the thing that I, that that was that became the hypothesis of the product that everybody's a mood reader. And so how do you help people find their next perfect book based on their mood?
Speaker 1:no it. It sounds kind of like, let's say, when you go to Netflix and you're like huh what do I feel like watching?
Speaker 2:today Do I want?
Speaker 1:to watch comedy. Do I want to watch, you know, like just action, just being able to figure out okay, what movie am I in the mood for? So in this case, it's like what book am I in the mood for? Yes, so I have looked at my story graph charts and I realize that I'm more of a reflective. I like to read books that are more reflective, inspiring and informative, and they're typically under 300 pages, because once it gets over 300 pages I'm like, okay, I need to find a book summary. So you mentioned or at least I've seen on Storygraph's website, you know, life is too short for a book you're not in the mood for. I have two questions there. One is what kind of reader are you now that you've been able to, you know, build the product? And then, two, what book are you currently in the mood for?
Speaker 2:Ooh. So what kind of reader am I? I feel like I'm a hybrid between a mood, because everyone's a mood reader, so I'm a hybrid between a mood reader and a planner. I'm quite an organized, disciplined person and I'm a goals-oriented person. So I set up personal reading challenges and reading goals and pages goals, and in my journal I have a spread or a page where I draw out all my reading goals for the for the year. So, for example, one of my personal reading challenges that I've been doing is I'm trying to read all of Toni Morrison's books in chronological in publication order and this is a multi-year project I'm slowly going through.
Speaker 2:I'm due to read Beloved this month, and so that is, um an example. So I'm like a goals oriented mood reader, because I am that person that if I see something, um. So a few weeks ago I was in Edinburgh with a friend and we went into a bookstore and this bright yellow cover with a kind of cow on it and a blood stain kind of drew us in. We were like what is it? It was called butter and we picked it up and we saw some of the, the key terms it was something about. There was like a murder mystery and there was something about misogyny and feminism and food butter. I love butter. So I thought, yeah, let's get it. And we got it and I just started it on the plane over to California. I'm in California right now, and so it's that mix between I have my goals for the month, but I'm open to throwing in something that grabs my attention.
Speaker 1:I'm also so you're oh no, go ahead. No, I was going to say I'm also so you're.
Speaker 2:Oh no, go ahead. No, I was gonna say I'm also an incredibly eclectic reader. It's similar with my, with my music and movies taste, uh, my, my tastes and interests are incredibly broad, so I read everything from your like history, uh, politics, history books. So one of the books I read at the beginning of this year was called All Out War and it was a detailed story of how we got to Brexit in the UK and it was like everything between the Brexit campaign, both sides, like behind the scenes, deep dive right. Some people would find that incredibly boring. I was fascinated To. I Will Read. I love everything from. I love fantasy. I've gotten into romance recently because of being exposed to what all my users read, so I read thriller. I just read every genre mostly. So that's another thing.
Speaker 1:I'm a very broad reader and it's fiction and nonfiction other thing, I'm a very broad reader and it's fiction and non-fiction. And you went to correct me if I'm wrong, but you went to school for philosophy, politics, and was it econ?
Speaker 2:yes, that was my that was my degree philosophy politics and economics and then I focused mainly on economics, um, and the philosophy side. But yeah, that was my degree okay.
Speaker 1:Was there a reason you chose that? Did you see yourself doing something in that space?
Speaker 2:yes, I was going to go into investment banking. I was. I was brought up so originally, you know, growing up to Nigerian parents, it was very much like doctor, lawyer, the, you know, the standard thing. So for a long time I said I'm going to be a doctor. And, um, I remember I was 14 and I was in art class and my art teacher sat next to me and he said so, what do you want to, what do you want to do, what do you want to be? And I said I want to be a doctor. And he immediately said no, you don't. And I looked at him. I remember being so taken aback I see it so visually right now and he said no, you don't. And I said what do you mean? Why did you say that? And he said, the way you, you don't. And I said what do you mean? Why did you say that? And he said, the way you said that I've seen you, you know I've been teaching you for some years now. You're not excited about being a doctor. And I remember going home and thinking, huh, I guess I've just been saying I'm going to be a doctor because that's what my mom told me.
Speaker 2:And I thought, yeah, I like science and the idea of helping people. And then I realized, you know, going through school, the sciences that I liked the most, the science that I liked the most, was physics, and then chemistry, and that was more the math side. And for medical courses, biology was never a requirement, it was always chemistry. But I did always find it weird that out of all the sciences, I liked biology the least, and I did think is this a problem? So at some point I kind of thought, ok, maybe I'm going to go down engineering, the engineering route, um, and then, for the final, throughout school though, I remember that my, uh, my, I had friends whose parents worked in like investment banks and they had things like work experience days, and so I went with. I remember one day I went with a friend, with her dad, to UBS, and when you're 14 and you go into an investment bank, it looks so exciting. You're seeing all these men and women in their suits, carrying their BlackBerrys, and you go on the trading floor.
Speaker 1:I remember BlackBerrys. Yes.
Speaker 2:And I remember thinking, ah, yes, this is what I want to do. No-transcript looked at this philosophy, politics and economics course and it was at Oxford, but there were there were also a couple of other places that did it and I thought, yes, this is, this is what I want to do, and so I transitioned into focusing on the philosophy, politics and economics, thinking I was going to end up in investment banking and I remember the only reason that my mom was okay with me going down this route was because it had economics in there. I remember her saying, okay, because there's economics there, then that's okay.
Speaker 1:If it didn't have economics, she wouldn't have gone for it.
Speaker 2:Politics and philosophy is not rigorous enough for her, but I feel like whatever I would have wanted to do, I would have done it, but it was great that she did approve. So yeah, that's the kind of transition how I went from I think I'm going to be a doctor to I love economics, I loved game theory, or I love game theory rather, and I'm going to go into investment banking. That was the journey.
Speaker 1:Okay. So it sounds like 2008 was key for you in terms of that interest in econ, politics and philosophy. So how did you go from that to okay, I want to start a company?
Speaker 2:Okay, so I've always been entrepreneurial, so I've always wanted to start a company. Okay, so, I've always been entrepreneurial, so I've always wanted to start a company. So, even when I was younger, um, I remember I don't I can't remember what age I was, but do you know the website neopets? Did you know that? It was like this website where you could have these pets that you could cultivate? Uh, it was a static website in and they had these things called guilds. And I remember starting a business then where I would code up I didn't know any code yet but using like HTML or whatever WYSIWYG editor they had, I would do custom designs for people's guild pages and then they would give me gold coins in the app. And that was probably my first kind of business thing, kind of business thing. And then at school, in that 16 to 18 phase, there's this program in the UK called Young Enterprise, where you group up with people in your school and you start a business and they have the structure and the framework for it. And so I was part of that and I was the finance officer for my, for the company that we started, and so going into university, I thought, yes, I, yes, I'm going to go. I've been following, like I had relationships with different banks through different summer internships and things like that. So I said, okay, I'm going to do my degree, then I'm going to go work in an investment bank and then at some point I'm going to leave and start my own business.
Speaker 2:While I was at university, I started an online publication with a friend called the Storygraph, and when I started that, I was launching that in the summer of my second and third year, and that was while I was doing an internship at Deutsche Bank, and so two things were happening. I remember it was during the internship that I first started to become disillusioned with the investment banking career. It just felt like it wasn't fulfilling enough, it wasn't stimulating enough, and I thought like there must be something more that I can do or something different like this isn't. I'm working so hard at university and the next step it doesn't feel that exciting. And at the same time, I'm working so hard at university and the next step it doesn't feel that exciting. And at the same time, I'm launching this online publication called the Storygraph and I'm thinking this is so exciting, this is really cool, and those kind of pieces are falling into place and I had applied for this entrepreneurship program accelerator thing called Entrepreneur First as a kind of alternative for when I finished university, and when I had applied there was a checkbox that said we will be trialing a coding, a free coding course for women.
Speaker 2:Are you interested in being considered for this? As there was like a separate add-on to the entrepreneurship program, and I just checked the box. I thought why not separate add-on to the entrepreneurship program? And I just checked the box. I thought why not? And so the other thing was, while I was launching this online publication, I had a friend who was helping with the website and me and my friend who was who were running the publication. We paid a amount of money like maybe a thousand pounds, I think it was, which was definitely underpaying for what he was doing. But he, as a favor, he said just pay me a thousand pounds, sort it all out. He ran like a website and illustration studio and so we had paid him a thousand pounds and he was kind of helping us, but it was because we weren't a proper paying client.
Speaker 2:I remember feeling very frustrated that I had to. If there was an issue, I had to email him, wait for him to get to it whenever he could, and then he would make a change. So all these things are happening. I'm having fun launching something, I'm feeling very hampered by my lack of technical ability, I'm becoming disillusioned with the investment banking career.
Speaker 2:And then I get the investment banking job. So I have a job waiting for me after I graduate. And then I don't make the entrepreneurship program, but they give me a place on this free coding course and I remember thinking what do I want the coding course? I don't want to be a developer, I want to run a business. And then the next day, after I got the no from this entrepreneurship program which, by the way, I got to the final round and their feedback to me was you're just a bit too corporate. And I remember thinking what do you mean? It's because you know I have an investment banking internship that you're just, you know, projecting or just imagining me as being corporate. That's how I received that feedback at the time. But because I turned up like in a blouse and jeans and these sneakers, colorful sneakers. So I was thinking what do you mean?
Speaker 1:I'm too corporate how do you, yeah, how do you get corporate from that?
Speaker 2:I think maybe just how I spoke in the interviews which obviously the I'd done so several like investment banking interviews, so maybe I interviewed as very like professional and corporate um. But the day after that, anyway, the day after day after I got the yes, we're not accepting you onto this entrepreneurship course, but we're going to give you a place on this free coding course my college at Oxford emailed me and said hey, we know you're probably already doing something after you graduate, but we would love to. We want someone to stay behind and work at the college for a while to help set up this website or this portal to help 12 to 16 year olds start to prepare to apply to top universities in this country and beyond. And I just thought you know what? I'm going to turn down the banking job. I'm going to spend a couple months working in Oxford at my college, setting up this resource. I'm going to spend a couple months working in Oxford at my college setting up this resource, and twice a week I'm going to go to London to do this free coding course.
Speaker 2:And so that's what I did. And then, while I was doing that free coding course, on Twitter I saw an ad for Makers Academy Bootcamp. We're doing a scholarship competition. The course is £8,000, but we're looking for one person to come and take the course for free and I applied for that and ended up winning it. And that's how I did the full-on software bootcamp, and fully transitioned into tech man.
Speaker 1:So it sounds like it was just the perfect combination of, like you know, being disillusioned with investment banking career, going through the coding bootcamp.
Speaker 1:you know the opportunity at Oxford to stay back and then you know being able to win that course or win the application to do that course, the $8,000 course. So it sounds like it's just things kind of were happening simultaneously that led you to where you are now. Yeah, so I saw you did a talk titled getting from 1 million users to you know, getting to 1 million users as a one woman dev team. Yes, now you're at 2 million. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker 2:That's true, and the last time I did that talk I submitted the title as getting to 2 million users as a one woman dev team.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay. So what does that mean to you like, looking at that and the growth that you've seen in the past? What believe the last time you did that talk? What was that like? So the last time I did the talk was a few months ago, but the first time I did it was october of 2020 2022 okay, so from then till now, like what does that growth mean to you?
Speaker 2:I remember that it wasn't until I was thinking about for that October 2022 conference which was in Hollywood in LA. Um, I remember thinking about what I was going to talk about and I was going to pitch a ruby, a technical ruby talk, and my friend, saron Saron Yitbarek she said I'm sorry, but if I was going to a Rails business conference and the founder of Storygraph was going to talk about a Ruby thing, I would be disappointed. You've got to talk about what you've done as a one-woman dev and the fact that you've reached so many users and you're profitable. And when I came up with that talk title getting to one million users as a one-woman dev it was a moment of pause for me. I remember sitting in my house and being like wow, I can give a talk with that title. So, because I'm just as I said, go, go, go. And I still feel like I'm so far from where I want to be that sometimes I don't take moments to celebrate or to be proud of myself. So I think the fact that I could even make a talk with that title was a real moment of like reflection and a moment to just take to pause and say wow, nadia, you should be really proud of yourself.
Speaker 2:And then, when I did it recently and it was getting to two million users, saron again my same friend. She was the one that advised me to change the talk title and I was very resistant at first because I said no, the talk is getting to one million users as a one woman dev. It doesn't. That's what the original story is about. And then at the end of the talk I say, well, here's how we are now. And I said it doesn't make sense, because otherwise you're basically suggesting that I keep changing the talk title every time I meet a new milestone. And she said, yeah, because that that's the headline, that's what grabs people, and so every time that number goes up, it's even more impressive. So if you say getting to five million users as a one woman dev, that's like wow.
Speaker 2:And when she said the talk title is your headline, then I was immediately like yes, I should change the talk title. And so again, what was really awesome was being like deleting the one, changing it to two. But then also there's a lot of other numbers and stats in the talk and all of them had gone up or stayed or were better than they were before, like in cases, maybe it's a cost thing or a churn thing, and so that was also another great point of reflection, because it was going through the story of how I got to the two million users but also going, wow, since the last time I did these talks, these numbers have only gone up. We had 8,000 plus subscribers, now we have 12,000, so things like that. So it's just by doing the talk it's a great reflection point, it's a great moment to celebrate, and I just feel so. You know, even just going over the story that I went through with you just before, I feel so grateful and fortunate and lucky to be in this situation as well.
Speaker 1:No, that's definitely impressive. I mean being able to see, ok, we went from this number to one million, from one million to two million, like it's like, oh, like we're growing, yes, and so that's definitely inspiring and and impressive. You mentioned being far from where you want to be. Where do you want to be?
Speaker 2:there is. There's no clear number or or goal, because I mean, you know, I'm that. I think that would be arbitrary, essentially, if I said, oh, I want to get to 10 million users and you know, and then what? I think I definitely want to be the best. I want to be known as the best reading tracking app in the world, like I want to be the go to no brainer place where, if you are an avid reader and you want to know what to read next, or if you're someone who wants to get into reading or used to love to read and haven't picked up a book in a very long time, you immediately say, oh, I'm just going to go to Storygraph. Obviously, I want to make sure that we're a company that stays customer centric and that we move with the time. So, as the books and reading industry changes, we're there, keeping up and making sure that we're just creating a joyful, intuitive, fun experience.
Speaker 2:So that's that, but I also there's a, there's another side to it. That's also just a feeling. So, for example, just knowing, like, right now, there were a lot of um, ux and ui pain points and things, of areas of polish that I just want to tackle. Um, sometimes people say you know, oh, the app can be a bit slow sometimes, and I want those kind of complaints to be a thing of the past. There's whether people like the product or not. There's no reason for someone to say the app is sometimes slow for me, like you know what I mean. Or yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm confused where's this feature? It might not be for you, but I don't want you to say I can't find where anything is. So there's that kind of barometer almost, or temperature gauge of just in general. I want the ui, ux and performance of the app to be like best in class and then separately.
Speaker 1:I want us to be like the main reading app that people go to Okay, and you mentioned adapting with the times and adapting with the industry in terms of where the industry is going book reading industry. What patterns have you seen in terms of the industry Books that people typically like to read? How has that changed? Obviously, this is very broad because it's different genres that people could could read, but what have you seen in terms of change in the industry and what people are actually like looking to read?
Speaker 2:yeah, it's, I don't really track friends very closely, um, but what I'm seeing from being on social media and because I run the company's instagram, twitter and threads accounts and my special instagram, you do see, like I have seen the big growth in romance and in fact there's this huge growth now in this what they're calling romance c, which I think is like romance and fantasy okay um, so I'm seeing things like that.
Speaker 2:Um, I'm seeing, um, you're seeing, in fact, the growth of more social reading, which is very interesting. So things like, uh, large online book clubs and and things like read-alongs and buddy reads, so more ad hoc group reading situations and storygraph. We so far have been, but we want to make sure we're there to facilitate those and enrich those where we can. The other thing that's interesting is a lot of things over time become more digital, right, and we do have, you know, kobos and Kindles and e-readers, but you are seeing like this, you'll see, you're still seeing lots of people buy print books, special editions, things like that.
Speaker 2:So there is a lot of room for offline reading as well, which is super interesting. There's a huge growth in audiobooks. So people are listening on audio and lots of people are now doing things where they're reading in tandem, different formats, so they're reading digitally or in print while listening to the audio as well, and so it's kind of thinking like, how can we be there as an app to facilitate that, immerse what people are classing or what we're classing, immersive reading? So those are some of the things I'm seeing and I want to make sure that Storygraph can just you know, enhance and enrich those experiences.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay, no, that's definitely helpful to know. So, looking at when Storygraph was founded, to like now is there anything you wish? Maybe you could have done differently.
Speaker 2:It's hard. I'm sure there are things that I could have done better. It's hard, I'm sure there are things that I could have done better, but every time that maybe I think I made a wrong decision, it's a learning, it was a learning thing. So it's hard to say is there anything I could have done differently? Because I feel like, because of the way I set the company up to be very responsive and agile, I can deploy. I often deploy several times a day. I can roll back changes.
Speaker 2:If I'm hearing some people the customers don't like something, I could undo it. I could adapt and improve it. And also, personally, with my personal reflection points along the way, if I feel like you haven't spent enough time coding this week or this month, then I'll try and correct for that next month. I feel like there are almost limited timeframes where I feel like I didn't manage my time well or I made the wrong product decision, but I feel like I've got all these checks and balances in place to correct for that. So I almost don't think there's not.
Speaker 2:If there was anything right now that I was thinking, oh, I wish I'd done differently, I think I would have handled it already or addressed it already, and I think sometimes some of the mistakes that have been made or things that went wrong are just ways to do it better next time. So we recently had a big migration and you know we we had planned it and we thought we were going to be down for six hours. We were actually down for 20 hours and I ran a postmortem with the team a few days ago talking about, ok, where did we go wrong and what can we do next time. And now we've got an action plan for the next migration. So we don't like that. We were down for so long, but it's kind of part of building and growing a company.
Speaker 1:You have to go through these growing pains and these experiences to know how to do it better next time. Okay, okay. So if there was anything, it's probably been handled already and you're you know. Basically, it is just taking it as a learning experience yeah, I think everything has been a learning experience.
Speaker 2:Now, if I had spent months building a feature on Storygraph and or paying somebody to build a feature on Storygraph, and then we'd launched it and we were now struggling to maintain it or it wasn't really being used, I might be saying, yeah, I regret doing that, never again, but I haven't. I think I went into Storygraph having some really good base practices from my work at Pivotal, which is the first place I worked when I finished bootcamp.
Speaker 2:I worked there for a year and a half they instilled some excellent software development practices and the agile methodology. And then also I had two co-founder partnerships before starting Storygraph, and so again, the learnings from those also meant that when I came to start the company, I feel like I was just going in with a really good set of processes and approaches. That really meant that it kind of minimized risk in terms of doing the wrong thing for too long.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay. So yeah, in terms of entrepreneurship, like, something I always think about is, like you know, there are good days and there are bad days, right?
Speaker 1:I always think about is, like you know, there are good days and there are bad days, right. So, like for you, how do you handle those good days and those bad days in a way that you're not like oh, I should quit this now? You know, because there are times where it's like things are going very well and you're like, yes, I can do this forever right. And there are times where it's like, eh well, maybe there are other things I could do. How do you handle that?
Speaker 2:Okay. So I think the stage at which Storygraph is changes the answer to this question. So, for example, in the first year where I was working solo and I was just trying to see, is there something here, I would have days where it felt like nobody cared, this was going nowhere and the things and I was working alone, so it wasn't like I had a team member or somebody to tell me no, no, we got this. Those times, the things that kept me going was one I had runway, which was super helpful for my previous business, and I, like I saved a lot so I didn't need to work.
Speaker 2:That was one but two, it was the um. I had the founder product sit, you know, when I told you I just knew I wanted to work in books, so I had. It was kind of my why or kind of my. I can't imagine doing anything else. This is what I really want to do. So I'm going to keep trying to make this work for as long as it makes sense or is sensible. So back then that's what kept me going.
Speaker 2:I think in the earlier stages you need some form of either personal interest in the product or the space, or a mission being mission driven, something that keeps you going when you're trying to get things off the ground. If we jump to, like today. There is never a time today when I think, oh, I want to pack in StoryGraph, like it never, because of where we're at the momentum. There's never a time where I think I don't wanna, I don't want to do this, but when I have bad days or really tough days, or just days where I'm stuck on a bug or it feels like things are too hard or there was just so many different things happening that a range of things keep me going one I have rob my co-founder, who's amazing. So it's always like, um, we, we're just a team, so just the virtue of having a partner is super helpful. Two, all the customers. Every day there are dozens of messages, at least of people on all the social media platforms of people saying amazing things about Storygraph. So it's like that keeps me going always, because it's like this is what I'm doing. I'm doing it to make these people happy and how amazing that something that was an idea in my head is bringing joy to all of these people. It was so fascinating when we were down for the 20 hours the other day seeing how many people almost. The product is almost like an emotional support blanket for them and it's their comfort space and they you go in every day to track their reading. They're tracking multiple times a day and so that I don't take that kind of, I guess, responsibility to my customers lightly as well, like it's like I'm doing this for them.
Speaker 2:So that's one piece, but also at the top of the conversation we spoke about all the stuff that I do in my life, like how full my life is outside of Storygraph and that my dancing, my family and friends, me time I work out outside of dancing. I go to the gym three times a week I run with my dad. Every other week I'm playing tennis. These things keep me mentally healthy, physically fit, and that means that the down times I'm just in a generally, I'm in a good. The down times I'm just in a generally I'm in a good mood, I'm feeling good.
Speaker 2:Um, I I think in general I'm very lucky to have a a positive, sunny, optimistic disposition, like that's my default. So that also helps. So things like I'm just I'm very lucky in that sense I'm also mentally healthy and that's also super helpful because, you know, things can get really tough, so all of these things just combine to mean that it never gets so, so bad. And when I, um, when I have a bad day, either, also if I feel personally like I have been unproductive or I've procrastinated, I say, well, there's no point worrying about that. Time is your most valuable resource, onto tomorrow, you know, onto the next day, and so the these are the kind of things that keep me going.
Speaker 1:Okay, so in the early days it was the fact that you knew you had found a product fit, but now you know that's what kept you. Now it's you know, your team, the customers and the healthy habits that you've built. Correct.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so one big combination. And also I I still have the founder product for it, but that never went away like I love what I'm doing, I see this as my life's work. I love reading, I love books, um, so it's, yes, a combination of all of these things. And also it's bad days, in terms of, like startup, bad days are very few and far in between. Like, most days are great. It's very rare that we have bad days.
Speaker 1:Okay, okay. And then what's something you wish more people knew about you and the work that you do that maybe they don't currently know.
Speaker 2:That's a good question, because I see them as different. Actually, what's one thing people wish they knew about you, but also the product? The first thing that comes to mind is how much care and attention I take to every single aspect, because I have to make decisions and trade us every day, and one of the things that's hardest to deal with for me is when I launch a product, when I launch a feature that I spent months working on, and immediately people say things as if this thing that they're talking about didn't cross my mind, and I just have to be very patient and just be like it's okay, they don't know, or, um, it's fine, like you're going to communicate with them. But I fight because I take so much care about trying to make as many people possible as happy Sorry, because I take so much care in trying to make as many people as possible happy. When people message and say, oh, you didn't think about the people who finished multiple books on a day, for example in relation to the new calendar feature, it was like no, I did. In relation to the new calendar feature, it was like no, I did. This was just a decision I made, because there were some people who finished 10 books in a day and there were some people who finished one book in a day. So I am trying to cater to all of you and so I think, if I knew, I wish more people knew that I do actually take attention to detail and often what they see is not a bug or a lack of consideration, but a choice that have to be made. Um, and then also, I think I wish more people knew that Storygraph was a one-woman dev.
Speaker 2:A lot of people don't know. They assume there's a team, and so when certain things happen or when it's like you know, I've been asking for this thing for years why hasn't it been done? It's like the team is actually quite small and if you think about the fact that, um, bigger companies sometimes take years to get to things, bigger companies still have outages. It's not, it's even like a. It just even goes to show that when we, when you think about what we're managing at the team size we are, I think it's even more impressive and I think more people would have a lot of patience and more grace if they knew that. And, on the whole, 95 98 of our user base is very understanding, supportive, even thinking we have a bigger team. They're great, but you do have cases where people um talk at you as if, um, you're a big team and you also didn't sweat the small stuff yeah, yeah, yeah, that can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, it's having to see. Okay, I on. Basically, you're saying you want people to see that you sweat the details and if there's something that they're seeing, it's not because you didn't think about it, but it's because you made a deliberate choice yes okay and often when I talk to people, when I message people on, say someone with this calendar thing, for example, I had a bunch of people message.
Speaker 2:So the calendar thing is a template where you get a calendar graphic where you see what you read and the color is picked from the cover, and so say you're reading a certain book, you've zero to one and that you've got a line that's the blue of that cover and it's going through the days that you read it. When you didn't read it there's a. It's empty. That line's not there. And on the day you finish it it's got the cover and the bottom right of every day cell has the number of pages you read or the number of minutes you listen to if you're on audio, right. So some people and I used to be this type of user until I started doing a pages goal some people they don't track their pages each day so they don't say, oh, now I'm at page 52, now I'm at page 57. They just mark I've started this book and then some days or some months later they'll come back and say I, I finished this book. Now for those people they get a little line on the day they started and a line and the cover on the day they ended. And I've had dozens of messages say is mine broken? Or this must be broken, because they say I don't track pages every day. But, um, I don't have a line running through and it just doesn't look great. And I purposely designed the graphic for both people for the people who start and stop. So I actually think it looks quite nice. You've got a little dash on the day you started and then a nice cover on the day you finished. I think it looks quite nice. But for the people who track every day, they've got the lines running through. And when I say to these people well, I can't just make it such that if you start and stop, there's a line running through all those days, because it completely ruins the graphic. For the people who do track daily, because now those people are off reading four to six books, now they have four to six lines every single day. It gets messy.
Speaker 2:And on the days where they didn't manage to read because they were with their kids or because they were in school and they were studying for a test, now they see that information and they're sharing the graphic saying spot, the days where it was back to school day or I had a rough day so I didn't pick up a book.
Speaker 2:They see that visually. I remember when I first showed Rob co-founder the first draft and he looked at the, he looked at the, his graphic, and he said why didn't I read on the 17th? And then he went and looked at his calendar or his messages and he thought, oh, that was why I was doing this thing. And you know, I didn't even realize and it's so interesting seeing how I read a little bit every day. And so once I communicate to these, the readers that don't track every day, that oh, there were this whole class of readers that read like this and that would spoil it, they go oh, I didn't even think about that, didn't even think about the fact that there are these type of readers that the experience would be completely ruined for.
Speaker 1:They assumed this doesn't make sense, this is broken, not, oh yeah, we are catering to two, three, four, five multitude different types of readers okay, okay, no, that's that's helpful to at least hear you know, because I'm sure readers want to know that you're paying the attention to detail which you are, and so thank you for thank you for laying that out. Um, where do you see the company storygraph in 10 years?
Speaker 2:well, hopefully, it's what I said. It's the number one reading tracking app. So, like I said, it's like the go-to place that people go to. Um, I see a lot more integrations and customizations and personalization to the product. So things like access, like things where we're hooked into, like your local library or local bookstores um, we are really like tuned into, like what you want to read.
Speaker 2:Something that I'm wary of, by the way, and that I don't want to get to, is I don't want to get to a world where storygraph is just telling you what to read, so I don't want us to have this AI that's just like and now you read this next, and now you read this next. So something that I'm very keen is striking the balance between employing this amazing technology that we have now with machine learning and AI, and just having this large digital database of books, with users being able to interact and communicate with the product. So I want to make sure that our users really feel like, with Storygraph, they're having a conversation with the product, always, they're being able to say actually, I want this. Actually, today, I want this completely different thing, and it's not like we're stuck giving you the same old thing just because for the last five years you've read that same old thing. So I just really hope that we've gotten that balance like it's excellent and it's perfect and people feel like we use advanced technology but it's a safe space and that we are just only using it to enrich um their reading life and I hope I'm, uh, in 10 years.
Speaker 2:I'm just overjoyed and I'm super happy and I've, um, I'm just books, books, books. It's my life and I'm, you know, reading all the books that I want to read and, um, I uh, I remember I was in a bookstore yesterday with a friend and so I'm, you know, invited often to do talks or panels or things like that, and I said, oh, I, I hope I get to do more interviews and Q&As and panels in bookstores, like that would be so fun. I just love being in bookstores.
Speaker 1:The vibe aesthetic, everything you know. We should have arranged for books to be in the background.
Speaker 2:That's true.
Speaker 1:No, I love that. I love that. So for our audience, right like how can our audience contribute to the work that you're doing at Storygraph?
Speaker 2:So following on social media is great. So if you're on Instagram Twitter Threads, we're at the Storygraph everywhere. Actually, we're at the. You say period. Right, americans say period the period Storygraph on Instagram and.
Speaker 2:Threads and the Storygraph exactly. We say full stop the Storygraph on Twitter. I'm personally on those platforms at Nodio. If you use the app and you love the app, there are three things you can do. One is just tell your friends, like tell readers in your life about the app. We actually also have gift subscriptions so you can gift a reader in your life about the app. We actually also have gift subscriptions so you can gift a reader in your life a plus subscription where they get custom stats. You can make your own charts, things like that. We also do have the plus plan.
Speaker 2:So one thing you do is just try the free trial. It's 30 days. We don't ask for any payment details, and that's something that I'm very proud of. We have 13,000 paying customers and not one of those customers is a oops, I accidentally forgot to cancel my trial. You have to actively go in and put in your credit card details to be billed, so there's no case of I forgot to cancel after the trial. So give the trial a go and see what you think.
Speaker 2:But also, we have a volunteer librarian community and we call it volunteer librarians, but you don't have to be a librarian. In fact, there are no qualifications required and essentially it just means that you have some edit admin privileges where you can help correct a page number or add a page number, can um correct publishing author information and you. There's no um time requirement, minimum time requirement, it's just we just want to have a bunch of people around the world who um have the ability to just make a quick change, and I and I always say that even if you just update the books that you're reading, you make the app better for everybody. So we have right now, I think, 1200 people around the world, all different ages, to just help us improve the book data on the app and so, yeah, these are some ways that people can help and get involved.
Speaker 1:Love that, love that. Thank you so so much, nadia. I really enjoyed hearing your journey, you know, to founding the company going to 2 million users, and I'm sure our listeners will also enjoy it as well. Thank you, I really enjoyed this. Hope you enjoyed it too.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me. I had a great time.
Speaker 1:For sure, for sure. So if you got value from that noble conversation, let us know in the comment section below exactly what you liked and share this with other people you think might enjoy as well. This helps us with two things One, it helps us reach more guests and two, it helps us reach more people with this content so that they can enjoy it as well. So don't be stingy. Like share comment subscribe.