Having grown 99designs from a small office of 6 people in Melbourne to a global operation of over 100 staff spanning 3 continents, CEO Patrick Llewellyn will share his experience in internationalizing a brand through an MVP strategy, raising VC funding, and when and how to move a company to Silicon Valley. Traction Conf Vancouver 2015 - http://tractionconf.io.

1. Patrick Llewellyn, CEO
@99designs
CREATE & GROW
99designs - how did we get there?

2. Every 2 secs
a design is uploaded
2,836 open
design contests today
$115M+
designer earnings
350,000
happy customers

3. Our designers, a global creative workforce
A diverse crowd of 1,039,000 creative minds,
that shares a love of design.

4. A broad design spectrum
Logo & Identity
Web & App design
Business & Advertising
Clothing & Merchandise
Packaging & Label
Art & Illustration
Book & Magazine
Other
Our top selling categories for design contests
What you get created at 99designs

5. Discover great design: 99designs.com/discover

6. https://99designs.com/profiles/stacehill

7. 115 colleagues on 5 continents
manage 99designs
• 24/7 customer support
• 4 offices
• 1 gazillion video conferences ;)

8. How did we
get there?
Design by Feeder, active since Jan 2009

9. It all started with some…

10. … friendly competition.
Design by Anak_alam, active since Feb 2012

11. Initially, bootstrapped growth
by word of mouth.

12. These 5 factors,
gave us traction!

13. 1. Built the community & engaged with
influencers early

14. 2. Focused on the product

15. 3. Built trust through customer support &
100% money back guarantee

16. 4. Initial customers were
tech savvy early adopters

17. 5. Invested in PR & built profile

18. Moved HQ: Into the US and Silicon Valley
The US and CA markets alone
offer access to 350M+ people
! Very open for innovation
! Online savvy
! Vibrant start-up scenes2010
Raised $35M from Accel in 2011
To ramp marketing and go
further international

19. Our learnings about
Silicon Valley
and VC money
Design by AccorDesigns, active since Sept 2012

20. Going international with a MVP approach
Acquired 12designer,
Berlin and LogoChef, Rio
99designs platform now
offers 7 languages and
supports 12 currencies.
2012
2013

21. Buy, Before Building
Design by AccorDesigns, active since Sept 2012

22. Use managers as mini startups –
MVP is the key word here

23. Next step Asia: Launch Japan
Just raised series B
from Recruit to step
into Asia.
2015

24. Questions,
comments?
patrick@99designs.com
Design by Feeder, active since Jan 2009