👉🏼 Description:
Tune in as Kirk talks about building revenue through event marketing, treating marketing like a product, creating the best merch, and more!
👉🏼 About the Guest:
Kirk Fernandes is the founder of Scout, the recruiting firm that automates hiring for early-stage founders. He was previously the founder of Merit and worked in product leadership at Microsoft, Hightower & VTS. Kirk studied Computer Science at the University of Waterloo.
👉🏼 About the Host:
Shriya Nevatia (50K+ followers on LI and X) has been building community for 12+ years for founders, investors, and builders around the world. She launched the On Deck Catalyst community for elite global young leaders, helped hundreds of women start angel investing at The Council Capital, and founded The Violet Society, a pre-accelerator for female & non-binary startup founders.
👉🏼 Timestamps:
- 00:00: Episode Highlight
- 00:38: Intro to Taste & Tactics
- 00:55: Intro to Kirk Fernandes, founder of Scout, the recruiting automation company for early-stage founders
- 01:54: What makes Scout a next-gen recruiting firm
- 02:54: How Scout improves on Merit, Kirk's previous startup
- 04:00: How Scout reaches the top engineering talent who are already flooded with offers
- 04:46: Kirk's methodologies to reach $500K in revenue in 6 months
- 06:06: Creating human connection in recruiting
- 06:53: What does it take to create the best events?
- 08:32: Creating chemistry amongst guests
- 08:59: Kirk's top recommended restaurants in SF & NYC
- 09:33: Structure vs flexibility and flow at events
- 10:43: How events can have both hard and soft sells
- 11:31: How soft sells lead to sales conversions
- 13:24: Different ways to create a sense of community
- 14:42: How to design merch people actually like
- 17:05: Offering potential customers a menu of options
- 20:16: Using tech to help with recruiting
- 22:16: How to ask for help when you're building out your company
- 24:34: Creating a community within your customer base
- 26:08: Previous mistakes Kirk has learned from
- 27:33: Are events actually efficient for sales?
- 28:38: Designing marketing like a product
- 31:05: When taste outweighs data
- 32:54: Learnings and takeaways from the episode
- 34:30: Outro
👉🏼 Resources:
👉🏼 Where to find Kirk:
👉🏼 Where to find Shriya:
What is Taste & Tactics?
Taste & Tactics breaks down the real playbooks behind iconic products, told by the people who built them.
Each episode goes deep on one bold launch: what sparked the idea, how it reached the right audience, and the moves that made it stick.
Hosted by Shriya Nevatia, the show is made for founders, marketers, and brand builders who are sick of vague advice and want practical frameworks.