An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Start slow. No one told me to start my company slowly. In fact, the popular opinion in tech is to go fast. I decided against this path and to take the slow route, which allowed me to play the long game and be successful over time without giving up control of my company.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Aytekin Tank.

Aytekin Tank is the Founder and CEO of Jotform, a popular online forms solution. He enjoys writing about his entrepreneurial journey and sharing advice with startups.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I was born in Turkey, and my family frequently moved during my childhood. Looking back, adjusting to the constant relocation and establishing new roots helped me develop the ability to adapt quickly and appreciate different cultures. Those lessons also helped me stay resilient throughout my career and successfully grow and operate a company across multiple countries.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Writer Elizabeth Gilbert has said, “I have a rigid self-accountability.” To me, self-accountability is understanding time is limited, and if you want to make time for things you’re passionate about, you have to prioritize them. It’s about making good choices, which I believe is critical in my professional and personal life.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Similar to Gilbert’s quote I mentioned, entrepreneur and philosopher Naval Ravikant warned how a busy calendar would destroy your ability to do anything great. His ability to prioritize growth resonates with me since he has had to learn to say “no” and focus on things that matter and provide meaning.

Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?

My first step is to evaluate ideas honestly and see if they solve an existing problem. A lot of mythology exists in the business world about entrepreneurs following their dreams and chasing their passion. Sometimes, what the entrepreneur is passionate about translates into an innovation that brings success. But most of the time, successful entrepreneurs find a market for their innovation because it solves a problem for their customers.

Often when people think of a new idea, they dismiss it saying someone else must have thought of it before. How would you recommend that someone go about researching whether or not their idea has already been created?

A simple search online can help determine if the basic version of an idea or product exists. But research shouldn’t stop there. If you find a similar product or idea that already exists, see if your idea can solve a problem for a specific industry or consumer.

Also, check if the existing product creates another problem or flaw your idea can improve upon. When conducting this research, you want to constantly ask how your idea or product can be differentiated from similar products.

For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through, from when they think of the idea, until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? In particular, we’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.

Each process of bringing an idea to life is different. But I can speak to my online forms software company, Jotform.

The idea was sparked from the day job I had when I saw a huge opportunity to create a product that would ease the burden of coding online forms. I started the company because I was sick and tired of having to code forms and knew there had to be an easier way forward.

When I started Jotform, I thought it would be good to make the product completely free so there was a low barrier of entry for people to use it, and so it would create brand loyalty.

I opted to grow my business slowly, so I didn’t need to accept any venture capital or even bring in a co-founder. Of course, bootstrapping isn’t for everyone, but it worked well for Jotform.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

1. Start slow. No one told me to start my company slowly. In fact, the popular opinion in tech is to go fast. I decided against this path and to take the slow route, which allowed me to play the long game and be successful over time without giving up control of my company.
2. If you can swing it, grow organically. Choosing to grow through bootstrapping rather than taking on capital from investors is a great way to develop a loyal customer base and build out the product without outside pressure.
3. Focusing on profitability is the only way to ensure success. In a bootstrap situation, it’s a lot more valuable than “vanity” metrics. You can and should monitor an array of key performance indicators, but profitability is the most important by far.
4. You can create a great company as a solo founder. Many successful startups have multiple founders but resisting the pressure to launch with a co-founder or multiple co-founders streamlines decision-making when time is of the essence. You know what’s best for your company and growth.
5. Bootstrapping forces you to focus on customers, and that’s a good thing. Companies who receive VC funds answer to customers too, or they ultimately won’t succeed. But the leadership team’s time and attention are fragmented by the need to justify decisions to investors or shareholders who play an oversight role. In a bootstrap scenario, customers get 100% of your attention.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

My recommendation would be to define a list of people and resources needed to bring the project to life. First, take stock of the skills and resources you already have, then identify gaps and plan to acquire what will be needed to develop and market the product.

It’s also important to keep in mind how fast you’ll need to move. By setting expectations and timelines early, you’ll avoid overwhelming your team when you’ll need their input and commitment to move forward.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

Hiring an invention development consultant can be a great asset in terms of feedback and research. A second opinion is always good to have, especially from a consultant who has the expertise and background necessary to advance your idea. They can also provide the guidance and research needed to push your idea across the finish line.

However, it’s essential to stay true to your idea as well. You know your vision better than anyone else.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

I’m a strong proponent of bootstrapping over venture capital. Bootstrapping a company is not only possible — I believe it’s a more sustainable and streamlined way to build and scale a business. To be clear, bootstrapping isn’t always easy. It requires patience and focus, but the freedom to create a meaningful product on your own terms is worth more than even the biggest VC check.

Plus, as I mentioned earlier, bootstrapping allows the entrepreneur to focus on customers rather than answering to shareholders and investors. It also gives the entrepreneur autonomous control over their company’s decisions and, ultimately, its maturation. By enabling the entrepreneur to develop products and grow the team at their own pace rather than adhere to an artificial schedule, they can ensure their vision is executed accurately and efficiently.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

One achievement I take pride in is the great company culture we’ve built at Jotform. I believe in hiring driven and creative individuals because we’re an ambitious company, and I’m sure some of the decisions we made early on contributed to our growth and success. The Jotform team didn’t develop overnight, so we could curate a collaborative culture and create a workplace where people have the tools and resources they need to do great things — and the time and space they need to recharge.

I am also proud of how we’ve helped countless nonprofits advance their causes by offering them a 50% discount on Jotform tools. Philanthropy work is an asset to any company and including it in your business models sets intentions for your growth and value to your work.

You are an inspiration to a great many people. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

From a business perspective, I’d like to inspire a movement to “check egos at the door” so everyone can focus on solutions instead of unraveling over mistakes. This would be an enormous benefit to billions of people.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

Adam Grant is a brilliant management thinker, and it would be incredible to meet him one day and discuss some big-picture ideas about work and life.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

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Making Something From Nothing: Aytekin Tank Of Jotform On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.