An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Learn from people when they tell you “no.” When I started Awardco I was told no many times by many prospective clients and partners, but I moved forward anyway. They were sometimes right, but hearing their reasons made it easier for me to improve what I was trying to do.

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

Steve Sonnenberg, Founder & CEO, Awardco. Awardco’s founder and CEO, Steve Sonnenberg, learned a great deal watching his father’s career in employee recognition with companies like McDonald’s — but something was missing. In 2011, Steve began working on plans to use new, innovative technology to solve the pitfalls of traditional employee recognition programs: burdensome processes, exorbitant markups, and limited redemption options. Awardco was born shortly after, and Steve’s vision has resonated deeply within an industry in desperate need of change. Awardco is the fastest-growing rewards and recognition platform in the world as ranked by Inc. Magazine for the last 3 consecutive years, and more clients than ever are experiencing a better way to recognize.

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 grew up in the Chicago area and remember watching my Dad work in the recognition industry for a company called Jostens. At the time it was all about rings and lapel pins and fancy acrylics, and he was one of the top sales reps for his organization for nearly a decade. He worked with customers like McDonald’s, John Deere, and even the Chicago Bulls. My Dad worked incredibly hard, and that had a big impact on me. Even at a young age I remember thinking there had to be a better way.

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

Bill Gates said, “How you gather, manage, and use information will determine whether you win or lose.” This quote has stayed with me my entire career because I want to win, and I have been obsessed with organizing information since I was young. For example, in my first business in the early 2000s I created a search engine to match wholesalers with new business owners that wanted to sell products online. In 2008 I helped build an eBay analytical tool that helped eBay sellers know when and how to list their items based on historical selling data. In 2011, with the help of my cousin Mike, we founded Awardco to organize and manage the world’s incentive spend. With Awardco organizations can run all their recognition and incentive programs for employees and customers on one single application — organizing their own incentive spend in their own companies. After accomplishing that we then improved our recognition programs even further by building the largest global reward marketplace, and the rest is history. Thinking through the lens of gathering and managing information will inspire you to improve the world around you.

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?

Shoe Dog by Phil Knight is a perennial favorite of mine. It really impacted me to think outside the box and to think in ways others might not be — and it still drives me today to be better. The part that had the most impact on me was when Phil described having an idea about shoes and then went for it with what seemed like no planning. He went to the manufacturer’s plant in Japan and basically started what is arguably the most successful brand ever by showing up and having the tenacity and guts to go for what he wanted. When I first read it I remember feeling incredibly fired up to go out and achieve those things I’d been dreaming of.

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?

People struggle to take a good idea and translate it to an actual business because they think they have to get it right out of the gate. They’re often afraid to fail, and forget to realize that failure is their greatest teacher. My advice would be to change your attitude and get excited to fail — because each time you do, you get closer to your goal. When I first started Awardco it was a trophy shop, it then became a wholesale trophy shop with a membership (like Costco), then turned out to be an embroidery business, and eventually became a redemption engine that integrates with companies like Amazon, Priceline, and other merchants. I would have never gotten there if I didn’t just begin and have a good attitude about failing.

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?

This comes down to having the right mindset. I believe that it doesn’t matter if someone has thought of your idea, or maybe the business idea already exists. I look for opportunities in industries that I understand. First, you must work or have had a connection in that industry you are trying to disrupt to help identify the problem you are hoping to resolve. The research comes from experiencing firsthand the problem you are trying to fix.

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.

My experience here is a little different because software itself is slightly different than sourcing a manufacturer or finding a retailer. The best advice I can give here is to start somewhere. All too often too many entrepreneurs will think themselves into a stalemate and won’t ever START. Many things can be figured out as you go — and many of the best entrepreneurs will tell you that building a company is often like building an airplane mid-flight. There’s some truth to that. But as far as the steps, I’d say first lay out a business plan. Determine who your customer is. Come strong with your value-add. Then go out and build it.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

• There will be times when you fail. That doesn’t mean your idea is terrible or that it isn’t viable. In starting Awardco we originally set out to be a sort of “Costco” for employee recognition where employers could get items at wholesale to then give to their employees. This turned out to not be the best idea, so we pivoted.
• Your plan will change, but make one anyway. This was especially true of our financial plan. It definitely changed, and quickly, but having a plan to begin with meant we could only make it better.
• Start somewhere. Starting is the hardest part of any endeavor, but starting will get you to where you want to go. Don’t worry about the time it takes. I remember taking that first step to start Awardco when I already had a full-time job, and all it took was for me to take that step. Have that conversation. Ask for help, etc.
• Be a lion. Lots of entrepreneurs will tell you this, and what they seem to mean is that you have to be ferocious, which often equates to bulldozing anyone and anything in your path. I believe there’s a different way to be a lion, and that is to be a hunter. Know what you’re going for, and go out and get it. With how fast Awardco has been growing it can be easy to get complacent, but I always like to remind myself of where I came from, and it refreshes my energy to be that hunter.
• Learn from people when they tell you “no.” When I started Awardco I was told no many times by many prospective clients and partners, but I moved forward anyway. They were sometimes right, but hearing their reasons made it easier for me to improve what I was trying to do.

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?

You need to value the customer more than the money you could make. Oftentimes people get this wrong. The first steps I recommend are to build or create the product, and give it to customers to learn everything about your creation. Jeff Bezos said to “be stubborn on your vision, but flexible on the details,” and I think that’s a great place to start when refining your idea.

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?

Not at first. Your new idea needs to be pressure tested to gather data, and after that you might consider bringing in a consultant. Without going in head first, your consultant won’t be valuable.

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 feel pretty strongly about this and feel like bootstrapping is the way to go. It’s not the easiest way, and there are times when taking on outside funding via venture capital is a good thing, but I feel like being fiscally responsible, profitable, and careful, especially in the first few years of business, really pays huge dividends down the road when you aren’t beholden to investors right out of the gate.

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

Awardco exists to recognize the good in each of us. I believe that making this more readily available to more people, especially in the workplace, helps many of the common ills plaguing corporations today. Things like the great resignation, increased dissatisfaction with jobs or managers, lack of workplace loyalty, high turnover, low engagement…all of these things can be helped (and in some cases fixed) with timely, appropriate recognition. Success at Awardco means just that: making people’s lives better both internally and externally around us.

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.

I often feel that the power of a simple “thank you” is incredibly underestimated. Saying thank you requires humility on the part of the giver, but it has such an incredible impact on both the giver and the receiver. Expressions of gratitude can even influence people on a chemical level, reducing stress and improving decision making. If I could inspire a movement it would be to encourage expressions of genuine thanks more often in work and in life.

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.

Steph Curry. His positive attitude is contagious. He focuses on the good in everything he does. He loves his family, and he has built a successful business empire. Those are the types of people I want to surround myself with.

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

---

Making Something From Nothing: Steve Sonnenberg Of Awardco 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.