Explore all emails from Social Currency

View image: (https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/d72795b4-7eb8-453f-a0ce-66438b0fb56b/Weekly_Newsletter_Banner_1.5.25__5_.png?t=1759682538) Caption: ——————————————————————————— # **Walking the Walk: What I've Learned From Founders (Now That I'm Becoming One… Again)** I have a confession to make. Over the past ten months, I've been interviewing some of the most successful founders and CEOs on the planet for Social Currency— asking them how they built their companies, how they survived near “lose it all” experiences, how they made decisions that seemed crazy at the time. And I'd nod along, take notes, think _wow, that's fascinating._ But I wasn't actually _living_ any of it. I was a professional tourist in the world of entrepreneurship. That's changed. I'm now building a new venture in media — and I can't say much more than that yet (we're mid-raise, and I'm trying not to jinx anything) — but I can tell you this: everything hits different when you're the one in the arena. So today, I wanted to share something a little more personal today: the founder lessons that are _actually_ landing now that I'm living them. I’m pulling some of my favorite conversations that I’ve had on the show to share how these lessons really hit home… and if you’re either an aspiring entrepreneur or currently shaping your own side hustle or full time venture, I hope these words bring as much value as they’re currently bringing to me. ——————————————————————————— ### **1. "The first thing you have to do before you even pitch is have somebody’s attention."** **— Jim McKelvey, Co-Founder of Square (link to interview **[**here**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhaW34c3ydA)**)** This one really resonates. Because here's the thing: I didn't start building this venture from zero. I started with _you_. With this newsletter. With the podcast. With years of showing up, building an audience, and earning trust. And I didn't realize until recently how much of an advantage that actually is. Most founders I talk to are trying to do two things at once: build the company _and_ get people to care. They're cold-emailing potential investors, begging for press, trying to explain why anyone should pay attention to them. It's exhausting and inefficient. By building a personal brand/online persona first, you get to skip ahead past the “This is who I am” step. This is what I’ve been able to do, and this is not because I'm special, but because I've been in the attention-earning business for years. When I walk into a room with a potential investor or partner, I’ve already felt that it’s a bit easier to share what I’m working on because I have a few proof points. They already have a sense of my taste, my values, my point of view. Jim's point is deceptively simple: attention comes before the pitch. You can have the best deck in the world, but if no one's listening, it doesn't matter. The founders who win aren't just good at building — they're good at _commanding the room before they enter it._ ——————————————————————————— ### **2. "I think the biggest mistake founders make is they think 'my idea is so secret I can't tell anybody, sign this NDA.' If you think your idea is what's protecting you, I promise you you're going to fail."** **— Ankur Jain, Founder & CEO of Bilt (link to interview **[**here**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJmFoOMZnCA)**)** There's a version of founder culture that treats ideas like precious cargo — locked away, and revealed only under NDA. I remember hearing Sara Blakely mention that this was her POV on building Spanx on a podcast. She famously didn’t tell a soul about Spanx initially because she didn’t want to invite competition. Obviously, Spanx ended up being a tremendous billion-dollar+ success. Ankur thinks that's backwards. And now that I'm building something myself, I side with Ankur on this one. And between you and I, I think Sara should have brought more people along on the ride before she launched her latest venture Sneex (but that’s a whole conversation that I’ll save for another newsletter). Every week, I publish my takes on business and culture to hundreds of thousands of people. I talk about what I think is working, what's broken, what's next. I've interviewed the founders I admire most and asked them to reveal exactly how they built their companies. My entire brand is built on _sharing_ ideas openly. And here's what I've realized now that I'm building a new venture in media: that openness isn't a liability. It's the whole point (hence why seemingly every entrepreneur is now building in public). Ankur told me that earning points on rent wasn't a revolutionary concept — getting it to work was the hard part. Stealth is overrated. Execution is everything. ——————————————————————————— ### **3. "It's all about the people that you attract. And in my experience, the kind of people that I have gotten to work with, they need vision. Like they need to really believe in your vision, which means you need to believe in your vision. And if you don't believe in your vision, then why would anyone else take it seriously?"** **— Cassandra Grey, Founder of Violet Grey (link to interview **[**here**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvE1WBVbG-8&t=2674s)**)** Before you have a product, before you have revenue, all you have is the vision and conviction. And that conviction is either magnetic or it's not. Cassandra had never built a company in the beauty space. She didn't go to business school. She barely graduated high school. But she had a vision for Violet Grey that was so clear, so fully realized in her mind, that she could walk into a room with Anna Wintour and hold her own. She attracted world-class collaborators not because she had the best résumé, but because she believed in what she was building so deeply that other people wanted to be part of it. In the very early days of putting a business together and getting investors to believe in what you’re building, it’s essential that other people see that you _know_ where you're going. Like you've already seen the future and you're just inviting them to help build it. That kind of clarity doesn't come from a pitch deck. It comes from doing the internal work — the obsessive thinking about _why this, why now, why me_. Cassandra called it "courage of conviction." And as we all know, the best founders have so much conviction that it can sometimes border on delusion. ——————————————————————————— ### **The Mindset Shift I Didn't Expect** As I’m going through the early days of building, I’m shifting how I see entrepreneurship: it’s less of a genre and start seeing it as a mirror. Every conversation I've had on this podcast has been preparing me for this, I just didn't know it yet. It’s really wild to look back on your career/decision trajectory and see how many of the pieces have a funny way of falling into place. And now, during these podcast conversation, I'm not just taking notes. I'm _applying them. _More soon. For now, back to work. — Sammi ——————————————————————————— # Connect With Me If you liked this newsletter, it would be amazing if you shared it with your family, friends or even a random person that you know loves business, tech & culture news. Link to share [here](https://socialcurrency.beehiiv.com) 💌😄 I seriously love chatting with you all; please feel free to send me a note on any of these platforms: 📧 Email: sammi@socialcurrencymedia.com 📸 [My ](https://www.instagram.com/sammicohentalks/?hl=en)[Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/sammicohentalks/?hl=en), the [Social Currency Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/socialcurrency/?hl=en) 🎧️ SOCIAL CURRENCY, The Podcast: [YouTube](http://www.youtube.com/@sammicohentalks), [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/show/5yYv1RKy4eKthfg3FtSMM7?si=32b9c4c25d064844), [Apple](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/social-currency-with-sammi-cohen/id1812712126) 💼 [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/sammitannorcohen) 🎵 [TikTok](https://www.tiktok.com/@sammicohentalks/) P.S. - If you see any typos in this newsletter, know that I did it on purpose a la The New Yorker via [their style guide](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/12/style/new-yorker-style-guide.html). ——— You are reading a plain text version of this post. For the best experience, copy and paste this link in your browser to view the post online: https://socialcurrency.beehiiv.com/p/the-founder-s-journey

View image: (https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/d72795b4-7eb8-453f-a0ce-66438b0fb56b/Weekly_Newsletter_Banner_1.5.25__5_.png?t=1759682538) Caption: ——————————————————————————— # It’s Been a Minute Hi guys, it's been a while. The last time I sent this newsletter out was November 1st. And when I hit send on that one, I genuinely had no idea it would be my last for four months. I owe you an explanation—and I'm not going to pretend this was some planned break or strategic sabbatical. The truth is a lot messier than that. 2025 was wild, and I’ve taken you all along the journey of what it entailed. I left my full-time corporate job at Amazon, launched a twice-a-week podcast, and was trying to send this newsletter on a semi-regular cadence. At first, taking a few weeks off from sending the newsletter felt like a natural reset. Then a few more weeks went by. And then I hit an extended pause because of the holidays. And then again, I delayed. And now I’m ready to talk about why: it really comes down to _shiny object syndrome._ Here's what I've learned about myself in the nine months since leaving Amazon: I have a pattern of always looking for **the next thing**. Part of that is just how entrepreneurship works, especially in media. You're supposed to be ahead of trends. You're supposed to be thinking three steps ahead. But somewhere along the way, "staying ahead" turned into "constantly chasing." I was exploring new angles, taking calls about new projects, thinking through what I wanted the next few years to look like—and I lost focus on what was already working. Ironically, by constantly thinking about doing more, more, more, I hit a state of burnout because I was never actually satisfied with what was happening in the present. After talking to a lot of founder friends, especially in media, I've realized this feeling is very common. Many of us are always feeling like the next opportunity around the corner will be bigger, faster, & shinier than what we’re already doing. And the thing about these shiny objects is that they feel like progress; they’re like quick hits of dopamine. They feel like you're being smart and ambitious and forward-thinking. But most of the time, they're just distraction dressed up as strategy. So I spent the last few months slowing down to think longer term. I’ve been thinking through what I actually want the next few years to look and feel like. And even though I don’t have all of the answers, I came to a few conclusions. _First_: my favorite thing to do (still) is to connect with you guys and create interesting, meaningful conversations around what is happening in the world. _Second:_ if I am going to continue to dream really, really big (which I am), I needed to get more intentional about where my energy goes. _Third_: without giving too much away yet—I found something I'm genuinely very excited about. Something that feels like the right next chapter. I'll be sharing more in my next newsletter. Going forward, this newsletter is going to evolve a bit. I want it to be more of a founder diary—my brutally honest personal journey about building my businesses, the lessons I'm learning in real time, and of course, the stories I'm obsessing over in media, entrepreneurship, and the intersection of business and culture. I'll be sending it every other week, which feels like a cadence I can actually sustain without disappearing on you again. Thank you for still being here. Thank you for reading this. I met a bunch of you at Expo West yesterday, and I loved gossiping with you about the latest in the CPG space. It feels like a dream to have such a smart, ambitious community of readers and listeners. So if you want to say hi, just reply to this—I read everything. Sammi ——————————————————————————— # A Few Resources/Links/Reads_ _ [Series of free workshops to learn AI](https://maven.com/x/agent-ai-workflows?utm_campaign=agent-ai-series&utm_source=maven&utm_medium=email&utm_content=CTA-button&ajs_uid=649233&_bhlid=24e1ff434cb35194b2c2de55bcdfac4c5f1a5ac1) (Maven) [Library of tools for freelancers & creatives](https://library.studioworks.app/?utm_source=oldgirlsclub.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=the-old-girls-club-digest&_bhlid=2791f1c11b43ca1e6f2f9369c8267a056611fcda) (Studioworks Library) [This nonprofit designed to support independent contractors](https://freelancersunion.org/?utm_source=oldgirlsclub.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=the-old-girls-club-digest&_bhlid=568a747f8f848d4d63789aeec50b79d2498ca6f2) (Freelancers Union) [A list of better icebreaker questions at work](https://www.atlassian.com/blog/teamwork/icebreaker-questions?utm_source=oldgirlsclub.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=the-old-girls-club-digest&_bhlid=9b907121a159a17ad986a8ec2a469bd92a81b859) (Atlassian) [When using AI Leads to “Brain Fry”](https://hbr.org/2026/03/when-using-ai-leads-to-brain-fry?ab=HP-hero-featured-1) (see image below) View image: (https://media.beehiiv.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=scale-down,format=auto,onerror=redirect,quality=80/uploads/asset/file/53f0c9c3-d258-4ee7-8dbc-f44be5b0711f/Screenshot_2026-03-05_at_4.55.50_PM.png?t=1772758564) Caption: ——————————————————————————— # Connect With Me If you liked this newsletter, it would be amazing if you shared it with your family, friends or even a random person that you know loves business, tech & culture news. Link to share [here](https://socialcurrency.beehiiv.com) 💌😄 I seriously love chatting with you all; please feel free to send me a note on any of these platforms: 📧 Email: sammi@socialcurrencymedia.com 📸 [My ](https://www.instagram.com/sammicohentalks/?hl=en)[Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/sammicohentalks/?hl=en), the [Social Currency Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/socialcurrency/?hl=en) 🎧️ SOCIAL CURRENCY, The Podcast: [YouTube](http://www.youtube.com/@sammicohentalks), [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/show/5yYv1RKy4eKthfg3FtSMM7?si=32b9c4c25d064844), [Apple](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/social-currency-with-sammi-cohen/id1812712126) 💼 [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/sammitannorcohen) 🎵 [TikTok](https://www.tiktok.com/@sammicohentalks/) P.S. - If you see any typos in this newsletter, know that I did it on purpose a la The New Yorker via [their style guide](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/12/style/new-yorker-style-guide.html). ——— You are reading a plain text version of this post. For the best experience, copy and paste this link in your browser to view the post online: https://socialcurrency.beehiiv.com/p/the-real-reason-i-pressed-pause

Hey there! Ever notice how the most successful people always seem to know what's happening before everyone else? Here's the truth - we're living through the most interesting time in business and tech history, but most people are drowning in surface-level news that doesn't actually help them get ahead. That's why I created _Social Currency_™. Think of me as your personal researcher and analyst, breaking down: • The real reason behind major business moves (like why that CPG company ACTUALLY raised capital) • Tech developments you need to know about (before they hit mainstream) • Cultural shifts affecting markets (yes, even what Alex Cooper's next media play means for creators) My goal? To make you the most well-informed person in your group chat. With lots of actionable insights you can use to level up your career and decision-making. Quick but important: To make sure these insights actually reach you (and don't end up in spam purgatory), hit reply with "Yes" and move this email to your ‘Primary’ inbox if it landed in ‘Promotions’. Cheering you on always, Sammi PPS: Drop me a note introducing yourself! I love hearing what brought you here and what you're working on. Fair warning though - I get pretty invested in helping my subscribers win :)