Odinian Beta

My guest this week is Rebecca Lynn. Rebecca co-founded early-stage investor Canvas Ventures in 2013 and is regularly featured as one of the best VCs in the market. She has deep positioning and go-to-market experience, which she honed during her time at Procter & Gamble, and that’s the focus of our discussion. We cover the details of great marketing, why you should say no to customers, and how she has built Canvas. Please enjoy my discussion with Rebecca Lynn.

For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here.

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Past guests include Tobi Lutke, Kevin Systrom, Mike Krieger, John Collison, Kat Cole, Marc Andreessen, Matthew Ball, Bill Gurley, Anu Hariharan, Ben Thompson, and many more.

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Show Notes

[00:02:37] – [First question] – What she’d do a great job teaching if she could teach a singular 401 level course

[00:05:20] – Defining what the umbrella concept is 

[00:06:10] – What about her career at P&G applies most to the kinds of companies she spends her time with now 

[00:12:06] – What types of questions she asks to help someone building a product understand their marketing angle 

[00:15:34] – The top three things people do wrong when running a survey in tactics or strategy

[00:19:33] – Categories of questions where surveys are always helpful and effective   

[00:21:06] – What the Go-To-Market Council is and what it does 

[00:28:21] – The ways that most funnels are commonly broken  

[00:31:17] – Defining great positioning and what it accomplishes

[00:33:36] – How her knowledge and ideas most impacted the way she built Canvas

[00:35:04] – Lessons learned about the world of digital health and the quantified self  

[00:39:15] – The base level attributes that most indicate investment potential when she’s investing in a company

[00:42:32] – The shifts in the world that most have her attention today

[00:46:10] – What has her worried systemically about venture investing 

[00:49:37] – The kindest thing anyone has ever done for her