Episode 3: Andrew Needham, HeadBox

Marketplace Mechanics Episode 3: Andrew Needham, HeadBox

Really pleased to announce that Episode 3 of the Marketplace Mechanics podcast is OUT NOW!

In this episode, I was privileged to have Andrew Needham from HeadBox joining me in the studio.

HeadBox is a marketplace for booking inspiring meeting and events space all over the UK (and as of this month, Ireland!), and Andrew was generous enough to chat in-depth about the lessons learned during the early days of launching the platform.

You can listen to this episode on:

• Spotify
• Stitcher
• iTunes / Apple Podcasts
• Google Podcasts
• Soundcloud

And if you enjoyed this episode, please do leave a rating on your favourite platform.

This episode is 30mins, so perfect for your commute. Would love to hear what you think!

HUGE thanks to Spike and Max at RunwayEast for providing the fantastic Pitch Room studio for this podcast. This is the first episode I’ve recorded in a pro studio, and it’s night and day compared to my previous setup.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the mailing list using the sidebar on the right, and to follow on Twitter @marketplacepod if you haven’t already.

Finally, a couple of links if you want to find our more about Andrew and HeadBox:

• HeadBox website
• Andrew on Twitter: @AndrewNeedham

 

SHOW NOTES

1:55
Interview Begins – what is HeadBox?

2:49
What are the problems being solved by the HeadBox marketplace?
How did people book venues before HeadBox?

4:25
HeadBox Origin Story – where did the idea come from?

5:32
What did the first few days and weeks of HeadBox look like?
How did you get started?

9:25
Who were the first hires, and how did they acquire supply and demand?

11:10
After you had acquired your first 1000 venues – when did you switch on demand?
How did you decide which channel was best for your marketplace?

15:15
The importance of learning lessons about your customers yourself (the hard way) vs. offloading marketing to an agency

16:25
The importance of learning in startups

18:40
Manual processes behind the scenes (things that don’t scale) when growing HeadBox

21:08
SaaS-enabled marketplace – what the hell is a SaaS-enabled Marketplace?

22:05
HeadBox as the first SaaS-Enabled Marketplace in the Venue Industry

24:40
Spinning the ‘flywheel’ of growth by solving problems for customers and suppliers in tandem

26:20
Where will HeadBox be 3 years from now? What does the future of booking a venue look like?

30:25
Andrew’s advice to people starting or building two-sided marketplaces 34:09 Outro