Sell Before You Build with Liam Dunne

In this episode of 1 to 100, Liam joins Jack, Rishabh, and Jeremiah to discuss remote hiring, management, and building an organic search business with services and software.

Liam explains why his company hires globally. He can recruit from a larger talent pool and serve different markets. Jack describes the cost difference between hiring engineers in the US and South America. Rishabh explains how an office near a strong university can help a company recruit locally.

Liam describes a hire who understood marketing deeply and struggled with pace, reliability, and ownership. His team now looks for intelligence, agency, and curiosity. Rishabh argues that AI can handle some of the coordination work that previously required managers. Liam says managers still need enough knowledge of the work to judge its quality.

They debate how experience, ego, and family affect career decisions. Rishabh argues that experienced operators may need to return to individual contributor work. Jeremiah explains how having children changed the work he was willing to pursue. Rishabh challenges his broader claim about family and career success, pointing to founders who have families.

Liam describes an organic search agency with about 20 people, including five to seven engineers and data scientists. His team builds tools for research and delivery, then uses those tools to produce results for clients. He explains why they moved from low-priced software subscriptions to a service model.

The team is considering how client data and software could help the company retain its value as competition grows. Jack raises personal brand as a way to attract customers. Liam wants to build a company that can retain its value independently of his own reputation.

Liam recommends selling before building. His team sought commitments, delivered work manually, and developed software after customers paid. He explains how they changed direction when an offer failed. They also discuss outbound sales, marketing budgets, and qualified sales calls that Liam says came through AI search on a new domain.

Chapters 00:00 Remote hiring and work preferences 03:48 Global talent and the cost of an office 07:39 Hiring near a strong university 10:31 Hiring for a brand and managing performance 13:36 AI and layers of management 16:54 Hiring for intelligence and agency 19:08 Ego and returning to individual work 24:33 Family and career decisions 28:30 An organic search agency with software 32:11 Competition and building a valuable company 37:20 Sell before you build 41:02 Outbound sales and marketing channels 46:09 Qualified leads from AI search