"Connectd did not just introduce me to support. It literally changed the trajectory of my company. We have a new name. That's far more than support. And Aria? It kept my sanity."
What was happening in the business that made you seek support from Connectd?
Michael Gold, Founder, Gold Strategic Delivery & Aria: Gold Project Management, now Gold Strategic Delivery, is a delivery consultancy and implementation partner. We came to Connectd because a lot had changed over the last three years in terms of market fit and how the business had evolved. We actually underwent a complete rebrand and repositioning thanks to the team at Connectd, which is how we became Gold Strategic Delivery.
Off the back of that work, and through dealing with many different project management tools, we ended up creating a second company called Aria, a professional services automation tool. That brought us back to Connectd in a completely different space. Aria is a brand new SaaS startup, a market I have very little experience in. I have the core expertise around the tool itself, but everything else around it, fundraising, financials, technical credibility of the product, and numerous other things, all came via Connectd.
What were your biggest pain points as a founder at that time?
Michael Gold: For Gold, it was around marketing and repositioning. I use LinkedIn quite a lot and I'm a fairly public face in that respect, but that's very different from SEO, rebranding, and repositioning. Having access to a specialist to think through how to take a repositioned company back to market has been one of the biggest successes.
For Aria, everything was a pain point. It's a brand new technical startup and there was just so much I didn't know. I actually pinch myself when I think about the sliding doors moment two or three months ago where I didn't join Connectd and did it alone. That is a genuinely scary proposition.
The funniest thing about being asked what your biggest pain point was is that you don't know what you don't know. I didn't go in with a clear problem for them to solve. They helped with that, but it's actually the other hundred things I had no idea I needed to solve that have made the real difference.
What do you value most in choosing the right advisor?
Michael Gold: I think everyone is different. I've been quite greedy with the Connectd platform. I have two companies and two full boards, so eight advisors in total, which puts me in a good position to talk about the differences.
You need a supportive, communicative, proactive team, but everyone has a different role. Some of them are hype people in a sense, always bringing positivity and driving you in the right direction. Others have a much more critical lens. It's a nice balance between people keeping you positive with momentum and people keeping you on the right track by asking the harder questions.
What made Connectd the right place to look for advisory support over other options?
Michael Gold: I had been working fractionally myself for the last three years, so there was already a natural connection and overlap. But if I'm being perfectly honest, it ultimately comes down to the pro bono scheme. It feels insane. I have never heard of the ability to access the type of resources we've been able to access.
I have the current CTO of Nokia on my project, for free, for six months. We also have the ex-CFO of McLaren and a marketing expert from Bumble. I don't think I could find that anywhere else. When you say there are other options, I genuinely don't think there are. Everyone treats each other with respect and transparency, they are willing to give their time and are so passionate about what we're building. There really is no other option.
How did you establish cadence with all of your advisors?
Michael Gold: It originally came through your advice. The initial step was a quick call, some 30 minutes and some an hour, just to check the vibe between us all was right. If we continued with the board members, we moved to a monthly board meeting with everyone, an hour with all four on a call, and then a biweekly hour in between. Then emails, WhatsApps, and whatever else ad hoc.
Everyone is slightly different. We have one board member working significantly more than the allotted hours. And then we have three fractional advisors in our Slack group, which is much more fluid and ad hoc. Half-hour meetings every week or every other week, depending. They feel much more like part of the team.
What are the most significant outcomes that have come out of the relationships with your advisors?
Michael Gold: For Gold Strategic Delivery, every single advisor, independently of one another, literally within the first week, aligned on the idea that I had named the company wrong. Which was fun. So we embarked on a full rebrand and repositioning. Deep dive workshops, close collaboration with my co-founder, and we came out with a new name, a redone website, new logos, and a full public relaunch. Pretty hefty change.
Alongside that, the other board members have helped put together a go-to-market strategy for how we now source clients.
On the Aria side, I had never fundraised before. The board advisor working more in depth with us has been absolutely amazing. The amount I've learned on fundraising, our ICP, our wedge, our financial forecasting. everything. From the CTO perspective, we are two domain experts and a brand designer building a technical SaaS product. Having a Nokia-level CTO review our product from a technical standpoint, support our development team, and give us a proper audit has been invaluable.
What advice would you give to another founder considering Connectd?
Michael Gold: Sign up. I've told people about it and they say it's such a good offer it seems too good to be true. Which is obviously a really nice thing to have as a company.
Connectd did not just introduce me to support. It literally changed the trajectory of my company. We have a new name. That's far more than support. And Aria? It kept my sanity.
Michael Gold, Founder, Gold Strategic Delivery & Aria
