#339: Chelsey Roney of Proxi, on the Techstars Experience, the Value of Adaptable Marketing and Growth Strategies, and Setting Boundaries for Balance

Just Go Grind with Justin Gordon

Chelsey Roney is the Co-Founder and COO of Proxi, the geospatial powerhouse behind transformative, human-centered interactions with the real world making mapping and crowdsourcing geographic data accessible to everyone. Their no-code platform allows users to create, customize and embed highly interactive maps into social media accounts, websites, and apps. Enabling and hosting this curated content will power future tech-enabled, location-based experiences for both brands and individuals in the creator economy.

Chelsey is a serial entrepreneur, a passionate business builder, and a marketing expert. After graduating from Texas A&M, Chelsey joined Boeing where she worked in financial planning and analysis and Microsoft where she worked in a demand center that focused on B2B omnichannel marketing. She grew and sold two businesses: a SaaS business in the University space, and a local services business. Chelsey is also an active member of her community, dedicated parent, and passionate supporter of women and business. Her persistence, attention to detail, and deep knowledge of finance and marketing have helped Proxi grow more than 100% month over month.

Topics Covered by Chelsey Roney in this Episode

• What Proxi is and how the idea was born from the first pandemic Halloween in 2020
• The evolution of Proxi’s crowdsourced mapping tool
• Deciding to raise VC and applying to Techstars
• Going full-time with Proxi
• The experience of going through Techstars and the value it provided
• Techstars’ Mentor Madness
• Raising a $1.2M VC round and the different expectations between being VC-backed, debt-backed, and bootstrapping
• Deciding to work with Leslie Feinzaig of Graham & Walker
• The big vision for Proxi and their pitch to investors
• Taking on Yelp and Google Maps
• The challenge of customer acquisition and narrowing down their ideal customer profile with such a large range of use cases
• Evolution and flexibility in Proxi’s business model
• Prioritizing hiring and marketing with the VC funds they raised
• Where they’ve focused their marketing allocations and navigating different strategies
• How they’re approaching product-led growth
• How they prioritize feedback about which new features to build and why they’re incorporating accounts into their product
• Why Chelsea loves entrepreneurship and how she finds balance and implements boundaries
• A special announcement about what’s next for Proxi

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