How to Build a Successful Tech Startup A Discussion With Kontentino’s CEO, Bohumil Pokstefl

Welcome to the Marketing Growth Podcast. This episode is sponsored by Ahrefs. I’m your host, Shane Barker, and my guest today is Bohumil Pokstefl, the Chief Executive Officer of Kontentino. In today’s episode, we’ll talk about how a social media management tool has evolved over the years. Before we start the conversation, I wanted to discuss a common issue many of my listeners face, and that’s getting website traffic. As someone who’s been in their shoes, I can tell you it’s frustrating and very time-consuming. But there’s a way to take the pain out of the process—you can use an all-in-one tool like Ahrefs to access multiple SEO tools that help you rank higher and drive more traffic. Right now, they’re offering a seven-day trial for only seven dollars at ahrefs.com. They also have an engaging blog and a brilliant YouTube channel with step-by-step SEO tutorials, so be sure to check them out.

Alright, now it’s time to dive into the conversation. I’m excited to have you on the podcast today, Bo. I think we’re going to cover some great stuff, and I’m looking forward to hearing about what you guys have built over the last four—maybe four and a half—years, right?

Awesome. Well, good, good. So hey, guys, we’ve got Bo on the podcast today. Are you the founder or co-founder? You have a partner, correct?

You’ve got a good team. You don’t want to take all the credit, but you’re probably the face of the company—what most people see, without getting into behind-the-scenes politics. Before we jump into that (because I’m excited to discuss that story, which is the reason you’re on the podcast), give us a little background on yourself. I always like to get a bit of a backstory about the people I interview—like, where did you grow up? Is it the same place where you are now?

That’s what I love about Europe, man. When you go to Europe, something I’ve always been envious of is how close everything is. You can drive half an hour, an hour, two hours, and be in a totally different country with different languages, cultures, and amazing people. I’m in Sacramento, California, and I live here because San Francisco is an hour and a half away and the beaches are an hour and a half away—but they’re all still American. I love Americans, but it’s not like in Europe, where crossing a border means a totally different culture and language. There are so many languages there, while in the US most people I know only speak one—maybe two. So let me put you on the spot: how many different languages do you actually speak enough to get by?

Basically the same. When we start drinking, we think our language gets better. So I was Spanish—long story. I went to school in Costa Rica, and I was almost fluent in Spanish. I’m not fluent anymore because I haven’t used it, but as soon as I have a beer or two, I feel like I’m fluent again. I start speaking, and you kind of feel like you’ve got it a little more. That’s what I love about it: you speak three languages, and you’re like, “Well, really, five or six, and I can get away with this.” That’s what I love—people in the US (and I love us US folks) just don’t have that. We speak one, maybe two languages. You’re from Europe, and you moved here, you know. But I love that you have that possibility just to learn and adapt to the culture. I’ve always been super envious of that.

So, how big was your family growing up in Slovakia?

Awesome. You got mom and dad support, and little sister didn’t bother you too much. It sounds like she supported you as well.

We all have different avenues we take. And it sounds like your sister’s raising good kids, which is a good, worldly way to look at things and get things done—to raise them to be good people. So that’s, I think, universal. It should be worldwide. That’s awesome. And you’re currently in Slovakia right now, correct?

I mean, you’re right in the middle of it all there. I have to say I’m a little envious of that. So what about growing up, man? We have a heavy U.S.-based audience, and I’m curious if there are any interesting facts or differences you noticed while growing up—things that might seem completely normal to you but might be surprising to someone in the U.S.?

And then it’s, you know, I don’t know if we in the U.S. fully appreciate that, right? Because we’ve been free for a long time, and then suddenly someone says, “Hey, you can’t do this, this, and this,” and a year later they’re like, “Hey, you can do whatever you want.” And you’re thinking, “Wait a second, what?” It’s the magnitude of being freed at a certain point and then going through the whole process to where your country is today. It’s phenomenal, right? I can see you thinking about it, so it must have been a huge impact. One moment you’re like, “Wait, now I can do anything?” That’s pretty amazing, especially from an entrepreneurial mindset—it’s like the world is your oyster. I can only imagine being a kid, thinking, “Wait, this is a whole new country? This is awesome.” We wouldn’t be talking today if that hadn’t happened, right? That’s such a pivotal event, which is awesome.

You said you moved back in 2016, so did you go off to college? Tell me about that journey.

I love that. I love the fact that the government is supporting startups, because startups aren’t easy. We both know that firsthand. And any kind of support you can get is huge, since most of us don’t have millions of dollars to throw into something. If you do, that usually means you have a VC or private equity fund, and then they might dictate how you do things. Your vote might go down to 49%, they get 51%—it’s not always like that, but you’re essentially giving up part of what you’ve built. There can be value in that, but there’s also another side to it. So I love that the government’s actually stepping in to help. That is absolutely key: “How can we get you to this stage, and then the next stage, and so on?” I love that.

So it sounds like you were in West Virginia—how long were you there?

And that’s the hardest thing to find, right? You’ve got the idea, or—y’know—then you don’t have somebody who can actually implement it. It becomes really difficult to find another person. There are a lot of places where they’ve tried to merge it: “Hey, I’m business, I’m this, I’ve got the idea, I’ve got marketing, but I don’t have the tech or engineering skills,” or whatever it is you need to bring the idea together. Do you think what you learned in West Virginia and in college helped you build a successful company? Because you said, “Hey, it takes two sides to make this work, and we have to bring them together.” I imagine you saw quite a few use cases where that had to happen.

You really hit the nail on the head: it’s like finding your soulmate. It’s already hard enough to find a wife or a husband, but when you’re talking about a business partner, that’s the same kind of challenge. You’ve got your idea, and you need to find the engineer who understands it, and everything has to line up perfectly. That’s why a lot of startups don’t make it—it’s just really hard to find the right match. Plus, there’s so much stress to deal with, whether it’s pivoting or COVID or whatever else comes along. As entrepreneurs, we know it’s not easy. It takes a lot of work, a lot of getting punched in the face, bootstrapping, and all kinds of challenges. But all of that lays the foundation for what we build.

That leads me to what you guys have done. You’ve gone from zero to over 4,000 clients in about four years. You started in 2016, right? That is phenomenal—zero to 4,000 is huge. How did you get started? And it’s Kontentino, right? That’s how you say it. We’ve looked at it and worked with you a bit, and I was seriously impressed—that’s why you’re on the podcast. So tell us a little about it: how did you get started, and what’s the backstory?

McKinsey—you were thinking, “Hey, I was supposed to be up here, and now you’re asking me to do this down here,” right?

That’s awesome. Because when you think about it, what you figured out was that Buffer and everything else is great for posting content, but they don’t take care of the approval and collaboration process, which is the hard part, right? The scheduling part is easy. You can learn software and do that. It’s the approval process when you have three people on one side, three on the other side, and all that back-and-forth. People listening who’ve been in the middle of that know it’s a cluster if you don’t have some kind of organization.

I’m not talking about emails, because emails are—I don’t need 17 more emails or 17,000 more emails on a daily basis. That’s a headache. So what were some of the challenges you guys dealt with? It sounds like the main thing for you was addressing the approval and collaboration headache, right? If you can solve that, that’s everybody’s problem. So what other challenges did you find? Because it sounds like in three, four months, you cracked it quick, which is not usual—most people get punched in the face a lot more, end up homeless, live in their car. You’re obviously a smart guy. So give us a little more: what else happened during that period?

They can get a job anywhere, and they have ten people banging on their door at any point.

And I think that’s—you know, it’s you. I always fight with that because you want the person who’s scrappy, who grinds, who treats the startup like it’s their own, and who’s willing to learn outside of that. You really have to grind it out, and then you’ll get to a point in your startup career where you’re like, “Maybe I need someone to advise me who’s done this before, who’s had those successes.” I love the idea of giving people an internal, in-house opportunity to grow with the company—I think there’s huge value there. It also builds trust and support within the community, right? It’s easy to hire some “big dog,” and then they leave in three months for a better deal. But the person who’s been grinding it out with you from the beginning—and you’re giving them better pay, better opportunities—will be more loyal. I love that. It’s awesome that you guys have 20 people on your team, and now more than 4,000 clients—maybe even 4,500.

That’s awesome. So, we’ve got a lot of entrepreneurs listening to the podcast. What advice would you give them about starting their own company? I know you guys worked hard, but it was quick, man—you’re the epitome of very few people who say, “Within three months, we cracked it, and we were cash-positive, didn’t need VC money, and good things just happened.” Obviously, that’s hard work with a bit of luck sprinkled in. So, as an entrepreneur, what’s one thing you learned early on that someone else could take away?

Yeah, I think that’s the thing. A lot of people, what they do is read a book, and the person says, “Hey, do this now. This is going to be what my agency can do.” The end of the day, the only way you’re going to guarantee not to be successful is just not to execute, not to make it happen, right? It doesn’t need to be perfect. I think a lot of people get in that mindset of, “It’s not perfect. Like, I don’t want to launch it because it’s not perfect.” And guess what? It’ll never be perfect, ever, exactly, ever, ever, ever, so you’ll always have to change it and do things. And I think that’s what people get nervous about with anything, doing videos, with doing, you know, like, whatever it is, like, you have to start. And that’s my big thing is, like, you know, my buddy Brian’s always like, “You got to press the button. It’s got to happen. You can’t just wait forever.” Nobody will know about your software if you don’t launch it at some point. And if you’ve been spending three years on your software trying to get it perfect, I’m here to give you the bad news: it’ll never be perfect, and nobody will ever know about it if you don’t launch it. That’s the key to the whole thing.

You’re waiting for it to be perfect. You’re gonna die with that software in your hand because then nobody will know that it was great or bad, or sucked or didn’t suck, or whatever the deal was, because once again, you failed to launch. And failure to launch means that nobody’s gonna know.

Thanks, Bo. It’s been great getting to know what it took to build and grow Kontentino into a successful social media management tool. While we’ll wrap up this segment here, we’ll be back soon with another great conversation. In the next episode, we’ll discuss tips on streamlining workflows for brands and agencies. In the meantime, if you need help improving your social media marketing strategy, you can reach out to my team at shanebarker.com. We’ll help you boost your visibility and increase your ROI.