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[MUSIC] Daniela, welcome to Stanford.
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>> Thank you so much for having me.
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It's weird I feel like when I was 18, if I would have even stepped foot here, I would just like burn into ash because I was the dumb twin, >> [LAUGH] >> But my sister would have like thrived.
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She would have turned into these flowers.
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>> I'm sure you would have done great and it is such a pleasure to have you here.
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I have to admit I've been following you on Instagram and you are partnering with some really heavy hitters. >> [LAUGH].
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>> Selena Gomez, Serena Williams, >> [LAUGH] >> DVF, who has actually sat in this very same seat as a view from the top speaker.
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>> I'm going to send her a picture like right after she's going to get a car.
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>> But there's actually one star in particular on your posts who I would love to get on next year slate. >> Okay.
0:51
>> Your chief happiness officer, Leo.
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>> He would love it but he would just honestly curl up and now the whole time but I think people pay for that.
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So, >> I'm sure we'll all have to find some good questions to keep them engaged.
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But in all seriousness, I can't wait to get into your entrepreneurial journey from founding your first company at just 19 years old to recently announcing your third venture in collaboration with JP Morgan. >> Yes.
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>> But your early experiences that got you to this point are equally as inspiring so I want to start back there. >> Okay.
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>> You've spoken previously about growing up in Florida and a family of hard workers between your mother, your father, even your identical twin sister.
1:31
How did those early childhood experiences shape your understanding of success?
1:36
>> Wow, well, first of all, thank you so much for having me.
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I have horrible ice I was just talking to Nora, who's right there with the camera on me, saying that it was just so odd that my story has gotten me here.
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Because again, I just did to talk that very dorm, mess up the night one second. I think that's better.
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I just did to talk that you pen, and that's all.
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So my sister went here to Stanford, and a lot of my super smart friends went there and super successful friends went here, or are still here, like Phoebe Gates, etcetera.
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And I just always felt so, what's the word, jealous, that they got to be among so many other people that excelled in that amazing lane, but it was very different than the lane that I was supposed to be on.
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So I think in order to answer your question, the first thing I need to say is success looks different.
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And now I know that and now that's really the message of the breadwinner.
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It looks different for everyone.
2:41
So I grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, the sexiest part of Florida.
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[LAUGH] No one ever knows what it is.
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But I grew up as the dumb twin.
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My father, who is from Niagara Falls, New York he didn't go to colleges.
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His dad worked in a factory and died very young unfortunately.
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And he had four siblings and he started working at the age of 13 and worked his way, washing cars, fixing cars, etcetera.
3:08
My mother grew up in Colombia and Bogota we both have Hispanic upbringings.
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And she actually grew up even poorer, she lived next to a mass grave.
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[LAUGH] That's how poor, but they were the lucky ones they had shoes and like an actual roof instead of like a hut.
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But she worked her ass off and she was like all of you guys and like my sister.
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She really excelled at school and she almost didn't really have a choice.
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She had to because there were private schools in Colombia and then very, very bad public schools, and the only way she could ever go to a private school was to win the one scholarship that they had every single year, and it had to be the best students.
3:49
She literally won it every single year.
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She didn't have a choice.
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It wasn't like, oops, if I get a B, it's like survival mode, and her family just wanted her to become an oral surgeon, a dentist, because my grandfather, he still does this.
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I don't know why, because he doesn't have to anymore, but he still makes dentures.
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I don't even know what it would be called here.
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But the whole dream was that she was going to be a oral surgeon.
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He was going to do the dentures, and it was going to be great.
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And the epitome of success, and so both of my parents know what it's like to go from absolutely nothing to success, but in totally different paths.
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And I mirror my father a lot and my sister mirrors my mother a lot, and my dad was always much harder on me because I think he thought that I was kind of like his son as like a tomboy.
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He's was such a playboy, and he says that God's cursed to him for being a playboy was that he got two twin girls, [LAUGH] and never got a son.
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And so I was like, the one that would fish with him, etcetera but it's very long way of me saying that.
5:01
The way that I developed my version of success was through school, because that's all I knew.
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I was very lucky to go to a very good school in Jacksonville, Florida.
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Again, my parents worked their asses off to make sure that we would never have to suffer like they did.
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And Alex was just always amazing at school.
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That's my twin, her name Alex Astor.
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She's a New York Times best-selling author, so cool.
5:24
But she was always excelling and I just hated it.
5:28
And I honestly thought I was dumb, and it's because my teachers told me I was dumb.
5:33
[LAUGH] It wasn't, I didn't have a lot of teachers that were like, no, you might be so good at this other thing.
5:38
It was like, if you're not good at math and science and history and all these things that honestly, sorry, professors in the room.
5:46
But if you're good at all of those subjects, I don't want to hire you on my team, I want you to be amazing at one thing.
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But it made me feel so stupid because I just couldn't learn it.
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And I realized as I got older that I couldn't learn it because I didn't care.
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I knew I was never going to professionally measure triangles. So like why?
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I still wonder someone in the audience please let me know in the Q&A.
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The Earth's crust how many times I learned about that, amoebas like, my goodness, Jesus.
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It's like they're preparing us to be like you Renaissance people of the world.
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And I just could not get myself to care until sophomore year when I saw my sister getting letters from places like this, the new pen, etcetera, begging her to apply and I basically got letters telling me not even to try.
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Because I was a BNC student, my sister was a, she graduated [FOREIGN], etcetera.
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So then I was like, okay, if I don't get my shit together, I'm going to be stuck in Jacksonville, Florida my entire life, and that's not happening to me.
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So those triangles became very interesting, >> [LAUGH] >> And I almost used it as a path to, instead of caring so much about what I was learning about and I almost liked to bring people down. It was just very odd.
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I liked to make the comparison of the dumb twin and the smart twin.
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Like, that was literally my nickname from professors. It was really cruel.
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Hopefully times have changed, but, I started basically using something that would become a barrier to me that I didn't know I had, which was OCD. I was undiagnosed.
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I kind of found out I had it, my freshman year of high school because I took like a behavioral science class and we talked about like schizophrenia, OCD, and I was like, my god, that's stuff I do.
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And even though my parents were in a position to get me a therapist to psychiatrist and it would have changed my life, my mother had the shame of like Latinos.
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No like, if something hurts like you don't say anything like you, it's just emotional whatever, my dad is a very man's man like We don't talk about that stuff, whatever.
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So I basically got no help from anybody.
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My parents feel very bad now about it, but like times have changed.
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And so I used that OCD to my benefit.
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I didn't know it at the time, but when you have OCD and ADHD, which I later found out I had, if you love something, you can do it for eight hours straight without even getting up to peak, like truly and so that's what I did.
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I saw getting out of Jacksonville, Florida here and then put all the score here and I ended up going from almost all season B's to straight A pluses and I think my parents were like, wait, what happened?
8:38
Like and I I ended up getting into Bu ,but that was my first introduction to what does success look like and it truly felt like if you were not perfect at the things that the professors are telling you.
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You have to be perfect at at such a young age in middle school high school when you're developing as a person.
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It felt like you were an outcast where I see so many successful people like my friend Ruby Carr, who's the best selling poet in the world.
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Her Milken Honey book out sold Odyssey, which is crazy and she's multi-millionaire, and she's a very similar way.
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And so I think both ways, what you guys have done to be in this room is so admirable and I wish I had tried harder in high school before, so maybe I could have been among you all.
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But I'm still a proud of my success story.
9:35
>> It's incredibly inspiring and I think it's amazing how you're able to channel that focus into your success in high school, which as you mentioned, led you to be you.
9:44
While you were in college, that's also the time when you founded your first company, The News Zet, what was your motivation for starting a company at that point rather than trying to have a more traditional college experience?
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>> Yeah, so basically it's funny how so many different categories are woven through your entire life. Where is this mine? Is it here? [INAUDIBLE]. >> Okay.
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I'm like I keep touching it.
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But everything nd I'm 28.
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I'm too young to say this.
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I used to feel so young, now I feel so old in so many rooms, but I'm too young to say this, but I've really lived in the last nine years, better or worse, and so many themes come back to almost haunt you.
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But sometimes in a good way, like the thing you thought was the worst thing in the world, you're like, thank God that happened.
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And so when I was in school I was so excited when I got into BU, I was thrilled because of the first two years of high school, my GPA average wasn't as good as it would've been if I would've cared the entire time.
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So BU has this special program called the College of General Studies.
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And so I was like, okay, great.
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And it basically I think it's like the bottom 10% of people who get accepted, they go into the school and you kind of have to prove yourself to go into the College of Arts and Sciences, whatever the F that means the business school, the comm school, etc..
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And so I wasn't off the hook yet.
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I had to like, prove that you get into the business school.
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And so I was still like, no, but I'm going to learn I'm going to finally learn things I want to do and I'm going to be a professional because I always just wanted to go out and work.
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And the first day I go to college general studies, I sit down and guess what the first subject is? >> Try and go. >> Try and go. >> [LAUGH].
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>> And I was like, what the actual fuck?
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And I realized for two years I was going to be doing the same thing learning about history, amoebas all of those things again, you think I'd be an expert but my god, I don't even know any of that stuff.
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But like, I just literally was like No and so the first year I was so depressed and I honestly thought I wanted to be you but I can't magic lightning doesn't strike twice.
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I'm not going to get into the business school.
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I just counted myself out because I felt stupid in those classes. I didn't care.
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I wanted to use that time to do something.
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And so very quickly, in my sophomore year, I realized I stopped feeling sorry for myself and I realized that I actually had an opportunity that I was there and I was lucky enough.
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Because my parents again worked their asses off to allow my sister and I to go to college without having any debt or having to have a job.
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That was the best gift that they could have ever given me.
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They give me the gift of time.
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So while they were like, go find yourself and make friends, like that wasn't happening, I wasn't in my identity parties.
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I decided to use that time and say, okay, if I am not going to really care, I'm just going to kind of, just not fell out which would be hard and I'll tell you about that in a second of harder than I thought.
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Let me use these next three years where this is the only time my life I'm not going to have any responsibilities.
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I have a bed to sleep in at a dorm like I just have a few classes a day.
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Let me use this time if no one's going to hire me to hire myself after college, and I just got into my mind, and I don't know where this confidence came from because I had zero confidence.
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I literally would wake up sometimes in the morning and think, what am I even doing?
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I'm just a waste of space.
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Truly at 19 or 18, I didn't feel like I had a purpose in this world.
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I often times would tell my mom to her horror that I thought I would die young because I there had to be some inkling of I want to be a news reporter.
13:49
I want to be a scientist, not a fucking scientist. >> [LAUGH].
13:54
>> I want to do something but I just could not picture myself doing anything.
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Thing and so I was like, I guess I'm just like psychic and there's no future and that's it and my mom was like what?
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But she was also struggling because she dedicated her entire life to me and my sister who are twins, so we left at the same time.
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And then she just had my dad and she really had no life because she gave up being an oral surgeon because when she came here, she had to take another course to be certified here, and she got immediately pregnant with twin girls.
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And so she wanted to be a mother.
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And so she was kind of losing herself and her independence.
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And she would call me with her problems and all of a sudden I felt like I was the parent and I told my mom, don't worry.
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I'm going to make it so that me and my sister her anyone can make our own decisions because we're going to have financial freedom because I'm going to build a company and I'm going to make us all filthy rich.
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And she'd be like, okay, honey, whatever that is. >> [LAUGH].
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>> Okay, yeah, you maybe, yeah, Alex but not you, but she was like, no, don't worry about me, but honestly, the worry and the fact that so many women in the world are beholden to spouses who make a certain amount of money, etc.
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And the wife doesn't work or maybe she doesn't make as much, or partner, woman and woman, man and man, there's such a power imbalance there.
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And my mom even though she had worked so hard just like my dad, didn't really have any money of her own.
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And even though they didn't sign a prenup or anything like she would have gotten half but not that they were going to get divorced but she just kind of felt like wait, what is my purpose now?
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And I wanted to give her that purpose and that freedom and so that's the stuff I really don't talk about, like I talked about like, I was dumb, so I wanted to hire myself haha and then that's like the headline.
15:59
It's also that I wanted to save my mom from ever having to make a decision based on just staying with somebody because of they would pay for me my sister's college or whatever, and my parents are still together today.
16:13
I'm painting it like my dad's horrible.
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No, they're still together today, but she could have traveled the world, like, go play tennis with your friends. I don't know.
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But she didn't feel like she had that freedom because she didn't feel like she had anything of her own.
16:28
And I was able at 25 to make my mother a multimillionaire, because I gave her 15% of my company.
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And that was the greatest gift that I could have ever given my entire family, because now they are free to do what they want.
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And that's the greatest gift I got as well.
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Because I really thought it was going to be, when I saw millions of dollars in my bank account, I really thought it was going to be like a F you moment.
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Like, I'm going to go to my high school reunion and whatever. And like, I didn't care.
16:59
It was like, you work so hard and you finally make it, and you're in this big apartment that used to be owned by the chairman of NBC, and you feel like you married a rich guy.
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And you're just like, yeah, I guess I live here.
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And it's so weird, and so I kind of pinch myself every day, because I was the dumb twin, that was my identity for my entire life.
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Only the last four years I was, she's not a dumb twin, she's a smart twin, and my sister is wildly successful as well now.
17:32
But no one thought I would be anything, like, literally anything.
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And so, the fact that I'm in this room and it's not like, this is why you don't do drugs or something like that.
17:43
>> [LAUGH] >> I've actually never done drugs, that's why I had no friends in college.
17:49
>> [LAUGH] >> But like, it's just astounding, because I know how hard my sister worked to get into Penn and how hard all of you worked to work so hard here and then afterwards.
18:03
And it really is just like, the harder you work, the luckier you get.
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And I found an opportunity for me to work really hard on something that, thank God, became something, but it wasn't luck.
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I worked every single second of the day, I was obsessed with.
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And it was because I wanted independence for myself, my family, and I also kind of needed a job when I got out of college.
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I didn't want to go back to Jacksonville.
18:31
[LAUGH] >> I think that's an amazing motivation, and obviously, you proved a lot of people wrong.
18:37
The Newsette has grown into a phenomenal success, it's become a next-gen media company and creative agency that now works with over 1 million customers daily.
18:48
As you were seeing the early signs of success and the company was scaling, how did you initially think about differentiation and product market fit considering how competitive and crowded the media space is?
18:58
>> Yeah, so, I wish we had a million customers, that'd be cool.
19:02
No, we have a million readers or reach, and they are our customers.
19:07
The weird thing about media, and honestly, none of you get into media, it is so ridiculous.
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Like, I wish I sold a package good or something, because with a media company, and it actually, though, while growing, it made me build competence.
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It's like I was a new person, I grew my shell, because it's so complicated.
19:28
So, really quick with media, you don't have one client.
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If you were selling these glasses that I might need in a second to actually see faces, because right now it's just a bunch of big potatoes, because I stared at my screen for nine years in a row.
19:43
Seriously, I had good eyesight, it's really bad.
19:46
And if anyone can help me here later, but anyways, you don't just have one customer, you have two.
19:54
Because you have to give free value to one customer and basically give them all of your energy, and make content, and grow the audience, etc, for a customer that is not paying you, that's your reader.
20:09
And then you also at the same time have to give just as much energy to the other customer, which is the advertiser.
20:17
And so, there's very few industries where you have to make that huge balance and you can't just focus on one, because if you only focus on one, you lose the other one.
20:27
And so, that is something that I learned very early on.
20:32
But for media, when I started in 2015, there weren't any newsletters out there, it was just a few coming up, Daily Candy obviously was a big deal, like a decade prior.
20:45
But AOL kind of effed it up and it went from like $100 million valuation to negative 100 million.
20:53
And so, I think people stay away from [LAUGH] newsletters for a while.
20:55
But when I decided, okay, I'm going to start a company I was like, okay, I'm going to make a list, what am I good at?
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And there was nothing on that list.
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I am not joking or trying to be cute, I couldn't even lie to myself.
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I was like, I'm not I'm not good at writing, no, I'm not good at this, I wasn't good at anything.
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And so I was like, okay, I'm going to become good at these things.
21:15
And so I decided that instead of making a list of what am I good at, what do I love to do?
21:21
I love to read magazines, which is like, okay, what are you going to do, be a professional magazine reader?
21:27
No, I decided to make my own magazine.
21:30
And I thought, the inbox can be such a toxic place and it's such a white space in the market for actual positive stuff where you're, I guess, trying to refresh your inbox.
21:44
And not looking for the email from your professor that's telling you something bad or good, or a payment for your credit card, whatever.
21:53
It's like a gift in your inbox, and so that's the story I tell people.
21:59
The actual story is, I tried to make a website, I had no idea how to make a website, I was on score space for like 17 hours straight and I just could not do it.
22:06
So I was like, what's easier than a website, newsletter.
22:10
And thank God I did that, because having a newsletter means that you own your audience, you have those emails, you literally.
22:17
It's like going to somebody's door every day and saying, hello, listen to me, and they can open the door or they cannot open the door.
22:25
But having a website, it's like being a car on the freeway passing the house.
22:28
There's no intimacy, I just made that up.
22:31
So I'm sorry, that was a really bad analogy or metaphor or whatever.
22:35
Anyways, but I was so lucky that I kind of stumbled into that, because I was differentiated in the market space.
22:42
There was nothing like me.
22:43
There were a few other newsletters coming about literally that exact same time that I didn't know about and then I found out about later on.
22:51
But I was just in my lane.
22:53
I didn't know how media worked, I didn't know any other media companies, so I just did what I wanted to do.
22:59
And the newsletter today actually is very similar in terms of topics as it was nine years ago.
23:06
>> Well, as someone who can definitely relate to having an inbox that caused a lot of stress, I'm going to follow up with you about tips for that.
23:13
Another really unique part of your founder story is that you were able to build this newsletter to a very impressive $200 million valuation.
23:22
And you did that all without raising any VC funding.
23:26
For any aspiring founders in the room, what are your considerations on the merits and costs of bootstrapping versus raising VC?
23:33
>> Yeah, well, first I want to say, I think it was last year or the year before, I was named by Forbes, the youngest, wealthiest, self-made woman of color in the world.
23:43
The only woman younger than me and wealthier than me was Kylie Jenner.
23:47
And I was like, I'll take it. >> [LAUGH].
23:49
But that was like a nice headline, and just to be totally honest with all of you, y companies, just because they're valued one year or something, It doesn't mean that the value holds that same way.
24:04
I actually was one of the people who actually proved that value because someone bought a percentage of the company at that valuation.
24:10
Usually it's like a funding round, where it kind of is like a fake valuation and people around here are starting to think that and figure that out that profitability is actually quite a nice word and not a bad word.
24:22
But I'm not going to sit here and be like, yeah, I knew I wanted to just have so much money in my 20s and not have to wait until I exited, if I ever exited, etc.
24:33
I tried to raise money, I came right to New York.
24:37
The way I monetize the newsletter, I knew that I could Could not monetize until I graduated.
24:44
The dumb twin had one smart thing in her mind because I knew, what if I get a dream advertiser and they're like, can we talk?
24:51
And I had so many fake emails, like sarah@thenews. com.
24:55
Because people didn't know people would email from BuzzFeed and stuff, we should do a traffic swap because you're driving so much traffic to our site.
25:04
I'm like, let me have Sarah answer. Sarah was my toenail.
25:09
[LAUGH] >> And so, I literally just, I faked it till I made it, and it was just me and every newsletter subscriber, I literally could feel like I was getting them.
25:22
I actually was such a stalker during the time that I was in the classrooms and they were studying, trees and very important stuff that I should never be in charge of.
25:34
I was on Facebook looking at my friends, well, not really friends, I guess, people who I went to high school with, looking to see who their new friends were, because Facebook did chronological order there.
25:46
So, thanks, Facebook, and I would be able to say, these are people from their new college.
25:51
And so then I would DM all of these people that were complete strangers to me and be like, hey, I'm and, as a sophomore, I don't know if you guys can relate.
26:00
It's really hard to get a cool internship until you're like a junior senior.
26:04
I wouldn't know, I never got an internship, I was me myself annoying, but basically, everyone wants something on their resume.
26:12
And this was a time where stuff the broad resume wasn't just out there everywhere, and so I would DM all these random people I never knew who they were.
26:23
And I would say, hey, and like, I didn't look like a serial killer, so at least they knew that much.
26:28
But I was like, Hey, I work at this amazing company called the News That, all you have to do is just have ten of your friends subscribe, and then you will become an official ambassador and you can put that on your resume, etc.
26:40
And almost everybody I messaged was like, okay, because it was like, I would put myself, this is a lesson for everybody, and might be so obvious.
26:50
But you sometimes forget even after doing business for so many years as myself, you always have to put yourself in the other person's shoes. Like, what do they want?
27:02
They're not going to do something for me because they care, no one cares.
27:06
You have stuff to do, you got shit going on.
27:08
So I was like, I know these people want something to put on their resume, and they want something to be able to be a part of, to get an internship, etc. So I made it that.
27:19
And I pretended like I worked there instead of, I started it, because if they saw me and I started it, they'd be like, yeah, right, this is like a Joe Schmo thing, and it was.
27:28
But I made it look like it was bigger than it was.
27:31
And I actually have a really good friend from BU that became an ambassador, had no idea that I was the founder of the company for like two years.
27:38
And she's still an Incredible friend today.
27:42
I don't remember the question honestly, I just started talking.
27:45
>> [LAUGH] >> I think that's the best fake it till you make its story, but clearly you made it.
27:51
>> [LAUGH] >> I wasn't building a car or something, that would have been troublesome.
27:54
>> [LAUGH] >> It was like, no, just get in, it'll work, like, no.
27:58
>> But obviously it was so successful that it led you eventually- >> Okay, yeah, no, sorry, I got, this is actually something that I told him I wanted to talk about, and then I just started talking and the words escaped me.
28:10
So, I told you that I really wanted to talk to all of you about the different paths of funding versus bootstrapping.
28:19
So I realized that I had to make money, obviously, But in my very long story, sorry about that, I have ADHD and I don't think I took that medicine today.
28:29
>> [LAUGH] >> Basically, I realized that I could not sell anything to advertisers until I graduated because I didn't want a huge advertiser to be like, can you get on a call.
28:39
And I'm like, no, I have math class, it's embarrassing.
28:43
Not embarrassing here though, if you're at Stanford, the like, cool, okay.
28:48
So one month before graduation, it was just exams and stuff, I started to monetize, I opened it up and there were so many brands that came to me, like Stitch Fix and Casper mattress.
29:01
And all of those guys that I think are still out there.
29:04
They would come to me and I would be like, no, we don't do advertising, and then they want you, so it's like the girl that's like, I don't like you. It's like, really?
29:12
[LAUGH] >> Like, comes back with a dozen roses, and so finally when I open the doors to advertisement, I actually made $25,000 in one month.
29:22
And for somebody with overhead of three people, me and myself and I, that was a lot.
29:28
>> [LAUGH] >> So I was like, I'm going to New York.
29:30
And so me and my sister moved to New York, and I had that $25,000, and I had to make it work, like Project Runway says.
29:39
And literally, I just worked my ass off because I knew that was the money I had, it wasn't like some Genie was going to come and give me money.
29:48
But then I quickly realized, because I realized all these people were getting these cool profiles and they were usually men.
29:57
This was when I was 21, 22, I would email reporters and like pitch myself, which I didn't know was an ick thing to do for reporters because it's usually like your PR team visit, I don't know.
30:07
But pitch yourself, who cares?
30:09
Anyways, they were like, so how much have you raised?
30:12
Every single one of them.
30:13
And I was like, God, I have to raise money.
30:15
I should have known, because when I was making the presentation, I was like, what am I going to do with this money?
30:21
It was like, what I was already doing was sustainably, but it would just take me less time.
30:26
But everyone was getting funding, so I was like, I gotta do it.
30:30
So I got into, like, I weaseled my way into every room and I actually gone to some pretty important rooms because their associates or their secretaries were readers of the news act.
30:41
And were like, no, you gotta meet with this person.
30:44
But everyone I met with was an old white man, apologies for all of you out there.
30:49
>> [LAUGH] >> Anyways, you're great.
30:51
So, specifically, there was one old white man who all of you would know, very, very, very successful investor person and very old.
31:01
And he, >> [LAUGH] >> I did my whole presentation and I was so excited, I was looking for a million dollars at a $10 million valuation, and that was that.
31:12
So I was doing my presentation and he starts laughing, and I'm like, ha ha ha, laughing with them, let's all laugh together, and then he stopped.
31:19
And I was like, what's so funny?
31:21
And he said, you remind me of my granddaughter.
31:24
And I was stupid enough not to even see that as an insult, so I was like, tell me more. So I was like, really?
31:31
She must be so smart and cool and entrepreneurial.
31:35
And he got super dead faced and said, no, actually, she talks way too fast and she has no idea what she's talking about.
31:42
I'm not joking, and literally, sat there waiting for me to get up, and I actually got that social cue to get up and leave.
31:50
And I cried the entire Uber way home, that sounds like the end of a Taylor Swift song, but it's true, l I did.
31:57
And I felt so sorry for myself, So whatever and something I've learned is the measure of success is not how much you win.
32:08
It's truly and I sound like a baseball player from the 20s or something, but it's not about how many times you win, it's about the times you fail and how you react to those failures.
32:20
And I'm somebody who like sometimes can cry and feel sorry for myself, but I listen to like one song, like Girl on Fire or something like that.
32:29
And then I'm like, you know what, F everyone, I'm going to do it my way, and that's one of my favorite songs, My Way.
32:35
And it's like, I really chewed him up and spit them out that investor guy, but I said you know what?
32:45
If again it was another old white man telling me that I couldn't do what I wanted to do.
32:49
I skipped over this but I actually failed my entrepreneurship project at BU, it was very fair, I don't know if you guys do something like this probably Knox or Stanford.
32:59
But It was an entrepreneurship project, and how many of you guys know founders who have eight co-founders, anyone?
33:09
Not a good idea, it's like, yes, let me start a company that's going to be super successful, and I'd love to split it in eight pieces after I have like one percent, not a good idea.
33:19
They were like, okay, we're going to put all of you guys in groups of like nine to ten, like first rung, then we're going to have one of you guys fail.
33:28
Okay, no all of us fail if the entrepreneur project doesn't work in real life, but okay, one of us will fail.
33:33
And the cherry on top was the professors a. k.
33:34
a the investors or whatever in the real world aren't going to pick who fails.
33:40
The other people in your group are, and so it was so and whoever came up with this and I told the current dean now and I think they like took that away because I have shit on it so many times.
33:52
But I was the one they picked to fail because I instead of going out to drink or whatever after we were all done with the project, it's something we did like every single day for like six months.
34:03
I would go home and do my newsletter and everyone knew that.
34:05
And so literally, a guy that never brought his computer once to any of the meetings and like, I'm sorry, you can't do a project like that without a computer.
34:14
He didn't fail, I failed, so that meant I failed all of my classes because it was like 70% of the grade.
34:20
And so I got a nice letter from the Dean saying, If you don't get this GPA, retake all these classes on top of the new classes, on top of doing the news that which everyone called.
34:30
My professors called my little newsletter, you are going to be kicked out once semester before graduation.
34:36
So, [LAUGH] that was the hardest time in my life and I literally I felt like dying and that's when I actually did something about my OCD and went to get help.
34:46
And it was the hardest semester of my life, but I somehow did it and I ended up graduating on the Dean's list, which is like a much better letter to get from him.
34:56
He was also an old white guy, [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] >> I'm joking, I'm joking, my dad's one.
35:01
But [LAUGH] I realized at that moment, okay, another old white guy, back to the investor guide, the really old mean guy, the one that made me cry.
35:14
[LAUGH] I was like, am I going to let him define me?
35:18
Even though, like, I should have been like, yes, sir, I am a failure, goodbye.
35:23
Because he was so successful, he still is so successful, I think I don't know, I don't like Google him every day or anything.
35:27
[LAUGH] Am joking, but I was like, am I going to let that happen?
35:32
I said no, and I probably sounded so stupid, I didn't tell anybody this, and thank God I didn't because this was so far fetched, and thank God I'm so stubborn.
35:40
But I said instead of getting a million dollars from four white old men in suits for like four investors, let's say I'm going to get a million dollars from 200 companies if it takes those money for advertising.
35:56
And that's what I did, and in 2019 we did a million dollars in sales, 2020,we did 7 million, and 2021, we did 40 million dollars in sales with eight figures of profit.
36:06
Because I never took on an investor, because all of them laughed me out of the room, I was able to write myself an eight-figure check and deposit into my bank account.
36:18
And so all the founder friends that I have, this is a cautionary tale, all the founder friends I had that raised at a billion dollar valuation owned like 2% of the company.
36:28
And they were like, so cool and laughed about my company, I had like lots of money in the bank and they had like 200 k from secondary and then their company tank.
36:40
And they like bought like an $8 million house before, there are some horror stories, so people don't tell you that, people don't tell you the parts where it's like, yeah, that person is so successful.
36:49
But like it all these valuations finally caught up on them and they're never going to sell for that much they're going to sell for half mean meaning they're not going to get one penny.
36:58
So, that $1 million gone Secondary but you bought like $100 million house because you thought you were going to be a billionaire, sorry like you're in debt now.
37:06
So I was in a very unique position not just among women or Latinos or whatever, among men to where I had a lot of money at 25 years old and no one else that I knew did because it was all fake money.
37:20
And so, it worked out for me and the reason why, again, the valuation of that company was so high, it was four times our revenue that year.
37:29
And we had an agency, we worked with companies like Amazon, Mattel, etc.
37:34
And it was a lot of hustling and struggling and there were Lucky points DVF that sat here, I actually flew with her the first time I ever came to Palo Alto.
37:48
We stayed in and would just skis or NW guest house, and I was watching Shark Tank with like the Google errs [LAUGH] they were so cute.
37:58
But I came here because I convinced her for her incharge movement to do something with Facebook and I met Mark Zuckerberg and I shook his hand I started to sell him at 23 years old.
38:09
And she was like, stop it, and then we like die laughing the whole way back, but she's the one that opened so many doors for me like introducing me to Amazon.
38:17
And that became one of our biggest clients and was response possible for tens of millions of dollars of revenue over the years.
38:24
>> So even though there were a lot of people early on who might not have believed in you and sounds like you ended up finding a really strong support system of people who did. >> Yeah.
38:33
>> And for your second company, I know you were able to co-found it alongside Selena Gomez and her mother Mandy Tiffy. >> Yes.
38:40
>> They're Accompany a wandering mind to destigmatize and democratize mental health. >> Yes.
38:44
>> One of the main concepts of Wonder mind is this idea of mental fitness, exercising our minds like we do our bodies >> Yes.
38:50
>> To a roomful of type A overachievers, who could probably benefit from incorporating some of those practices, how should we be prioritizing mental health relative to our other priorities?
39:04
>> So, the reason why I don't get nervous for these things is because I have, long gone are the periods where I care about what people think about me because I cared so much.
39:15
So I will just share a secret with you all, I would be a fucking hypocrite if I told you guys I knew the answer to that question because I'm still not there, but I'm trying.
39:27
I started wonder mind with Selena and Mandy because I realized that I all of a sudden lived in this eight figure apartment and I literally could spend hundreds of $1,000 a month, didn't even matter.
39:42
I went from just, not even getting, I didn't get paid for the news that and only let the incidentals and stuff, It was a really big jump, and I wasn't happy.
39:52
And I realized that maybe the freedom was great, but the material stuff wasn't making me happy.
39:59
I wanted to Figure out what would.
40:02
And I have realized that whenever I speak on a panel for Forbes or speaker at something like this, and I am open about my OCD, ADHD depression.
40:14
So many people come up, there was literally a conference where there was a huge celebrity that spoke right after me.
40:20
And then I had a line, I was, like a huge celebrity because people were like, wow, I can't believe you say all those things about yourself.
40:29
>> That's kind of embarrassing, and I'm like, yeah.
40:32
And then some people would be like, I have OCD too.
40:36
And I realized that, wow, like by me being so transparent.
40:40
It was actually making people either be like, wow, she's a fool, or, wow, maybe we should talk about this more.
40:48
And so I think that I'm a strong believer and the only way to change the world, and this is a very capitalist mindset, but it's a realistic one.
40:57
The only way to change the world is to prove that your change can make a lot of money.
41:03
And so instead of starting a fund, or a charity or something, I said, let's start a business.
41:11
And just like 15 years ago, I don't know how old you guys all are again, I have no glasses on.
41:17
I'm 28, but 15 years ago if I want go to a yoga class.
41:21
I had to drive in Jacksonville, Florida to the yoga studios sweat, drive myself back, whatever that was my only option.
41:29
Then all of a sudden 10 years later, now you are 15 years later you can literally have access to hundreds of free workout apps.
41:38
And do yoga and like your car if you want to am like with a goat. And [LAUGH] it's free.
41:44
And so I realized, wow, that market was so small.
41:47
And then as soon as people started realizing, wait, you can make money, like blue lemon and soul cycle.
41:53
And then all of a sudden it became bigger and bigger, then all of these resources are free for people.
41:58
People don't have to even pay for just gym membership because basically people are giving it to you for free because it's all funded by VCs and Wall Street.
42:06
It's kind of fun to think about.
42:07
So I thought, we're going to make this the biggest company ever and help people at the same time so that we can do the same thing that physical fitness did.
42:17
Where in hopefully 5 or 10 years people don't even have to pay for a psychiatrist or a therapist.
42:22
Because there'll be so much money from Wall Street and from investors paying just for them to be a user.
42:29
And so that was my goal and still is my goal to de-stigmatize and democratize mental health and to treat it like mental fitness.
42:38
so going back to the hypocrite part is.
42:41
I think I think everyone in this room if you want to be an entrepreneur, you have to be really honest with yourself because you are just like the race to get into Stanford.
42:56
You are up against the best and brightest and you if you don't work yourselves, someone else will.
43:03
And it's okay if you don't want that life.
43:05
I envy people who don't have that life to be totally honest with you.
43:10
And I have a curse where I just can't stop, I have to keep going.
43:13
And so hopefully I figure that out, but making therapy a priority, I still is a struggle for me.
43:20
And so like again I don't want to be hypocrite and be like now I like float in the air and meditate, that's not the case.
43:27
But I do yoga now like three times a week and started meditating, I thought it was like a fake thing but actually it's real.
43:34
And my Nora, who's in the front row, my right and left hand she like literally makes me feel better.
43:40
If I don't do my therapy sessions, because I'm somebody who doesn't like to talk about my feelings.
43:46
I just want to keep going and going and going.
43:48
And I've been in survival mode for the last nine years of my life.
43:51
And so, I would encourage all of you to not learn the hard way through multiple burnouts.
43:57
And just really tough parts of your life to start your journey with those practices, with working out, with walking with friends, with making family a priority.
44:09
I didn't go home for Christmas for three years, making those things a priority before you even start.
44:16
Because here I am not having to hustle every day like I used to, and I still do, and I still missed Christmas last year.
44:23
So I would just caution all of you guys and just take care of yourselves first.
44:29
Because I learned the hard way that if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of anyone else.
44:34
>> One of the themes that I really drew from in your story is this idea of empowering others.
44:39
Which brings us to to your latest venture via breadwinner.
44:42
You just announced it last month in collaboration with JP Morgan and the CEO of their wealth management arm Kristin Lim cow. >> Yes.
44:50
>> As you're building this company and looking to the future, if you could use that to redefine tomorrow in one way, what would it be?
44:58
>> That's a great question.
44:59
So again, I I told you guys in the beginning he was like where I can't even follow this conversation by promise you there's a through line.
45:04
It's like Dave Chappelle is like comedy specials.
45:06
You're like, where is he going?
45:07
And then at the end, you're like, that was the first joke, it all connects. >> [LAUGH].
45:11
>> I promise it's going to connect.
45:14
I just saw him because one of my business partners and someone that I'm close to his team was Kevin Hart and I was lucky enough to watch him get the Mark Twain award.
45:22
And then when Dave Chappelle came on, I was like, My god.
45:25
Anyways, so sorry to disappoint just me. But I it all comes back.
45:31
So everything I've been saying today is kind of the thesis of what I'm about to say which is the mission of be a breadwinner.
45:41
The mission of be a breadwinner is for anybody and everybody to build financial freedom and their future.
45:51
And one thing I have realized through all these years is money can't buy happiness, money can't buy friends, money can't buy that stuff.
46:00
But you know what it can buy? Money can buy freedom. Freedom to what?
46:07
Freedom to leave a toxic relationship.
46:10
Freedom to quit the job you hate and start a new job or start an entrepreneurial journey, freedom to change the world.
46:17
And so to answer that question, if I could change the world in one day, it would be the mission of this company, which is barriers, make your barriers, your building blocks.
46:31
And so I wish everybody could wake up tomorrow with zero bias of, are you a woman?
46:38
Are you a woman of have color? Are you a male of color? Do have dyslexia?
46:44
Do you have a mental health problem?
46:46
Are you from the wrong side of town?
46:47
All those things, nothing matters.
46:49
All that matters is you get to the mat and whoever performs performs, that's what I wish we could have in society.
46:57
And that's what the breadwinner is all about because it's for men and women but it's for everybody.
47:03
Even people in this room clearly all of you guys are empowered in some way because you're here and it's thriving.
47:13
But it's for everybody to kind of ignite that voice in your head and say, wait, just because I'm a psychology student, but maybe I want to be an entrepreneur. Do it, just do it.
47:27
Anybody can do anything and if I'm living proof of that and my goal is to take that Forbes title and give it to someone else as quickly as I can.
47:39
Because it's ridiculous that at 27, I was the youngest wealthiest self-made woman of color in the world.
47:45
When the male equivalent or the white male equivalent is probably 13 in someone's basement making like Bitcoin or whatever. >> [LAUGH]. >> Did you make Bitcoin?
47:53
I don't know, but that's my concept and JP, Morgan Wealth Management and Christian Linca, they were such fantastic partners for the launch, the soft launch, it still hasn't officially launched yet.
48:08
But this is my ecosystem of everything that I have proven in my story and everything, and none of my businesses have ever been me first.
48:16
I didn't want to start a blog about myself, I hate seeing myself in pictures, when I see my sister on TikTok, she's my identical twin, I'm like, my God.
48:25
But this is kind of my way of taking everything that I've learned in my personal story and literally saying if a Latina with no funding, no pedigree, no belief [LAUGH] from anybody except family members, no connections, no help, no anything, was able to build that kind of not on paper wealth, in the bank wealth at 25, anyone can do it, I promise.
49:01
It's just about breaking down those barriers and making them your building blocks.
49:06
The more barriers that you face, stack them up even higher.
49:10
Because I promise you that every single weakness that you think is a weakness is actually your strength and that's something that Divy says all the time.
49:18
So I totally just stole that from her, but it's so true, that woman is my oracle, she literally has predicted my entire life.
49:24
But seriously, every person here is not only capable of changing the world, but also changing your life and other people's lives.
49:34
And just because maybe you have some sort of preconceived notion of what it is you want to do with your life, if you feel like you want to do something else, go for it.
49:46
Just put yourself in a position where you can and that's where financial freedom and practicing financial fitness comes in. So yeah.
49:55
>> I think that message has the power to inspire and help a lot of people.
49:58
So thank you so much- >> It's really hard to inspire this crowd, you guys already are great [LAUGH] yeah.
50:06
>> With our last couple of minutes, I think I'd like to turn it over to the audience for Q&A.
50:10
I think we'll have time for one question and then we'll wrap up with a view from the top lightning round tradition. >> All right.
50:16
>> So if you have a question, please raise your hand and one of our mic runners will give you the mic. >> Walk, walk. >> Hi, I'm Trip. >> Hi.
50:34
>> So last year Andy Dunn came to speak with us and he has bipolar disorder and spoke about how he's managed that and built a business.
50:44
I'm curious, with your mental health situation, a, how have you managed depression, OCD, ADHD, but also how you turn those things into strengths for yourself through this process.
50:59
>> Great question, and I love the hat, you're definitely- >> [LAUGH] >> A dermatologist definitely told you you need to stay out of the sun.
51:07
Is that it, yeah, I need one, too.
51:13
So Andy Dunn and I actually did a co-keynote for Forbes a couple years ago where we talked about having mental health illnesses and thriving past that.
51:26
And that's a really good question.
51:29
So my OCD, again, everybody's journey is different, but when I failed that project and I realized that it was so unfair that this group of people just could decide my fate, because my fate would have been getting shipped right back to Jacksonville, Florida and I don't think I would be here today.
51:46
It made me so upset, and angry, and numb that my new rituals, because when you have OCD, some people have rituals.
51:57
Okay, the difference between being psychotic and having OCD is that you know that things that you think aren't true, but you still have the intrusive thoughts.
52:07
And so it's like, if I don't look under the bed every night before I go to bed, my mom's going to die.
52:12
And you know it's not going to happen, but it kills you.
52:15
And so those rituals, I would look under the bed until the bad feeling went away, and it wouldn't go away.
52:22
And I would slap my hands and one time they literally were bloody.
52:25
And my boyfriend at the time who is still my partner today, was actually the CEO of my company for quite a while but that was literally when I was just starting my company.
52:35
He took it upon himself and I will never be able to thank him enough for doing this, because I would have never done it myself.
52:43
He found me a therapist, and he found me a psychiatrist, and I paid for it with my little affiliate money, because I could not have my parents know about it.
52:51
And I actually got on medicine, and I'm still on it today, Prozac, and Prozac has enabled me to completely take away all of the intrusive thoughts.
53:00
So no longer do I feel like, I have to tap this five times or anything like that, which is, it was such a curse.
53:07
So it's such a blessing not to have that but my OCD does manifest in other ways.
53:12
But that was crippling and so that's something that I did.
53:16
My ADHD, I didn't actually get diagnosed with that until like two years ago, and it explains a lot [LAUGH].
53:24
But now I'm also on medicine for that, and I'm able to now kind of like if I'm super anxious or if I'm obsessing about something, I can say it's your OCD.
53:35
It's kind of everything is less scary when you can put a name and a face to it.
53:41
So it's like in Monsters Inc, [LAUGH] I have so many great analogies today [LAUGH].
53:46
When the monster comes but you're like, you're cute and I'm going to name you whatever, then it's not as scary.
53:52
That's kind of how it is now with my OCD, ADHD, and depression, because it's like, it's just my OCD coming out.
53:58
And I have these tools and remedies to solve it.
54:02
I used to give up and just take a nap for three hours, I'm not going to do that, I'm going to go for a walk and I'm going to re-inspire myself.
54:10
And so truly, for me, the way that I've been able to continue on is having a mission that's greater than myself.
54:23
I want to help people, and I want to change the world, and I can't do that if I'm going to be depressed in my bed all day.
54:31
I do it for every single person that thought that they could be successful, but decided not to even try because they have ADHD.
54:40
Because they didn't go to an Ivy League school, because they were a person of color, because they got laughed out of a room by an old man with some sort of granddaughter issue.
54:50
>> [LAUGH] >> That's why I do it.
54:53
And so I think having a purpose that's bigger than just making money, that also helps.
55:02
Because I have really bad days, I mean, Nora can tell you, there's times where I just cry because it's hard.
55:11
If you're an entrepreneur, you're not getting punched in the face 20 times a day, you're not doing it right, you just aren't.
55:17
And I'm kind of the recipe for the person who should never be an entrepreneur, but I still am.
55:23
And so I guess that kind of literally closes it all out with the fact that, just because you have all these barriers that history and statistics say will not work for success, you can actually make a new recipe.
55:41
And that's why I built Be a Breadwinner, and why I'm so excited for a launch is because it really is for somebody who wants to have success on their own terms and be a barrier breaker, a bread taker of a new mold of a money maker.
55:56
>> Well, it's clear that nothing is going to get in your way or stop you.
55:58
>> [LAUGH] >> Before I let you go, we do have to finish with this view from the top tradition, it's a quick lightning round. >> Okay.
56:04
>> So I'm going to ask you or give you five short phrases and you're just going to finish it with the first word or short phrase that comes to mind >> God, I came back to college and I have to do work now. >> [LAUGH] >> Pop quiz. >> Okay.
56:16
>> Biggest difference between you and your twin sister.
56:20
>> She loved school, [LAUGH].
56:25
>> Favorite article that you wrote for the News Art.
56:28
>> [LAUGH] I wrote the News Art every single day for five years from 5 AM to 10 AM every single weekday, even when we made a million dollars because I was so cheap with the money.
56:39
So I don't even remember, but I've written thousands of things [LAUGH].
56:46
>> Mental fitness technique that works best for you.
56:50
>> I actually just started doing yoga three times a week before work.
56:54
And usually, I used to think that meditation was a myth, but it's totally not.
56:59
I'm not good at it or anything, yet, but the breathing works.
57:02
And so there's something called a box breath situation where you inhale, 1 2 3 4 5, hold it, 1 2 3 4 5 exhale, 1 2 3 4 5 hold it, 1 2 3 4 5.
57:13
I might have messed it up, and all of you guys are going to get an aneurysm [LAUGH].
57:16
But I think I'm pretty sure it was that, and I've actually used that recently, so it's a recent discovery.
57:25
>> Most played song by Selena Gomez. >> My Mind & Me.
57:29
>> I'm partial, the Same Old Love, but I will let it slide.
57:31
>> [LAUGH] >> And last but not least, I know you were just on the Mario Lopez, Access Hollywood for an interview, which one did you have more fun with?
57:42
>> [CROSSTALK] Mario Lopez or you? >> Yeah, yeah.
57:45
>> [LAUGH] >> Definitely had more fun with you. >> There you go [LAUGH].
57:52
>> [APPLAUSE] >> You passed the pop quiz [LAUGH].
57:58
>> Daniela, it's been such a pleasure, thank you so much, and we are so excited to see all your continued success moving forward. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> [APPLAUSE] [MUSIC]