Meet the Entrepreneur Behind Qualified Digital

Jaqi Saleem is the founder and CEO of digital expertise company Certified Digital, and founding father of Jaqi Goal Co., a mission-driven funding fund. Right here she breaks down her greatest recommendation for sustainable development, fundraising, and making a tradition of collaboration.

Please give us the elevator pitch of your online business.
My firm, Certified Digital, is an award-winning digital expertise company that competes with prime consultancies 100-1,000 occasions our measurement to serve Fortune 500 shoppers like Mayo Clinic, CVS, Hitachi Vantara, CommonSpirit Well being, Kaiser Permanente, Novo Nordisk, Bristol-Myers Squibb and TransUnion. Our 360° method, in partnership with business leaders like Adobe, blends B2B and B2C experience to craft seamless buyer journeys. Our tagline is “The Expertise of Connection”.

Or, if you would like a less complicated comfortable pitch, we will use my Mother’s description: “I feel they put the buttons on the web.” You aren’t fallacious, Mother, we do this too.

What impressed you to create this enterprise?
The reality is, I began this digital buyer expertise company fully accidentally. After over 15 years at companies — and getting the sensation I had hit a glass ceiling — I made a decision to present unbiased consulting a attempt. A few months in, a buyer supplied me a chance to construct and fund my very own guerrilla dream group to choose up some business-critical tasks after an sudden and speedy break up with their earlier digital company. I did not hesitate — I known as the entire smartest individuals I knew and requested them to hitch me. I used to be gratified and humbled after they did. Quick ahead 7.5 years, Certified Digital is non-public fairness backed by Stella Level Capital, and has 100+ teammates composed of the neatest individuals I now know.

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What recommendation would you give entrepreneurs searching for funding?
Ensure you are searching for a accomplice who provides worth and is aligned to your imaginative and prescient, not only a test. Do not be pompous, however be curious in ways in which present you’ll want to know concerning the potential investor, as effectively. Do not ask them questions you could possibly discover on their web site; welcome them into the dialog; depart room for his or her voice, because the dynamic adjustments and creates extra alternative to attach. They’re investing in you as a pacesetter, as a lot as in your online business, so be human, not a well-dressed robotic. When you wish to be ready to talk all the time, hope and invite a dialogue and anticipate what they could ask so you do not freeze or skip a beat. Observe, apply, apply, not only for presenting your investor deck within the order it’s laid out, however for any route that the dialog could go. I usually maintain an appendix of things that doubtless would not make it into a short pitch, however could also be a confidence builder in the event that they ask a pointed query and you’ll present you’re on prime of it.

Lastly, and that is extraordinarily essential: guarantee they do not see you as a undertaking. Buyers do not wish to do your job; they should consider which you can execute on an unimaginable concept, not simply that you’ve one. Particularly if you do not have a observe report to level to, develop a transparent plan or embody a accomplice who can lead on the enterprise entrance. Clear plans are essential, both means, in order that they really feel they’ll press the simple button by simply funding and advising.

Feminine-owned companies solely get 2 per cent of VC funding — what particular recommendation are you able to give to girls enterprise house owners looking for to emulate what you achieved in getting PE funding?
Understanding that stat could be intimidating, however do not let it get in your head. It would cease you from asking in any respect, and we have to change that quantity, not perpetuate it.

I didn’t run into any resistance in my course of, and ran a aggressive one, which I extremely suggest. This allowed me to command the worth I knew Certified Digital was price, gender id apart.

If you’re on the proper stage, actually think about bringing on a banker to signify you. They arrive with charges, however the correct ones, with the correct community, are price their weight in gold.

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What sort of development have you ever seen?
Within the early years, ranging from scratch, Certified Digital grew 100% YoY+. As our income numbers elevated, that proportion has naturally modified. Final 12 months, we delivered 45%+ development. This 12 months, by means of the mix of natural development and our latest acquisition of Xpediant Digital, we’re on observe to ship one other 40% development 12 months for 2025 and are projecting $31.5M in income.

What suggestions are you able to give to different founders on sustaining firm tradition when your group is both partially or totally distant?
I am happy with the work-life stability that we’re in a position to give our group by being a totally distant firm. We’ve over 100 workers and FTE equivalents on our group, primarily based all throughout the US and around the globe, and that group is ready to decide up and drop off their children in school, care for their psychological and bodily well being, and do the issues they love like journey, or no matter passions or hobbies they’ve. QD’s firm tradition encourages a mindset that’s each entrepreneurial and collaborative, and I really feel that is among the issues that actually units us aside.

My recommendation is: create an vitality that multiplies, and it’ll. Tradition cascades from the highest, so your group has to need you to win, they should need one another to win, and so they should wish to win themselves. And most of all: rent nice people and attention-grabbing individuals. Your group is the magic, and it’s your job as a pacesetter to guard that tradition from those that draw down on it.

What recommendation are you able to give about making the choice to accumulate one other firm, reminiscent of your latest acquisition of Xpediant Digital?
See a transparent 1+1 = 3. Don’t purchase income, purchase a price multiplier, whether or not that could be a new functionality, new industries, or merchandise that speed up what you do. Is it a price add to your present shoppers, or is all of it about new shoppers you possibly can add worth to? Both means, simply guarantee you will have a transparent imaginative and prescient that helps your group and their group get excited to execute on that imaginative and prescient. Be certain the corporate is a tradition match; that your group and their group can be proud to face shoulder to shoulder and excited to collaborate.

Keep in mind, if you end up hungry, the whole lot can appear to be a steak (or a portobello mushroom burger if that is extra your fashion).

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You additionally make investments by means of your funding fund, Jaqi Goal Co. What suggestions are you able to give entrepreneurs looking for to pitch to buyers such as you?
Present me the issue, present me that fixing that downside provides a social or mission-oriented consequence, after which present me the answer you will have for that downside and the way you’re doing so. Present me there’s a market or want for it, that nobody else is doing it (effectively), and that if you happen to had the cash, you’d be capable to ship what and by when. Be prepared to indicate me that you’re prepared. I wish to put money into issues that matter, which implies I would like that funding to achieve success. It can’t simply be an concept, it must be a plan. A plan which you can execute on with steering and cash, not one that may be a undertaking I might tackle.

What does the phrase “entrepreneur” imply to you?
If I’m sincere, the phrase entrepreneur remains to be a phrase that I’ve to recollect to match myself to. I really like this query, as a result of it challenges outdated pondering I had across the phrase.

Taking a step again, acknowledging that I’m an entrepreneur, I might say this: It’s somebody who’s relentlessly passionate concerning the enterprise, product or downside they’re fixing; somebody who shouldn’t be afraid of failing, however principally as a result of they assume they will not in the long term; know that managed failure is a necessary a part of the method in any type of significant success; somebody who teeters the road of confidence and delusion, simply sufficient to take the large dangerous swings essential to drive significant affect, however with the humility and pragmatism that retains them grounded and taking the correct swings; somebody who builds with the top in thoughts, making house for the correct amount of uncertainty and evolution, however with some sense of what success appears like ultimately.

Is there a selected quote or saying that you simply use as private motivation?
“I’ve no explicit skills — I’m simply passionately curious” – Einstein. I really like this quote, and actually, “passionately curious” is one among our 5 core values at Certified Digital. It was simply so relatable to me. It eroded a few of that “them however not me” impostor mindset. If Einstein says he has no particular skills, and his superpower is curiosity, effectively then, that could be a recipe I might put to motion.