Launching a startup is not for the faint of heart. It’s a world of 72-hour workweeks, unanswered emails, and objections that make you question everything. But it’s also the adrenaline of creating something from scratch, the thrill of landing that first paying customer, and the satisfaction of knowing you’re solving real problems.  

This dynamic, raw reality was at the center of a recent conversation between Stephen Lowisz, host of the GTM Secrets podcast, and Noah Jacobs, co-founder of Bird Dog. The two didn’t sugarcoat a thing—they talked about startup culture, personal sacrifice, and the grind of building a sales tech company without a giant network or fat investor checks.  

If you’re a current or aspiring founder—or simply curious about what it takes to thrive in the trenches of entrepreneurship—this is the playbook you didn’t know you needed.

From “Finance Bro” to Startup Dev  

Noah’s story starts in a world far from sales and development. After graduating from the University of Michigan in 2023, he launched a finance business during college, thinking the path to success was as simple as growing assets under management (AUM). “I thought managing money was going to be an asymmetric business model,” Noah shared. “But I was wrong about that ‘not increasing the work’ part.” Reality soon set in, forcing him to pivot.  

While the finance hustle didn’t pan out as planned, it gifted Noah with an unexpected set of skills. His fascination with options pricing nudged him to learn development, which sparked his eventual transition into tech. But it wasn’t a smooth ride.  

“I built a tool to monitor publicly traded equities,” he explained. “It was fun to build, but the problem? Nobody wanted to buy it.” One customer flat-out refused to pay $1 a month, forcing Noah and his co-founder to reassess. It was a classic case of building something cool—but useless.  

But here’s where the magic happened. A small handful of customers started using the same tool for sales purposes, and they absolutely loved it. That was the lightbulb moment. “We realized we were solving the wrong problem for the wrong people,” Noah said. And just like that, Bird Dog pivoted to helping sales teams prioritize accounts and conduct advanced account research.  

The key takeaway? Build something customers actually want, even if it means scrapping your initial vision. Your ego has no place in the product development process.  

Why Startup Culture “Sucks” (and Why It’s Totally Worth It)  

Entrepreneurship gets a lot of buzz for being glamorous. Create your own hours. Call the shots. Work in your pajamas. But as both Stephen and Noah made clear during the podcast, the reality is far more gritty.  

Stephen captured it best when he said, “Entrepreneurship is brutal. It sucks. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone—not even my ex-wife.”  

Noah painted an equally vivid picture of what it’s actually like to run Bird Dog, a bootstrapped startup. “I work 72-hour weeks. My day starts at 7 a.m. debugging code and ends around 10 p.m. If something breaks, it’s on me to fix it.” He continued, “The hardest part is balancing development and sales. While I’m on a sales call, I’m thinking, ‘When can I get back to coding?’ And while I’m coding, I’m thinking, ‘When can I get back to selling?’”  

And what about rejection? It comes with the territory. “We had a client report saving seven and a half hours a week with Bird Dog,” Noah said. “But then, his boss declined to move forward because he said it wasn’t ready for prime time. That’s startup life—you do incredible work, and sometimes you still get a ‘no.’”  

It’s a tough pill to swallow, but moments like these are what separate dreamers from doers.

Execution Over Ideas—Every Time  

Understand this if you’re starting a company in 2023 or beyond: Your idea is not unique. What will set you apart is your ability to execute better and faster than everyone else.  

“Execution is more important than the idea,” Noah stressed. “A great idea makes execution easier, but if you can’t execute, you’re not going to get anywhere.”  

Bird Dog’s development process is a perfect example of this principle in action. Before writing a single line of code, Noah and his co-founder spent months delivering their product as a manual, spreadsheet-powered service. “I was essentially a spreadsheet monkey in early 2024,” Noah admitted. “But that’s what helped us validate the concept. We weren’t guessing—we were solving problems that users were paying for, even in those early stages.”  

Stephen echoed this sentiment with his own example from Identity Matrix. “I white-labeled a competitor’s tool under my agency just to see if there was demand. It wasn’t my product, and it wasn’t perfect. But it taught me that the market was ready for something better.”  

If you’re starting a business, the lesson here is critical. Stop obsessing over the perfection of your idea. Start selling, tweaking, and improving. Your customers will tell you if what you’ve built is worth pursuing.

The Bird Dog Difference  

The sales tech landscape is crowded with tools that promise personalization, but as Stephen pointed out, “Most personalization is BS. A few merge tags and a line like ‘Hey, I saw you went to U of M’—no one cares, and we all know it’s automated.”  

Bird Dog flips this lazy approach on its head. Here’s where it truly stands out:

• Deep Data Sources: Bird Dog doesn’t just scrape Google. It pulls insights from company websites, LinkedIn posts, SEC filings, employee activity, and over 13 million news articles every quarter.  
• Actionable Insights: Instead of vague data points, Bird Dog surfaces meaningful triggers. Think, “This company raised $50M, added 10 sales reps, and has a $100M ARR growth target,” rather than, “They hired a new VP of marketing.”  
• Prioritization at Scale: Bird Dog users can upload hundreds of accounts, and the platform ranks them based on sales-readiness indicators. Saved hours and laser-focused outreach? Check and check.  

And Noah is just getting started. By the end of the year, Bird Dog plans to grow its capabilities, moving from account enrichment to active lead identification. The goal? Remove the guesswork entirely and bring founders closer to their ideal clients at scale.  

Tactical Growth Without a Fat Rolodex  

Stephen and Noah brought two very different approaches to scaling their startups. Stephen leaned on strong VC and advisor support, while Noah built Bird Dog the scrappy way—on LinkedIn, one post and one cold email at a time.  

“Our number one strategy has been posting content on LinkedIn and engaging with prospects directly,” Noah said. “Jack’s great at creating viral content, and that’s helped us generate attention without spending a dime on ads.”  

Cold email is another proven workhorse for Bird Dog. “We’ll grab lists of high-growth companies, throw them into Bird Dog, and start personalizing our outreach based on what we find.”  

What’s the takeaway here? Social media isn’t just for brand building—it can be a business-building powerhouse. Whether you’re nurturing inbound leads from your posts or reaching out with manual cold email efforts, hustle trumps everything else.

Advice for Aspiring Founders  

The conversation was packed with advice for founders (aspiring, current, or otherwise). Here are the key takeaways, reimagined as your tactical roadmap:

1. Validate, Validate, Validate: You don’t need code to start. Use spreadsheets, consulting methods, whatever it takes. Prove people will pay for what you’re selling.  
2. Play to Your Strengths: If you’re technical, learn sales. If you’re non-technical, find a rockstar developer who aligns with your vision.  
3. Be Relentless: You’ll work 70+ hours weekly, face rejection, and question your sanity. Stay focused on solving one real problem for one real customer.  
4. Focus on Scalability: The clearer your market and ICP (ideal customer profile), the easier it becomes to scale without spinning your wheels.  
5. Hustle Smarter, Not Harder: Social platforms like LinkedIn are free tools for client acquisition. Use them wisely.  
6. Never Stop Iterating: Noah sums it up perfectly—“If users keep saying no, it’s on you to identify the objection and bake that solution into your product.”

Startup Life Isn’t for Everyone, but It Can Be for You  

Startup life is anything but easy. But as Noah’s story shows, grit, resourcefulness, and relentless execution can turn a half-baked idea into a truly disruptive product.  

And if you’re in sales and itching to boost your research game, Bird Dog might just become your secret weapon. Because, as Noah puts it, “Sometimes the scrappy underdog has the sharpest bite.”  

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