ÜBERCEO

Coming straight out of college to start a business without an established network was no barrier for Jordon Goldman, CEO of UniGo, an online community platform for high school students to find the college that’s right for them. Jordon realized that if he wanted UniGo to succeed, he would need to harness the internet to get the right people with the right skill-sets to help him build his business.

We asked Jordon how, with his initial lack of contacts, he was able to pull together an impressive advisory board that includes the CEO of TiVo (NASDAQ: TIVO), Tom Rogers, JetBlue (NASDAQ: JBLU) board member, Frank Sica, and Chief Revenue Officer at Bankrate.com (NASDAQ-GS: RATE), Don Ross. He shares a few secrets:

1. Start off with your own alumni network and look for people you admire. Jordon sent a cold email to the CEO of TiVo and invited him to lunch. While it took several months and a few emails to get the first meeting, he used the first meeting to get a second meeting. It was only after he’d built up a relationship over time did he ask Tom to be on the advisory board.
2. Reach out tangentially to connect to the right people. Use Facebook and LinkedIn to see who is connected to whom. Ask for introductions, without being obnoxious.
3. Use the same approach with employees. Do the research up front on people who would best benefit the organization. Jordan was then very aggressive about convincing them that UniGo was the right place for them.
4. Understand that the process takes months, not days, so take that into account for your product roll-out.
5. Use any resource available to you to connect with those you respect and want on your team. By using the internet you can find the email addresses of your targets or even a profile.
6. Even if you do meet up with them and they decline, still use their expertise in an unofficial capacity. Jordan still meets informally with several senior executives to get their advice. He shares his vision then asks them to challenge it to discover the flaws in his model.

While Jordon admits that getting in front of the right people is harder than convincing them to be on the advisory board, Jordon doesn’t take no for an answer and hasn’t let youth or lack of a network prevent him from success.