Episode 19 – Resilience and Innovation: How Llyas Salahud-Din is Revolutionizing Grant Writing

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to the Boost I’m Pablo and I’m Leon we’re at geekdom for San Antonio startup week and we’re gonna sit down with ellias saluden from [Music] gantly okay welcome hey thanks for having me first of all congratulations yes yeah that was that was intense it was it was uh a long uh six six seven weeks of um being part of the pre-ex it was well worth it and uh thank you thank you um and in the backup in the context for anybody who doesn’t know you won the $220,000 part of the um the pre- accelerator uh pitch competition so

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that kicked off Monday as part of like San Antonio startup week so really congrats you there was thank you seven other companies eight in total yeah seven seven or yeah seven other companies and it was it was tight everybody that you know I did a little bit of mentoring I couldn’t be too involved this year but it was a really tight set of folks everybody had um not only a business kind of predefined they had products they had customers like it was a tight one so really congrats on thank you so much thank you so much yeah

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I mean cats off to everyone who participated and you know we you know we all went I wish everyone could have won um but you know they they chose one I’m glad they chose me and uh but I couldn’t think Think Geek them enough and getting me like allow me to be part of the boot camp at first and then the pre accelerator you know that the boot camp and the pre- seller they they both gave me that confidence to um go to market right and because I remember at one time I remember sitting with you and I was I

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was talking about like I had to have everything perfect and um you’re like just and then we had the go to market um a workshop as well um and and then you know that just gave me the confidence I just need to put myself out there and see what happens and so yeah um since then I think we were we were um just being in a market for like two months and we started seeing some some success you know um but uh yeah that traction really really helped out I believe the traction really helped out for um helping us helping us win you know we

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had a lot of traction in in a short amount of time um and then I think what we’re doing for the for the community as well like what it’s really like what we’re set out to do and the impact that we want to make and you know we’re all of our attraction is you know OB would say 90% of it is here in here in San Antonio and so we want to grow here and um support a lot of nonprofits so quick question as far as like just giving some context about Grant apply um give us like your elevator pitch you know not to

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make you pitch again but just just a quick explanation on Grant apply and how it it really works in in the you know ecosystem well there’s 1.8 million nonprofits in the nation you know here in San Antonio there’s about like 12,000 nonprofits you know they all need money you know they every their whole all their business models is to raise they all have to raise money and so our software what it does it helps them um produce more grants uh in in a faster faster way so if it takes you five to 12 hours to write a grant we should be in

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our software helps you do it in a fraction of the time um and so that gives them time to really focus on like what they um want to do the most is like really focusing on their customers really fing know focusing on their clients um like saving that time because you know time is money and um most nonprofits wear a thousand hats right and so you can’t really I mean imagine wearing a bunch of hats while you’re trying to save the world or or or uh improve your community like you really want to have that Focus time and so we

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really give them time to do that with our software so and nutshell helps you produce more grants and um you know it does a lot has a bunch of other bells and whistles you can blog with our software brainstorm with it um copyright social media content um General market research but um it’s kind of a One-Stop shop to help helping you um with all sorts of communication but most importantly grant writing well one thing that was impressive to me was that you came to the pre accelerator with your product already developed I mean you had

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structured out pretty much everything you had some you know questions on on things that you were still working through and and we had talked about some of those you know potential uh items which I’m sure you you’ve worked on and and developed significantly since then um but beyond that uh what you were saying is you know we had talked about how many people that are in the grant writing space they don’t really know the process they don’t know what they’re supposed to do they don’t have the structure so it almost like your product

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allows a grant writer to also learn proper process for getting that time efficiency in because you’re not spinning your wheels asking a bunch of people about what should I do next how should I do this and then have to start looking for almost like a mentor to figure out how to do the grant writing professionally right yeah that whole process is extremely time consuming um and we wanted to streamline that process for them right and so that’s where the time comes in um so no one I don’t I mean most people um don’t like to write

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uh or not are not really good writers and so with our software you don’t really have to be an excellent rer the software you know if you’re mediocre the software makes you excellent and so um and then like there’s High turnover in fundraising there’s High turnover in the grant writing space right uh especially you’re proficient and really good and and then you know it’s like everyone wants you so you can go work for you know you just kind of you can job hop and just make more money and so that there’s a high turnover because there’s

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a lot of expectations too you know on grant writers to produce and but they don’t have all the resources and so if somebody leaves your leaves a a nonprofit our software you can anyone can pick up um where they left off because you know you you keep your your your data and so um and you just plug again were the last person left off in regards to um riding another Grant and so that’s that’s that’s really cool that we were able to add that so one question that I had for you is how did you get here I mean your

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professional background I’m sure LED you to this right yeah it’s long story I mean like I was a foster kid from 7 to 21 right and so I was lucky to be a part of a nonprofit that had resources um so I could be self-sufficient so you know I can know be a grow up to be a a professional I mean they provided food clothing shelter um I had friends and most importantly had an education right but this nonprofit had resources in regards to most nonprofits that don’t have the resources and they’re just kind

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of like you know it’s they’re struggling and so that abundance like long term um you know that passion pushed me to wanting to also like work in the sector right and and so as a profession PR professional fundraiser or working on projects or on programs know I got to see you know how a nonprofit is is ran firsthand right so I lived it I was someone’s outcome I was I was a form of impact um but also at the same time I worked in the nonprofit sector for over like 18 years and I’ve raised over $50

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million for nonprofits so that’s amazing I understand what it what it took to raise money or what it took to run a program and it wasn’t easy and I and I and I saw the some of the inefficiencies and and you know I had my own pain points like wearing a bunch of hats and like I was like I want to be more efficient and um I got to the point where um I met an engineer first and because I I keep all my notes every year when I like pain points of like how I can be more efficient I would act literally take notes and then when I met

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an engineer he’s like promise me the world yeah I can I can I can help you like build whatever you want out seven months later nothing you know he didn’t produce anything and I was like complaining to a friend of like man my engineer is just like not getting me where I want to be and then uh he’s like I know an engineer and it’s my ex-girlfriend a friend and he introduced me and we got on the phone it was like like we clicked like you know phone call he he could you know we just it was kind of like a marriage right like Universe

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brought us together yeah but this engineer is like he’s like a superhero like I I tell him what I need my new engineer and U we and he produces like there’s no micromanaging it’s like he just sees in my head and um I’ll tell him what I need a week later we have an update software update or so he’s the guy is really good um he never made any promises but he just he works hard um he understands like what I need and and um I think Engineers are like hard to find um and you guys have built businesses

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and companies and and just it’s just the universe brought me to just um an amazing individual who uh who produced and so we were able to get into when we started boot camp we had we had an MVP um and then we just kept on producing it and then we got the confidence to go to market and we push it and and here we are so that’s great on that go to market those customers that you’re you’re helping is there like some measurable impacts even right now like oh yeah I hear a lot of like nonprofits just through through others

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that like the grant process almost like uh scholarships for college like you can apply as to as many as you want and honestly it’s kind of encouraged to to apply to a lot because that’s a source of funding and it’s a it’s a hard source of funding sometimes to come by yeah I mean we’ve already gotten our first customer um while using our software raised um $250,000 um and so U and then yesterday I was um doing I was onboarding um so when we are onboarding 20s seven nonprofit Executives with the social

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Venture Partners um and also G just partnered with social Venture partners and so um that cohort this current cohort um there was a gentleman that’s in the cohort that I actually tested the software on I didn’t know he’s going to be in SVP um so it was kind of cool yesterday I was giving a presentation an onboarding uh the whole court and he was like Hey I actually raised $150,000 while like testing with your software so we’ve got two test um cases that we’re able to share now um in a short amount

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of time of like one nonprofit raising 250 and another raising $150,000 so you got to snag them put them in front of a camera just like this and and have them do that because that’s a super impactful and especially for nonprofits like there’s a ton of softwares out there there’s they’re sometimes they’re super expensive sometimes they’re clunky so hearing that I think is is super impactful but also it’s a validation because they’re able to spend a you know small amount of money for for the software and then have

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$150,000 come in during a you know small trial period or test period is and while it’s a you know somewhat of an MBP is is it it changes the trajectory of a nonprofit in that quarter in that year a lot of them you know they’re on shoestring budgets every single time and I know like regular giving just just like individuals and businesses is down in America so I think grants are becoming a more important portion of of these nonprofits yeah correct yeah I mean I need to get that in front of a camera

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and be sure I’ve got to do a better job at like marketing that’s that’s every entrepreneur you know you have to like you mentioned earlier you have to wear every single hat but you know you’re doing the right thing because you’ve already established a good relationship with a driver within your business which is your partnership with your engineer you know we talk about it all the time it’s like if you’re going to scale a business you have to have good relationships in place uh so you know kudos to finding that resource sometimes

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you run through multiple before you actually find quote unquote the one you know the the true partner yeah um did you have that experience when you were looking for engineers or was it pretty much media one I I ran through one but I think we put seven months and in into into trying to build something and we got nothing um we got like a lot of like code that just wasn’t working you know just very clunky um nothing where I could like I couldn’t even it wasn’t any form of MVP I couldn’t share with anyone

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it was this like it worked but it gave you a lot of like junk right and you’re non-technical so I’m not no I’m non- Tech I’m like I’m everything’s here it’s all in my head so I couldn’t um it’s a little harder to you have to have an engineer that understands not only the nontechnical with the technical and kind of translate that and that’s a it’s an exceedingly hard thing we we talk to all these startups and a lot of them to to the point run through a lot of Engineers and developers and they they struggle

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with that so finding that is it’s a it’s a rare kind of diamond in the the rough there I think the universe really helped me out and you know and then like I think years ago I had this and you’re right like I had this other idea I don’t remember what it was about um but I had two engineers and I remember like speaking to them and I was like do you get what I’m trying to say I kind of felt like they understood but it was we it was and that was like an that was two years of like yeah like it was two years

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of just whiteboarding and like we never like coded anything and then I was like man I’m I’m out I don’t think we’re speaking the same language it’s trying to tell them to build a bridge and then they’re asking like this steel trust and you’re like I’m not sure I want a cool Arch and I want some you know like like things here and then they have to translate that and it’s a it’s a hard thing especially when you don’t know like the lingo and the jargon that they’ve got so one thing that uh that I’d like to say is you surpass and you

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went you got through that first headwind MH many people sometimes will just say oh I gave it my best shot and then it just didn’t work yeah not realizing that it’s not that their vision is wrong sometimes it’s just the team that you have around you sometimes is you’re right I mean you you you just you’re not speaking the same language sometimes um just in terms of like you know if you remember Leon you know doing strengths finder and and you know you you figure out that some people have a combination

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of strengths that are very good for certain things and then they’re not so great at other things uh and then you know just being able to match those and how do you work together how do you motivate each other I mean sometimes it’s like okay you’re you’re it’s like two magnets that are you know the the same exact you know polarity so you’re not able to like connect uh and it’s it’s not it’s not uh anyone’s fault necessarily but you you’d be surprised at how many entrepreneurs just kind of hang up the cleats and say I’m not going

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to do it I tried it and it didn’t work and they just they just don’t do it anymore yeah it’s not my not my thing I think you know growing up as a foster kid like you had to be resilient always had to think about Solutions and I think that just I just never thought that you know that was going to help me long term as a personally and professionally right cuz even F raising like I say raised over $50 million but like the amount of nose that I got of people you know not believing in like the mission or the

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vision that I had to help this like School build a a $39 million campus and I and my board is not um a wealthy board or very connected and it’s the amount of nose that I got just to do like to help an organization um you know I took all and that same experience was was was the same with like the startup and know um I try to raise some money in the beginning and knows or people just didn’t understand what I was doing or um so like that whole being resilient and not giving up like I I’ve been doing that

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since I was seven years old you know what I’m saying so like you know I’m always thinking about like it’s always about it’s not even about it’s about how do I help like the community right how do I uplift um like all these calls that we have in our backyard um and for me some somebody paid it forward for for me you know so I’m just trying to pay it forward and I did it as a professional raising money um writing grants and now I’ve just had this idea of like doing it with tech right so um now I have a

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business and be honest I don’t know anything about running a business I’m learning but like just beinging gum like the cool thing is like I have like like a family you know and it’s like the the the the the degree of connecting with someone like I see on the street all the time and like we’re sitting here like like it’s just it’s a it’s a small town and um like there’s just a lot of cool people and a lot of cool resources and uh I’m just blessed to be able to like be part of the geekdom like like boot

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camp pre accelerator you know just keep the family and I’m just excited to um see where this goes and and and see how many people we could help but also like how do we also pay it forward and E eat them Community um so it’s a really unique space in the startup space I think people are sleeping on San Antonio and but um but not for long R so on a whole another level that people just don’t see right now yeah it it’s from when we started working downtown it was roughly eight years ago to now it’s it’s

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come a long way I think it’s it’s got some small hurdles to come over overcome there’s valley of death and and then you know the fundraising figuring those parts out but those those come with people like you setting those those foundations here building those businesses and and growing it now talking about growing it in the future that 20,000 have you kind of I don’t know a lot of folks put them in their pictures have you thought about where that money is kind of being allocated to yeah so um we built phase one of the

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software is to help you write grants like phase two is um nonprofits need grants and it takes time just find grants there are other softwares out there that finds grants for your for your nonprofit but they’re like $300 $400 a month um we want to also add that feature to the software and make it affordable right so um for an extra $50 or $60 um our tool will find grants for you right and so you will be able to not only find grants but use our tool to buy grants and so I think that’s it’s a perfect pair for the next evolution of

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like our software or where’s it where’s it going um so that’s going to be that money is going to be put towards more engineering um and then no one knows about me right us and so we definitely need to do more marketing um Communications like you know sponsoring like associations that are talking about AI Andor um fundraising um getting fun of nonprofits and supporting them um just you know trying to get in front of like more organizations and associations that are in this space um some like a little bit of funny towards marketing um

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and then like what’s unique about like our our company is you know i’ I’ve since I’ve fundraised for 18 years I do um I do know a fair amount of like foundations and so that’s like our Playbook right now is like um this how we’re working with Social Venture Partners is we a foundation the first aid Foundation is is supporting that cohort right and so that’s our Playbook like also moving forward is getting going to other foundations and say hey support your grantees we already have some successes support your grantees so

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they can use our software to you know save time and raise more money um and so there’s a number of uh foundations here in town and or corporations that want to help you know support the the nonprofits that they support so right now that’s what we’re that’s our Playbook right now for like at least in the next year and a half until like we start getting that organic growth from you know marketing and going out in front getting in front of people um so that’s that’s that’s the unique way that we’re we’re trying to

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raise keep the money coming in I like the one demand many it’s a channel approach and that it really works you know you get in a couple of of those groups where it’s like-minded individuals businesses all the same in this case nonprofits and they’re going to do cohorts and they’re going to see the value as that organization and then continue to bring you in and recommend you to every single company and it’s an easy approach to growing and sustainably growing it’s consistent that gives you that Capital to turn around and and have

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a marketing plan the other part that I I’m sure I’ve mentioned it to you I mentioned it to everybody is building those personal Brands yeah like at some point whether you know wherever this goes whether you exit you know you create a sustainable business or or something else happens you you want to be able to have that foundation in the future of hey we we did this and we impact back to this and this is my new Venture and I’m helping you know nonprofits in this way I’m I’m doing this next thing so I think as you build

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that that marketing it ends up lifting you up in a lot of ways and putting you on that thought leadership those conference talks these podcasts and all of that this is my first podcast it was pretty cool oh awesome I’m glad you you chose the Boost um you know the the thing that comes to mind for me at the very least is uh so when when I launched my first agency um I was registered as a minority business Enterprise and as an MBE as a single operator MBE at the time figuring out how to navigate that

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process you know even though it’s not nonprofits I’m thinking that there may even be potential use for software from what I sat down with you and and this is just simply ideation you know you can take with a grain of salt but you know being a minority entrepreneur yourself in the the space there are a number of different companies out there that are looking for you know uh participation with government programs that process is not allog together that different from the nonprofit space uh and I’m almost

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wondering if you know do you think that there could ever be sort of an application for being able to use the technology to facilitate those kinds of processes uh or is that is that too far oh man I’d love to get in that space and I thought about it um once I uh obviously I need to get some like expertise of folks who were like in the business space that they’re applying for Grants like the federal space and the the state and federal Grant space is that could be really huge for us to be able to because there is one of our

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competitors does focus on just Federal like you know and so not saying that we want to like own that market but if we can has have success next couple years and then get into that space as well as an add-on um that that would be great that I mean I mean that’d be huge you know we could help you write a $50 million Federal Grant or $20 million State Grant and have some sort of um uh I guess earned revenue from that 8% or 5% 10% of of because another thing we want to do long term is um not everyone

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wants to like write grants they want to Outsource so I’ve got nonprofit hey we just want to Outsource you but we’re not there yet right so I think once we’re there and we have the money and we have we can you know say okay you can Outsource to us and we’ll get a percentage of what we write and a base pay monthly base um and and so having like backin Grant riders that are they’re probably retired but they still need to make some extra cash sure we can Outsource they’ll be on our team and they’ll they’ll help right they have

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they’re they’re seasoned you know everyone that works for us is seasoned you can out SCE whether it’s a foundation or Federal Grant and you know that’s another form of re Revenue that we’ll do in the future it’s like a white glove service I I see those a lot where it’s a full SASS and then it gets to become a I’ve seen it with like accounting softwares a lot they all of a sudden add on CPAs they add on bookkeepers and it’s like that it it’s a it’s a smart move and the same thing for you it’s it’s a smart and easy jump to

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say but let’s let’s do it for you I like the percentages too cuz it’s low risk and for the base rate they you know it’s all commission based and I think a lot of businesses for the most part and even nonprofits will go oh yes 100% like none of this you know maybe at some time after you want a ton for them they might re-evaluate it but at that point it’s like way way the yeah cuz you get nonprofits that like they want to work with I mean I’m with my Consulting app like like taking away my grant apply

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like my Consulting like they work with me but they don’t have a ton of cash so they pay me a a base and I get you know percent like of from from like the general operations right you know not like of the grant but like um that’s that’s a way that you know we can definitely um raise some Capital long term I mean that’s a story in of itself right is how you use your own software to improve your own you know business on the private side right outside of Grant apply but how you leverage it as a user

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I mean you’re drinking your own Kool-Aid right and you have the facts to prove that you’re more efficient you’re generating more Revenue uh you know that’s a that’s a compelling story if you’re speaking to others that are in your similar situation but don’t have the technology necessarily or are just simply like just hacking it together uh in some way shape or form it’s best to co-op them into your into your model that’s the hardest part for most people that they don’t dog food their their product

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you know like I I know there was a large backlash not too long ago in the tech space of making every door Dash employee go door Dash like once a month wow and it was I understand there’s like you know all the the legals and everything but it’s like no you should go out there and use your product you’re you’re doing it in a very unique way it’s I had a problem I’m going to solve it it’s going to help everybody like it’s it’s a ecosystem and then you get to firsthand drive it where you a lot of times I do it a lot where I’m like oh

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this is the best way and then the actual customer is like H this is actually how we need it and then you start to realize okay this is this is the actual path of it and I’m the I’m the company’s biggest user like I use my software every day I’ve got like 37 projects on my you’re the expert you’re you’re you’re the resident expert like you know in buunny right before my pitch yesterday not my pitch on boarding yesterday I had a bug right I was using it just testing it making sure everything was good had a

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bug I had an hour we had an hour to fix this this bug I was like oh my gosh but because I use it every day like I’m able to see um like how it’s being used what needs to be changed like what bugs are in there um think goodness we don’t have a lot of bugs like very fortunate um but we’ve had some here and there and the the most the two that I’ve had every presentation I’ve only had two two big ones were yesterday and but um kind of weird but um not a lot of bugs so like he my engineer I’m very very happy with

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him but I’m the biggest user of a software and um like I can’t see your data because your data is it’s it’s it’s protected and it’s it’s all yours um but I can see how many projects you’ve created so um I’m winning project wise that’s great that’s great make a leader boardy that would be pretty cool well one of the things that you’re also doing is you know you mentioned earlier how you’re not Tech but you know you are an expert in the space you have done the work you you have user expect so what

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you are really doing is you’re doing user experience design and you’re thinking through all of the problems that you personally have had or would like to avoid or you know just simply trying to improve what something that already exists so you know trying to sort of like Grease the shoot so to speak to be able to get things done more efficiently uh it will help you with your onboarding it’ll help you with obviously with keeping you know I mean the biggest thing about getting users is keeping them right and keeping them

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happy and if you can’t keep them happy they’re not going to be for long you know so I I think that that there is a significant value in in your uh expertise uh and I’m sure that’s probably part of the reason why you’ve been as successful as you have been thank you so much and I also read that book Steve like long time ago I still want to meet this guy I’m like say right now Steve case you know I’m sure you know him met um I think I I may have met him just at his book signing but like not really talking to him but I want to

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meet him and talk to him um teacher and inspired by like one one of his passages in the books it talks about like like it’s called the third wave and I’m sure youall read it and you don’t have to be an extra expert you just you know and I thought about should I be an expert and I read the book like no you don’t have to be an expert you just got to find people who are as passionate as you you’re the expert in your industry find someone who’s an expert on something that you’re not good at y’all come

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together as a team and produce something good for the world and so um like I want to meet him yeah that’s been like inspiration I well you can hop a plane and go back to to where I’m I’m originally from the DC Baltimore Maryland area that’s where Steve case is from you know at least that’s where all of his businesses were based um but uh no I think you make a good point though and that is that anyone that says that they’re an expert in everything is really an expert in nothing right I mean you have your strengths I have a very

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hard time Leon knows I’ve never nobody ever I never allow anyone to call me an expert in anything because things change so quickly you know yeah know a lot about something but you know it could it could be different tomorrow so but uh in any case well is there anything that you like to you know say to the audience as far as you know budding entrepreneurs that are starting their their own Journeys yeah I just say I guess for other entrepreneurs um just stick with it and I think the most important thing

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is just like build relationships and and um find people mentors who have been in that space and um I think take every meeting or or mentorship as a with a grand salt right get it can be overwhelming but like I think if you’re just if you’re passionate about what you’re doing I I think it should you know just it should work out right um I know it’s kind of like cliche right but like there’s more that comes with that passion but I think that passion paired with relationships um can I think you can springboard like your your idea or

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or get you in the in the right rooms so um I think that’s what’s worked for me um so far is those relationships those genuine relationships and just um I mean I love what I do like I love community and and like I said in the beginning it’s not about like me like I want to like make sure like I’m someone else’s Legacy and like I want to pay forward um but now I just want to do it in like a text Tech space right I’ve always done in a nonprofit space so that’s really for having me like like San Antonio is a

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small town um I know I saw you grab a beer and I said we got to get you on Pablo called me like like 8:00 P.M or something or 700 p.m. was like Hey you know can we can we do a morning podcast and I was like I’ll I’ll get awake make sure I’m away I’m there I was like perfect and I was like it’s just like we executed but out of your story The perseverance thing is is what stood out for me thank you so much it it’s a lot of people don’t have it it’s a stamina of of getting through it and not letting

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those hardships like slow you down and you know obviously there there was a lot through life and it’s it’s a inspiring story for many and many that probably want to work in the non nonprofit space that want to work in Tech that want to be an entrepreneur so I I you know I recommend that personal brand and shouting that from the rooftops it’s going to not only help you grow but inspire a lot of those future you know entrepreneurs out there I just say don’t don’t give up man like and I’ll share something that I didn’t

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share with you because like you know my wife was pregnant during the boot camp we lost our baby during the pre accelerator right oh I’m sorry and so like you know that’s that’s life you know like your story there’s always going to be personal um tragedies but really believe in like what you want to accomplish like and you have the right relationships um um in love and support that you you’ll get through it right so um that’s my spill just don’t give up you know and what you do very true inspiring thank you very much for your

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time and you know yeah we’ll put your information in there um I’ll add an Amazon link for the Steve case book um and then you know we really appreciate it hey thanks for having me you guys are great and I look forward to like getting y even more yes and hopefully we do this again yeah update absolutely that’ be great [Music]