Firing The Man
THANK YOU TO OUR 25,000+ LISTENERS! We are so thankful to be one of the TOP E-Commerce Podcasts delivering high-quality authentic content to you! Serial Entrepreneur’s David Schomer and Ken Wilson share tips, advice, and insider knowledge about all things Amazon FBA, Walmart WFS, and E-Commerce. Discover how you can create multiple income streams by selling physical products online so that you can have the time and freedom to do what you love - whether that is spending more time with family or traveling the world. Ken and David have successfully created several six and seven figure online business ventures. During the journey, they have had major wins, losses, and lessons learned. This podcast will teach you about selling physical products online through platforms such as Fulfillment by Amazon, building a team, outsourcing, listing optimization, pay per click (PPC) advertising, driving traffic to your listings, and productivity tips / life hacks that will provide a path to be successful in building your online business. It’s a mix of interviews, special co-hosts and solo shows from Ken and David you’re not going to want to miss. Hit subscribe, and get ready to change your life.
Firing The Man
Turning Parenting Struggles into Innovation with Britta Bucholz
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The screen time battle just got a revolutionary upgrade. Meet Britta Buchholz, the visionary entrepreneur who's flipping the script on how kids interact with technology through her groundbreaking app, Kidoo.
After watching her young children memorize complex passcodes to access their iPads while homework sat untouched, Britta had her lightbulb moment. What if those same devices that captivated children's attention could become powerful educational tools? What if kids had to answer educational questions to unlock their entertainment apps?
Drawing from her extensive experience running the Boomerang Group, a philanthropic consulting firm serving high-profile clients like Steve Aoki and Cesar Millan, Britta took the entrepreneurial leap. Despite having no background in tech development, she followed her instincts and pursued her vision with unwavering determination.
"I didn't even tell my husband for a few months later that I had started this company with this guy, that I had never met with this whimsical idea, that I had to invent an app which I had no clue about the technology industry," Britta shares with refreshing candor. Her journey wasn't without challenges – from facing critical feedback from early testers to navigating the technical complexities of app development and finding the courage to release a minimum viable product rather than waiting for perfection.
The result? A transformative tool that parents everywhere have been waiting for. Kidoo seamlessly integrates learning into screen time by requiring children to complete educational challenges before accessing entertainment apps. Unlike traditional educational apps that require parental navigation, Kidoo makes learning the gateway to entertainment, leveraging children's natural motivation to use devices.
Whether you're a parent struggling with screen time battles, an entrepreneur considering taking the leap, or simply fascinated by innovative solutions to modern challenges, this conversation offers valuable insights into both the practical aspects of startup development and the mindset required to bring transformative ideas to life. The future of family technology might just look brighter thanks to visionaries like Britta who dare to question the status quo.
How to connect with Britta?
Website: https://keydo.io/
Ready to scale your Amazon business? Click here to book a strategy call. https://calendly.com/firingtheman/amazon
Welcome everyone to the Firing the man podcast, a show for anyone who wants to be their own boss. If you sit in a cubicle every day and know you are capable of more, then join us. This show will help you build a business and grow your passive income streams in just a few short hours per day. And now your host serial entrepreneurs David Shomer and Ken Wilson.
Speaker 2:Welcome everyone to the Firing the man podcast, where we cut through the noise and bring you straight talk with entrepreneurs rewriting the rulebook. Today, we're joined by Britta Buchholz, a seasoned entrepreneur with a track record of building impactful ventures. She's the founder of the Boomerang Group, a full-service philanthropic consulting firm that helps high-profile clients turn their influence into a lasting impact. Her client roster includes global names like Steve Aoki, one of the world's most recognized DJs, and renowned dog behavioralist, cesar Millan, along with several other high-profile figures. Britta's ability to connect vision, strategy and execution has made her a trusted partner to some of the most influential personalities in the world.
Speaker 2:Building on that experience working with global influencers and causes, britta is now turning her focus to one of the biggest challenges facing families today screen time. Enter Kidoo, her breakthrough startup that flips the screen time fight on its head. With Kidoo, kids earn device access through bite-sized educational challenges, turning what used to be a headache into a mission. I've actually had the privilege of being part of the KEDU beta test and I can tell you firsthand this isn't just another parenting app. This is a technology with potential to reshape an entire generation. Think Uber, think Tesla. That's the level of disruption we're talking about. In this episode, you'll hear Britta's inspiring journey of building Keydo from the ground up, along with the real challenges she faced along the way. Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a parent navigating the screen time battle, or simply know someone who is, this is an episode you will not want to miss. Britta, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3:Hey David.
Speaker 2:Very excited to have you. So, to start things off, can you share with our audience a little bit about yourself and path in the entrepreneurial world?
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, that entrepreneurial world just started. I've been a product of the nonprofit industry for over two decades, for 25 years. But the last seven years is when I started my consulting firm Seven, almost eight years actually and I saw that it could be done. So it was really the leap of courage that got me into it. But I've been in the nonprofit space forever Every type of nonprofit you can imagine, doing fundraising but I've always had that urge in my heart to do something independently.
Speaker 3:My family kind of came from an entrepreneurial world. It was always kind of a spirit in our family and I just I think I was born with it. Well, very nice, very nice. Now let's talk a little bit about Kedu and what was the moment feel like? It's one of those obvious moments for most parents.
Speaker 3:I was picking up the kids from school and I think I had flickers of this idea even in before this. But I was picking the kiddos up from school and it was one of those nights where you knew you had to go to Dick's Sporting Goods to get a pair of soccer shoes and you had a drop off at UPS and you're going to be in the car for at least 40 minutes, but yet you had soccer practice and you had cheerleading practice. You had all this stuff going on and you had a homework that the teachers had just thrown on top of everything. And I remember sitting in the back of the car and we had just gotten over the conversation with all the kids at that time they were young, they were very young, they were kinders and they were second graders having the conversation of what homework do you have tonight? And it was kind of the obligatory all the spelling words. Do you want to sit down at the table and do them together? No, mom, I hate studying with you. Math homework. They had to read for 20 minutes. Just the obvious, right, very obvious for those younger elementary kids. And part of me was already avoiding the idea that I had to do this later on tonight or tomorrow morning, and so when was going to be the best time? And I had all this stuff going on.
Speaker 3:So because we had this long road trip to get all the errands run before all the activities, I, as a mother, gave them the iPads, because we were in the car and I saw out of the back of my eye when I was at the stoplight. The little four-year-olds were asking the six-year-olds what the password was to get into the iPad. And at that time the four-year-olds really weren't sure all of their numbers at this point, and so one of them was an eight. You know, we have like the six digit passcodes. So my son was like doing what an eight was in the sky, and the little four-year-olds were like oh, yeah, yeah, the ones with the two circles. And I was like, yeah, yeah, they'd put the passcode in there and before I knew it they had full on memorized the six digit passcode and could put it in whenever they wanted, however they wanted and knew their numbers because they were motivated to learn to access this device. So all these little pieces of the puzzle started coming together for me in that moment and I thought if I could just get the spelling words in there and not the passcode, or if I could just get his math homework in there and not the passcode, that would be so amazing. Every whatever five minutes, that app locks and they have to re-put a passcode or the answer a question. It then puts me out of that awkward position of being a teacher and puts them in this beautiful position of using the device as this motivational tool to learn, and that was was the full on inception of it.
Speaker 3:And I just kind of funnily, was talking to a client when I was trying to pitch them to to come to one of our nonprofit events and I he had a child, I had a child and we just were commiserating together and I giggled with the idea.
Speaker 3:And, david, now that you're getting to know how many whimsical ideas I come up with, he's like I actually like that one. I was like, okay, great, he called me a week later and he's like we're starting a company. I was like, okay, all right, we'll start a company. I didn't even tell my husband for a few months later that I had started this company with this guy, that I had never met with this whimsical idea, that I had to invent an app which I had no clue about the technology industry. So it was a bit about walking off a cliff. So Kedu was a different direction than, say, starting a consulting firm in the nonprofit industry, where I had full knowledge of what I was walking into and how I was going to get paid and that I was set up for success on day one. But it was really more about taking a chance on myself.
Speaker 2:Finally, I like it. I love that story and one of the coolest parts about that story is you went from idea to executing and that's something that. I find a lot being an entrepreneur is people often come up to me and they'll say, oh, I've got this idea and they will share with me that idea, and then you talk to them in two or three years and it's still in the idea stage and I. So what was what helped you go from idea to? I'm going to, I'm going to do this thing.
Speaker 3:And so on a human answer, there's a couple things. I went to business school at Loyola Marymount and I was in the entrepreneurship program, and our teacher there has this amazing man who's now passed away. His name was Dr Fred Kiesner and one of the things that he always said that every great business idea has about 100 people that come up with the exact same idea. It was just that one person that actually did something. So it always has kind of ruminated in the back of my mind that comment that he had made. But in all humanness, I am very fortunate to have a husband who is supporting me, to have kids that are incredible, who is supporting me to have kids that are incredible, and a family that loves me. And so to take a leap was not that leap of oh, I have to make ends meet. Can I really do this? I'm so scared, but it was a leap of sure. The markets are going to do what they're going to do. I have some assets. Let's try this. I've never tried to risk out myself. My husband's comment to me was if you're going to go back to school, it's going to cost the same amount of money. You're going to get a better education doing this than you would if you went back to school, and not even that I was contemplating going back to school. But it was such a cool and supportive response that I was like how did I get so lucky Right? And I think so much of just taking risk in life, depending on what your risk meter is is having a network and a world around you that supports you, and once you get to that place you have a little bit more courage to take the step, take that leap.
Speaker 3:When I started my consulting practice, that was a total different leap of fate. It was I had a calculated risk right and I knew what I was getting into. I knew that I could get clients. I knew if I had to charge X amount, I'd be just fine. There were very fewer risks than there were at investing over $100,000 in an app that I know nothing about the industry.
Speaker 3:I am not an educator, I'm a mom. I intrinsically believe that this is what is needed because I've seen devices. I've seen how motivated kids are. I've seen how judgmental people are when you walk in with an iPad. I know that devices aren't going anywhere. I've been present at the conversations that my husband and I have had about do we let them use an iPad, do we not? And we both have arguments on either side of letting our kids use a device. I think there's some really good benefits. Kids are going to use technology the rest of their lives. It's how they use technology and how we look at technology. So the risks were vastly different this time around than they were the first time the first time.
Speaker 2:One thing I really like about your process is you laid it out and thought about it logically. I think there's a lot of people that get stuck on what if this doesn't work? And, having been somebody who's had plenty of failed ventures, I can tell you really nothing. You learn and then you just keep going, and I think that defining the risk what does it look like if this works out versus doesn't work out I think is really really helpful. And you know talking going a little further about the problem. You know I've got a five-year-old. My son Henry would walk through a brick wall to play Minecraft.
Speaker 2:He loves it would walk through a brick wall to play Minecraft. He loves it and that brick wall being an educator that's driven by AI that and we to the audience. I've used this product and as Henry got more problems right, they got progressively more difficult. If he got something wrong we would revisit it and that brick wall became something that was really valuable to him to overcome. And to call it a brick wall really wasn't probably isn't appropriate. It was just a math problem, right, and so I really like that.
Speaker 2:And you know, zooming in on the problem a little bit more, this is one issue that our generation cannot look to the previous generation for advice on, and if anyone's a parent with young kids right now, you know that judgmental look that you get from an older generation when you're at dinner and you pull out an iPad, or you're traveling and you're pulling out an iPad, and one thing I really like about this is it does kind of flip it on its head to where there are things on that iPad that are fun and enjoyable, but we can also blend it with learning, and so, yeah, Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 3:I think it's so important to do that and, as I kind of did my market research, as if anything like this existed. There are amazing educational apps out there, but you have to navigate to them. So what kept getting me more and more excited about the idea is spring break ended and we're all laying in bed and I was like, hey Case, did you do your reading? I know we had to do your reading and I didn't do it because we've been whatever, whatever. Did you do your reading and did you do your math? Ah crap, mom, I didn't.
Speaker 3:If I would, I kept what I would say. If I had Kedu on your thing right now, if it was out of the development stages, your reading would have been done, because every time you went to the device, you had no choice but to access that versus Epic and all these other fabulous tools. As a mother or a parent, you actually have to take the child and put them on there and make sure they stay, and if they don't stay, or if you don't put them on there, they don't go. With Keto, it's totally different. In order to access anything, they have to be reading, they have to be answering the questions, they have to be learning, absolutely.
Speaker 2:So it's a rest-free kind of to meeting somebody to help co-found, to getting a product to market, which I think the idea. When people talk about how much is the idea worth, I think it's worth about 10%, and the other 90% is execution, and so let's talk about what did that look like?
Speaker 3:A lot of trust, an incredible amount of trust. So, going into this, I was the idea and the developer. The guy who said I want to do this actually has an app development company and this is what he does, and so all the tools and resources were kind of already in place, and so it was just a matter of trusting that mechanism. I was grateful, right. The other person wasn't just an investor saying let's go out now and find a marketing agency, let's find the developer, let's find all this stuff that can code it and do it. It was built in-house, so it was just this is what I wanted to do.
Speaker 3:And I think, as the process unfolded, the most challenge. I had never done some of this, so I would sit there literally like this and watch podcasts about what I need to be doing if I'm starting an app, right, and all these things. I remember driving to Vegas one day and I just had this on play and it kept saying minimally viable product, minimally viable product. And I kept thinking why, like you want to have a business plan, like you want this all drawn out, and they're like don't do that. You got to do the basic, basic and let your consumers tell you where this needs to go. And so, as this journey has unfolded, I idea woman keep saying but it can do this and we need it to do this and it needs to do this, but it shouldn't and it can't. When we go to market, it needs to be a minimally viable product. So keeping it as grassroots and as simple as possible and not doing all the bells and whistles and trusting that that's good enough. For me, this is the hardest part right now is trusting that the minimally viable product is okay enough to go out because it's my idea, right, and you don't want people to think your idea is bad.
Speaker 3:And then the first test group that I had. I actually put it out to a few people, including some members of our soccer team, and they didn't like it and it was embarrassing. I remember going to a soccer game and I dropped the kids off and I hid from my husband. I actually went and pretended I was going to go get water and started crying in the car, thinking these parents hated this app and I felt like I had failed. But then it kind of broke down. I finally, a month and a half later, told my husband that this hurt my feelings. He's like are you kidding me? They don't even have, they didn't even have an idea and they didn't even do anything with an idea. You've already taken it 5,000 times. Step further, so be proud of that. And so, again, it's that support system, that mechanism of being able to have the courage to go out and do it. It's not just coming from my internals, it's coming from this network around you. But it's an interesting journey and you kind of take it as it unfolds.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely, and I'd like to talk. I think that minimum viable product is a really good concept that I've heard. Minimum viable product is a really good concept that I've heard. I read about it first in the book E-Myth, revisited by Michael Gerber, and I'm curious when you your day one vision, had you taken that all the way to the finish line, versus making a minimum viable product, collecting feedback and then iterating based on that feedback? Have you ended up in a different spot, or were there points of feedback that were not even on your radar?
Speaker 3:So the original concept was to upload your homework and you'd answer your homework questions. Original idea, and still where I want it to be, the first version was purchasing questions, individual questions, from AI to feed into the system and then to feed to the student, depending on what grade level and what subject you choose, and then they answer it. That in itself was a problem, because every single time a kid chooses to answer a question, we owe like 0.2 cents or something. So if you have a family who's watching eight hours of iPad a day and they're answering questions every 15 minutes, the cost for us was skyrocketing. So we had to create a system internally that was generating the questions. So we weren't paying for the questions.
Speaker 3:Individually was the basics, and then from there, as we started seeing the kiddos, the thing that we saw that kiddos really wanted to do was manipulate the avatar or the person. So instead of going to uploading homework first, it became we need avatars that can be customizable to keep the kids attuned to what this like this, to the emotes that they want, do the skins that they want, whatever it is right To gather their attention and their focus. So that's the other direction it took before we even did homework upload. So homework upload is what we're working on actually right now. So the homework that's uploaded informs the questions. Those are the president questions that get answered before the kiddo does it. But the feedback was interesting. And the other piece that I thought was fascinating is children with autism seem to even love it more. Any autistic child or parent that I had of an autistic child it was like a slam dunk that they'd love the app.
Speaker 2:Interesting.
Speaker 3:Interesting, that was fascinating.
Speaker 2:That is fascinating when you heard some of the first criticisms. Obviously that hurts your feelings. That hurts your feelings and what you know knowing what you know now and getting the feedback that you have now, what would you tell the previous version of Britta?
Speaker 3:Just believe in yourself. Yeah, I know that sounds so trivial, right, but you can lose the money in the market. You can lose it anywhere, right, but you can lose the money in the market. You can lose it anywhere, right. At least you've learned something. I've learned so much more on this journey than I would have had if I just sat idle and watched what was being idle. So I think that's kind of really what I've learned through the whole process, and it's even made me want to take the risk even more because you realize the risk isn't really as big as you thought it was. It's more perceived than it is real. Absolutely, you know a lot of this too. David, I am again.
Speaker 3:I come from the nonprofit industry and not to take or cut down nonprofit industry versus for-profit or vice versa, but I'm very. My business has always been about relationship building. It isn't about understanding the intricacies and the complicatedness of business. It's really relationships and making things work because it's good and it's right and really more of a soulful, driven mission in what I do and that's kind of been the mission too, and even this process is.
Speaker 3:I can't sit here from an analytical business standpoint and tell you the profit margins and I'm not looking at this business from that perspective whatsoever, nor did I even when starting my consulting businesses. I did it because I had a passion and a belief, and I believe some people are different and they need the analytics and they need the business mentality and they need to read the books and they need to be researched and they need all that stuff to quantify the right decision-making process. For me, it's more of a. I have a passion, I believe in it, I know it can happen and when I started this this is how silly it is I started watching the laws of attraction. I'm like I'm just going to believe in myself Everywhere I like I'm just going to believe in myself Everywhere I go. I'm just going to believe in myself and envision this being a success. If I believe in it and I see it, it's going to happen.
Speaker 2:I like it. I like it how much so. As I said in the intro, you've worked with some of the biggest names in the world Steve Aoki, cesar Millan. What is have your experiences dealing with those types of incredibly high-achieving people? Has that influenced your path with Key Do?
Speaker 3:I don't know if it's influenced my path with Key Do in specific, but it's influenced my path of who I am as a person and how I perceive or execute myself personally and professionally. And I think it roots even way back to the beginning of my career, when I was at an amazing place called City of Hope at Cancer Research Hospital and I ran their music and entertainment industry group and I remember sitting in the offices of some of the most renowned executives in the music industry and, in order to get things done within 15 minutes of sitting in their office, if they said a name, they picked up the phone call and they called the person and they made it happen, or they saw if it was possible, or they got them recruited or they put them on the board or whatever it was. They sold them the tape right then and there. And it wasn't about making a list and to-dos and what needs to happen. It was about if you see it, you believe it, you execute it.
Speaker 3:And I think I've taken that initial observation and, as I've worked with individuals who are highly successful, they're the same way If you're going to get it done, you get it done. You don't ruminate on the what ifs and the could it be's and you do it right, and the could it be's and you, you do it right. You don't just sit and stutter.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right, you know, like any great athlete too like if they're going to win the race, if they're going to throw the trick, if they're going to do anything you don't sit and think about it. If you sit and think about it, you're going to hit your head, you're going to fail, you're going to fall, you're going to any great performance is lack of thought and just doing it. Because you're so trained, you just do it. So I think that's kind of the mission that I've taken with me is anything that I've done is just don't think. If you follow your gut and your soul, you're going to be okay.
Speaker 3:As we're born into this world, in this beautiful space where we are led by instinct, it's growth in years that teach us to lead and to think with our minds and not our hearts and our gut. And when we think with our minds, we get in trouble. We overthink and we over process and we over ponder, and that's when error happens. We overthink and we overprocess and we overponder, and that's when error happens. But if you live by instinct and heart, you're going to make the right decision most of the time, whether it's parenting and telling your kid don't watch the television or get off the iPad or do the homework or whatever it is. If you lead by instinct, you're going to do it right. It's when we overthink it and worry about what they think and what he thinks and what she thinks, and that we all get all messed up and mumbled. So I know this is a bit of a spiritual feedback, but I believe it's the same thing. Our lives intermix, whether it's business or professional.
Speaker 2:I think this is really really good advice, and we certainly have plenty of guests on the show that come in and talk about profit margin or some of the more technical aspects of running a business, but what I have seen and what I'm hearing from you is a lot of successful entrepreneurs. They take action, they have belief in themselves, they're not afraid of failure and yeah, that's what you're saying here, and so, no, I think this is really really good advice, and so and they can be.
Speaker 3:I would say it's not that they're void of fear of failure. You can be petrified of failure, you're just not going to listen to it, you're just not going to listen to it.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, because everybody does have that voice in their head, that negative Nancy sitting on their left shoulder who, what if this doesn't work, or what if that doesn't work? And yeah, it has also been my experience. The more I can quiet that voice, the better off things seem to go. And so now, so let's talk about the future of Kedu, what you know, from where you're at to continuing to grow and scale this business. What does that look like?
Speaker 3:So where we're at right now is to go. We're just launched on Apple, so we're trying to figure out what the acquisition cost is per customer. Once we can kind of figure that out, it's the idea of do we get an investor or do we stay internally invested? My preference is to stay internally invested as long and as much as possible that we can. So that's kind of where we're at from like a cost perspective and what we do between here and the next three, six months.
Speaker 3:But vision wise, I really want it to become something where it's not just you can. A kiddo can take the opportunity to say I just want to unlock my apps every 15 minutes and play or do whatever. Or they can actually take a different direction with Q2, where it's more of like a quest, take a different direction with Kedu, where it's more of like a quest, and if they choose the Kedu quest module of things, they can choose to go whatever island they want to or whatever land they want to. So if they want to do math island or if they want to do reading forest or whatever, they go to that place and they can compete with other kiddos that are in that same space at the same time Think a mashup between Fortnite a little bit right, and they actually compete to win prizes. So the first one to answer X amount of questions correctly unlocks X or does this, this, this and this, and can go onto a different land or fly wherever you want to go.
Speaker 3:But making it more of a challenge where you can pull in your classmates and compete with classmates. You can pull in friends. Parents compete with classmates. You can pull in friends. Parents can unlock safe networks for you. But gamifying, the quest of learning a little bit more versus just a single-off question, is where we hope to take it.
Speaker 2:Outstanding and if you want to know my prediction, this is it Just as we speak about today, about can you believe that we used to put cigarettes in our soldiers' lunchboxes? Or can you believe that we used to let kids, you know, eat lead paint or whatever? There will be a time when we say can you believe that we used to let kids use a six-digit password to open their iPad instead of using Kedu? Like, I really think this is a transformative technology and I'm really excited for it. I'm excited for it for my own usage with my own kids because, like you, we have that same problem where we some days it's a tool that's helpful, some days it's not a tool and seems like it's working against us as parents. Sometimes it feels like we have a stranger in our house that we did not invite, and I see this being a great way to pivot and to turn it into a tool always, and as a parent, that's what you want. Parenting's hard and the more tools you can have, the better off you're going to be and the better off your kids are going to be, and so I like it.
Speaker 2:It's very hard. Yes, it is. It is, but worth it, worth it, certainly. So before we end this interview, we have something called the fire round. It's four questions that we ask every guest at the end of the show. Are you ready? Yeah, all right. What is your favorite book I hate reading? Fair enough, fair enough. What are your hobbies? My kids Very good. What is one thing you do not miss about working for the man?
Speaker 3:Other people's insecurities.
Speaker 2:That's a good one. That's a good one. And final question what do you think sets apart successful entrepreneurs from those who give up, fail or never get started? Belief Belief. Very good, very good, berta. This has been an outstanding interview To our audience. I am going to post a link in the show notes to keydoio. It is K-E-Y-D-O dot I-O. Go out and download this in the App Store and make sure you leave a review and help us support Britta in her mission to changing how parents interact with technology. So, britta, thank you so much for your time today and looking forward to staying in touch. You too, honey, thank you.
