Viaka Newsletter: An AI-Powered Marketing Stack from VBOUT!
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Hi everyone! This week, we’re shining the spotlight on VBOUT, an AI-powered marketing stack. I spoke with Richard Fallah, co-founder and CEO of VBOUT.
VBOUT Quick Stats
Founded: 2013
Key Individuals: Richard Fallah, co-founder and CEO; Elsa Batour, CCO; Georges Fallah, marketing manager
Raison d’être: VBOUT uses advanced AI to streamline marketing efforts.
I got the chance to chat with Richard about VBOUT’s story, and their goals for the future. Here are some of the insights from our chat.
What is Vbout and how/why did it come to life?:
VBOUT is an AI powered marketing stack, built for marketing teams, to help them streamline their marketing efforts with automation. VBOUT came to life out of the need for digital agencies to consolidate the tool stack needed to execute end-to-end marketing campaigns, including lead generation, lead nurture and retention. While these tools already existed, they were either scattered across different tools, or offered through expensive and bulky platforms.
What is your personal story and relation to the problem (alongside your founders):
VBOUT founders, Richard and Imad, started as a boutique digital agency 15 years ago and soon noticed the gap in the market between the underkill marketing tools and the overkill expensive platforms. They set out to build a simple yet powerful marketing suite, to help businesses connect with their clients better. They built email marketing tools, social media scheduling capabilities and an easy drag and drop marketing logic builder, through which businesses can automate client nurture and outreach in a breeze. They also backed the product with an industry leading support team who are minutes away from solving the next technical question.
VBOUT is now used by over 4,000 businesses and digital agencies world wide and has consistently made the top list of the best and simplest marketing automation platforms for SMBs 5 years on a row.
What market are you attacking? Are you adding on or trying to replace current offerings?:
VBOUT makes a perfect match for small businesses, with a marketing practicioner on board, and are growing their lead generation and outreach campaign. As well as digital agencies who want to organize their clients marketing technology in one simple dashboard. By adopting VBOUT, companies can replace 10+ marketing tools or high-touch expensive products like Hubspot and Act-on.
What are you looking for from the Viaka community?:
We hope to provide marketing tech products and expertise as well as high quality marketing education content to the Viaka community. We will share our academy, our 8K + member community with monthly events and our industry leading marketing platform.
Where will that take you?:
Our goal at VBOUT is to make marketing easier, smarter and cost effective. We also believe in the power of knowledge sharing and education through online courses and events. We hope to grow VBOUT into a brand name in the AI marketing world and to help thousands of businesses succeed online with better marketing.
Promising Opportunities from Our Partners
New opportunities added in January 2023:
No Label Ventures backs immigrant founders in Europe at the earliest stages of startup creation. Have an amazing idea and looking for your first institutional funding? This is the fund for you.
Vbout is looking for expert advice on refining its B2B growth strategy and selling add-ons to its existing user base
YallaPlay is looking for expert advice on setting up a scalable employee incentive program and exploring the possibility of a rebrand to better address global markets.
NOMU Group is closing a pre-Series A round, to build out their products and grow market share and support their vision for a sustainable, equitable, and personalized food system for families and business in MENA and beyond.
Click on the button below to see all current opportunities & get involved:
Exciting Announcements From Our Network
Below is a list of updates, wins, and asks emanating from members of the Viaka Network in the “West.”
We’re hosting a Health Tech demo day 🏥 On January 30th, five early stage Health Tech founders in the Viaka Network will present their startups (via Zoom), and receive actionable feedback (and potentially raise funds) from investors, advisors, and serial entrepreneurs in their field.
TiE Scale Up is looking for Boston-based startups! TiE ScaleUp (tiescaleup.org) is a Boston-based, equity-free accelerator. They work across all industries. Applications are due Jan 31st and can be found here.
Check out this message from a Network member about a Lebanon ICT mission! “The biggest ICT outsourcing opportunities are in Lebanon. Supported by USAID, book B2B outsourcing meetings until Feb 6. Limited slots: https://calendly.com/usalebanonict/”
More Viaka events are already planned for 2023! Join the Network to get involved with our monthly coffee chats, demo days, and upcoming in-person meetups.
If you’re a member of our Network and would like to share your own update next week, email info.viaka@gmail.com or submit an update via this form.
Read of the Week
Viaka has launched a Network Reading List, where Network members are encouraged to submit media suggestions of their own.
Our suggested read this week is this piece from Wired about what Silicon Valley thinks of the MENA region!
Weekly Digest
Check out our weekly digest — we provide news from all across the MENA startup ecosystem, every single Friday. Be sure to follow our LinkedIn and Twitter for more.
That’s it for this week. Thank you!
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