Nick Telson

trumpet

Co-Founder

sequel

First Check Investor/Ideator

Horseplay Ventures

Horseplay Ventures is a Startup Playground for the new generation of startup founders. As recently exited founders we understand the pressures of being a founder and what it takes to scale and exit. Horseplay incorporates Pre-Seed/Seed Angel Investing, a free investor syndicate, a podcast and free tools for founders to use.

Co-Founder - Angel Investor

Pitch Deck - @pitchdeckpod

Pitch Deck:

- Top 10 Global Business Podcast
- Top 10 Global New Podcast
- Top 5 UK Career/Entrepreneurship Podcast 

Real investors, real founders, real pitches. In each episode, a startup founder has 10 minutes to pitch their business to Nick and guest Angel Investors/Mentors. They then all discuss the pitch and the business itself, asking questions an Investor would ask in a real pitch. The guest Angel and Nick then discuss what they make of the business and investment opportunity.

Podcaster

Proud Ventures

Member

London & Partners

Business Mentor

Virgin StartUp

Delighted to be an official mentor on the Virgin StartUp Programme; a not-for-profit organisation that exists to help founders start up and thrive.  

They provide funding, straight talk and useful advice to make the entrepreneurial road less bumpy and access to a supportive and dynamic community to help founders have some fun along the way.

Mentor

EMW Global | Sports & Entertainment

EMW Global is an international sports and entertainment marketing agency with offices in London, Hong Kong, Shanghai and São Paulo. They matchmake top class rights holders and athletes with global brands and entertainment IP. Some clients include the Brasilian National Team, Clube Flamingo, Dani Alves, Douglas Costa, Emerson and Marco Materazzi.

Advisor

The Access Group

Co-Founder of DesignMyNight . Acquired by The Access Group in December 2017. Remaining at DesignMyNight.

Co-Founder DesignMyNight

WFL Media LTD | www.designmynight.com

I am co-founder of UKs fastest growing nightlife website www.designmynight.com. Receiving over 6.5 million monthly views and several industry leading B2B softwares including Tonic, our DesignMyNight ticket platform and Collins; the first booking and enquiry management software for casual dining restaurants, bars and pubs. DesignMyNight was acquired by The Access Group in 2017.

Founder DesignMyNight (Acquired '19) 🍹 | Co-Founder trumpet 🎺 | Investor in 55+ Startups (Currently not investing in new deals) 😇 | Podcaster 🎙️| 🏳️‍🌈

Hey!

I’m a London-based entrepreneur, angel investor, podcaster, startup mentor and public speaker, whose speciality lies in talking no-nonsense founder/investor advice and help. I'm currently co-founder of new B2B sales tool, trumpet, host of Pitch Deck podcast and co-founder of an angel investing venture-arm, Horseplay Ventures

I previously co-founded DesignMyNight, back in 2010 and managed to grow that over 7 years with minimal angel funding, to 100+ employees, 15,000 SaaS customers and 8m monthly uniques on the website. We exited to Access Group in 2017.

I live for the early stages of startups - building the brand, finding product market fit, iterating quickly and building out a team. Most of my content is centred around this, as well as tips from an angel investor. Even after exiting to financial freedom, I caught the founder bug again and have co-founded my next startup, trumpet, in 2022; looking to disrupt B2B sales and kill the sales pdf deck. Follow me on here while we build out this new journey in public.

Please feel free to ask for any advice or help, whether a founder, startup employee or investor and I will always endeavour to do what I can. I'm also a regular guest on podcasts, startup speaking gigs and webinars, so feel free to reach out to me if you are looking for guests/speakers. 

I do respectfully ask not to be pitched for investment in my Linkedin DMs and instead go through Horseplay Ventures. Hopefully my podcast is also a treasure trove of information for those looking to raise early-stage investment, thinking about it or just interested in it - search for Pitch Deck by Nick Telson.

Nick Telson-Sillett

When we hit $1M ARR at both my startups, I thought we’d made it. 
I was wrong.

That milestone didn’t feel like success, it actually felt like survival.
Everyone told us $1M was “product-market fit.”

But all I saw behind the scenes was a brittle system held together by caffeine and duct tape!

Our pricing didn’t match value.
Our ICP was fuzzy.
Our team was doing too much of everything and mastering nothing.

The truth?
$1M ARR isn’t validation. It’s the starting line of the real company.

That’s where you stop experimenting and start operationalizing.
If I could go back, I’d systemize earlier and faster.

Milestones don’t necessarily mean stability. 
They mean responsibility.
Time to step up.

Co-Founder trumpet 🎺 | Founder DesignMyNight (Acquired '19) 🍹 | Investor in 55+ Startups 🤑 🏳️‍🌈

Every founder says, “We’re product-led.”
Most aren’t.

They’re product-first. Which is not the same thing.

Product-first means: “We’ll build what we think is awesome and hope they come.”
Product-led means: “The product is the growth engine, not just the feature list.”

A truly product-led company designs moments where the user experiences success before a salesperson ever shows up.

That might be a personalized trial that nails the buyer’s use case or a dashboard that instantly quantifies value or a shareable artifact that helps your champion explain the ROI to their boss.

Those are the product-led mechanisms that sell for you while you sleep.

Because people don’t buy just products anymore, they buy internal momentum.

And your product should be the one creating it.

If your product can make someone feel the win before they buy, you’re already halfway to closing them.

AI drop #4 of our AI-Suite.
Let me introduce you to Spark AI.

Write. Re-write. Ask Anything.

This is not just the usual AI writing tool that says "make it more concise"

Built directly into every Pod, Spark AI helps teams create deal-ready content in seconds, without tab-hopping, rewrites, or guesswork.

Our AI doesn’t just write, it understands who you are and who you're writing for, adapting every message to the buyer, persona, and stage of the deal.

↳ Rewrites Pod content for any audience, from CFOs to Champions.
↳ Summarises, translates, and localises content instantly.
↳ 30+ pre-trained prompts for Sales and Success teams
↳ Refines messaging with live buyer context 
↳ Helps handle objections or strengthens ROI messaging in one click.
↳ Keeps tone and quality consistent across every buyer touchpoint.

Spark AI brings the context to make that the AI efficiency meaningful.

From follow-ups to onboarding plans, it helps every team speak with precision, confidence, and intent.

Context built in. Clarity guaranteed.

I speak to 100s of founders and "growth" is what they say they are searching. Few admit they’re addicted to motion instead.

In our early GTM days, I kept mistaking speed for progress.

We were testing every channel, hiring faster than our process could handle, rewriting the strategy too regularly.

Slack looked alive. The dashboards were busy. But we weren’t actually taking big steps forward; just sideways, very quickly.

Here’s what I eventually learned:

- Most GTM problems are focus problems wearing different clothes.
- Growth isn’t found in “what else can we do?” it’s in “what can we stop doing?”
- A bloated strategy doc usually signals insecurity, not ambition.
- The best teams don’t chase motion; they compound signal.

When we started cutting; clarity returned.

Deals closed faster. Messaging sharpened. The team felt lighter and more confident.

The sharpest GTMs aren’t the biggest. They’re the most precise.

Blissgrowth

Blissgrowth is a venture studio and early stage fund partnering with second-time founders to ideate, build and scale the next generation of B2B software technology companies.

Managing Partner

ReelFlow

Founding Investor

StackOne

We help SaaS companies to add hundreds of high-quality integrations to their product in a matter of days. This means you don't have to say "no" to your customers next time they need a new integration built.

Our customers are expanding their total addressable market, increasing their revenue, and reducing their engineering costs by building integrations through our platform.

If you're a Product, Engineering, or GTM leader and this resonates with you – reach out for a chat!

Screenloop

Reachdesk

Emperia

Lead Investor

BlissInvest

Personal family office with my brother Meelan Radia.

We invest across a diverse range of asset classes, including residential and commercial property, B2B lending, bridging finance, public markets, and alternative assets (in particular PE funds, VC funds, and direct investments into startups). Additionally, our family office anchors our own project, Blissgrowth, a B2B SaaS Venture Studio in the UK.

Yieldify

Co-Founder & Board Director

Acquired by Publicis in Jan 2023.

Yieldify makes it simple for e-commerce businesses to deliver customer journeys at scale.

We've delivered over 250,000 campaigns for over 500 brands on more than 1,000 websites globally, including growing businesses and the world’s most recognisable brands, such as Marks and Spencer, Domino’s Pizza and L'Oreal.

I founded the company and led it to an 8 figure ARR over the incredible 7 year journey.  We have a fantastic new CEO and a very strong executive team leading the company. Go Team Yieldify!

Highlights & Recognition's: 
- TechTrack 100 Fastest Growing Companies in the UK (The Times 2017)
- Deliotte Top 50 Fast Companies UK (2017)
- Deliotte Top 100 Tech Companies Europe (2017)
- Madshift KPMG 2017 Top 100
- Future Fifty UK (Tech City)
- Top 10 Under 30 Entrepreneurs in Europe (Financial Times 2015) 
- Top 100 Start-ups (Startups UK)
- Runner-Up for "Young Entrepreneur of the Year"​ (WCIT 2014)
- Stevie Award for Company of the Year in Advertising, Marketing, & Public Relations (2014)
- Great British Entrepreneur Awards - Media Disrupter of the Year 2014 
- Publisher Partner of the Year (Performance Marketing Awards 2015)
- Winner Young Guns Award 2015

Co-Founder & CEO

Internet Ventures

- Created and also marketed several e-commerce websites in various niches.
- Used Google Adwords, Facebook & Twitter marketing, SEO, Affiliate marketing and Media Buying to create a profitable business.
- Worked with networks and merchants directly as an Affiliate/publisher.

Director

Bank of America Merrill Lynch

- Joined a startup team to help build and grow the business.
- Sales and Global Client Relationship manager (Europe, Asia and US). My clients transacted over $10bn of business each year 
- Involved in product development, technology and building our P&L System which saved the desk approx. $10M every year.
- Received early promotion (top 10% of my grad class) 
- BNP Paribas acquired our sales team and business area in October 2008 for approx $200m.
- Later head-hunted to build Credit Agricole's Equity Derivatives & Delta One business.

Derivatives Sales & Trading 

I have founded several successful tech businesses which have scaled globally: 

» Yieldify: making online shopping more personalized. As Co-Founder and CEO, I grew Yieldify to a solid 8-figure recurring revenue business, globalized to 4 continents, and was backed by Google Ventures, SoftBank, and Hoxton Ventures. It was acquired by Publicis in January 2023.

» Reachdesk: helping businesses to spread joy through corporate gifting. As Co-Founder, I helped put together the founding team and core operations/strategy. Reachdesk was voted one of the fastest-growing software companies in the world in 2021.

» Screenloop: helping businesses hire and retain their talent using data. As Co-Founder, I helped put together the founding team, led the financing and initial strategy for the company. Screenloop was voted the #1 startup to watch in London.


Now, I am working on: 
 
» Blissgrowth: building exceptional software companies with 2nd-time founders leveraging our ideation, team, playbooks and fund. Emperia (2021), StackOne (2023), BlissX (2024), BlissY (2024)

» Joyful Entrepreneur Podcast: A top 10 entrepreneurship podcast with two friends having fun and sharing stories on success and happiness. We are on all podcast platforms. I have paused new episodes for the moment.

» Angel Investor: I follow on rounds and have invested in over 30 companies globally through referrals only.

Some external recognition:
- Deloitte Top 50 Tech Companies Europe (Yieldify)
- Top 5 fastest-growing software companies in the world (Reachdesk)
- Top 10 Under 30 Entrepreneurs in Europe (Financial Times)
- Media Disrupter of the Year (Great British Entrepreneur Awards)

Jay Radia

Next week, I will be hosting the Building Again event in London.

There will be 100+ UK Second-Time Founders who are building again or looking to build again, and an exceptional speaker line-up who have built some of the largest startups in the UK. 

We have opened up a few more spots if you wanted to join. Link in the comments.

Speakers include: 
- Ross Mason (Exited Mulesoft to Salesforce and now Dig Ventures)
- Harrison Rose (Founder of Paddle and now Goodfit)
- Michele A. (Exited ESL FACEIT and now Insiders VC) 
- Matthew Wilson (Exited Omnipresent to Deel and now Jack & Jill)

This is a private, founder-only evening for entrepreneurs who are ideating or in the very early stages of their next company.

Thank you also to our sponsors HSBC Innovation Banking (Kofi), Goodwin (Andrew), Drata (Virginie), Google Cloud (Emma) & Burgess Hodgson (Martin)

Managing Partner at Blissgrowth | Creating exceptional AI B2B companies with second-time founders.

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Jay Radia

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The Battle

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Jay Radia

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Nick Telson-Sillett's LinkedIn Performance

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