36. How to get users on your app from day one | Michelle Kennedy

Summary

Podcast Summary: James Reed: All About Business

Episode 36: How to Get Users on Your App from Day One | Michelle Kennedy
Release Date: July 14, 2025

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Introduction

In Episode 36 of "James Reed: All About Business," host James Reed engages in an insightful conversation with Michelle Kennedy, the founder and CEO of Peanut, an award-winning social networking app designed to support women through various life stages. Michelle shares her journey from being the deputy CEO of Bumblebee to launching Peanut, offering valuable strategies for app user acquisition, fundraising, and navigating the challenges of being a female entrepreneur.

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Michelle Kennedy’s Journey and Motivation

Michelle Kennedy recounts her transition from the dating app industry to founding Peanut. While working at Badoo and later Bumble, Michelle experienced firsthand the lack of digital communities tailored for mothers. This gap became glaringly apparent during her experience as a new mother searching for support and connections.

[01:15] Michelle Kennedy: "When I was a newborn, I was searching the Internet for answers... it just felt like there wasn't anything that really spoke to me as a mother."

Her personal struggles with motherhood and the absence of a dedicated platform inspired her to create a space where women could find friends, share experiences, and support each other through various life stages.

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Founding of Peanut

Leaving a high-profile position as Deputy CEO of Badoo was a significant risk for Michelle. She describes the challenges of starting Peanut, particularly the restrictive covenants that limited her ability to hire from her previous network. Despite these hurdles, Michelle and her initial team of two launched Peanut, naming it affectionately after her son, Finn, who was likened to the size of a peanut during pregnancy.

[07:26] Michelle Kennedy: "That was because when I was pregnant with Finn, I had read that my baby was the size of a peanut. So that was it forever. It's after him, dedicated to Finn."

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Raising Funds and Overcoming Challenges

Michelle successfully raised over £23 million for Peanut, navigating the complexities of securing investment from both US and European venture capitalists. She highlights the differences between US and UK venture landscapes, noting that US investors often offer quicker decisions and higher valuations.

[08:34] Michelle Kennedy: "I think a lot of people are investing in the person. They have to really believe in you because there's going to be ups and downs."

She emphasizes the importance of building a strong pitch deck that showcases not just the product but also the founder's ability to adapt and lead through challenges.

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User Acquisition Strategies

A critical topic discussed is user acquisition from day one. Michelle outlines Peanut's seeding strategy, which involved initially enrolling over 250 women who were enthusiastic about the platform. These early adopters helped create momentum through word-of-mouth and grassroots evangelism, leading to Peanut's exponential growth to 5 million monthly active users.

[24:46] Michelle Kennedy: "We just gently seed with different people and see."

She underscores the necessity of having a critical mass of users to ensure the app's viability and success in a saturated market.

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Building a Community and Engagement

Peanut excels in fostering a safe and engaging environment for women. Features such as groups based on the child's age, interest-based communities, and live audio rooms facilitate meaningful connections and support.

[20:50] Michelle Kennedy: "We have groups called Stitch and Bitch where women sit and talk and do things. It's amazing."

These functionalities help replicate the sense of community that was prevalent in earlier generations but often missing in today's digital landscape.

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Lessons as a Female Founder

Michelle addresses the unique challenges faced by female entrepreneurs, including limited access to capital and support networks. She discusses her initiative, Start Her, a micro-fund aimed at supporting women-led startups by providing not only financial assistance but also access to a robust network of mentors and industry connections.

[32:42] Michelle Kennedy: "Start Her is like your rich auntie who can write you a 20k check or a 25k check to keep you going and get started."

Michelle advocates for increased funding and support for female founders to bridge the funding gap, where women receive less than 2% of venture capital despite making up 50% of the population.

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Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs

Michelle offers practical advice for those looking to launch their own apps or startups:

1. Know Your Market: Conduct extensive research and engage with your target audience to understand their needs.
2. Bootstrap Before Raising Funds: Utilize available resources and validate your idea before seeking investment.
3. Build a Strong Team: Surround yourself with talented individuals who share your vision and can help scale the business.

[10:40] Michelle Kennedy: "People are investing in the person. They have to really believe in you because there's going to be ups and downs."

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The Role of AI in Peanut’s Growth

Peanut leverages Artificial Intelligence for moderating the platform and enhancing user experience. Michelle emphasizes the potential of AI to streamline operations and improve community safety.

[28:32] Michelle Kennedy: "AI is just amazing. At Peanut, we used large language models to moderate the site and keep the community safe."

She also cautions about maintaining curiosity and critical thinking in an era dominated by AI-driven answers.

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Future Plans and Expansion

Looking ahead, Michelle shares Peanut’s expansion into Germany and other European markets, facilitated by AI-powered translation and localization. Additionally, Peanut is set to release a book titled "It Takes a Village," which compiles stories from women on the platform, providing curated insights and expert advice on motherhood.

[47:42] Michelle Kennedy: "We launch in Germany later this year... AI has really opened up our ability to get into new markets more quickly."

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Closing Thoughts

Michelle concludes by emphasizing the importance of passion and resilience in entrepreneurship. She highlights the fulfillment derived from building a business that positively impacts lives and encourages others to pursue their ventures with optimism and determination.

[54:14] Michelle Kennedy: "Framing is everything. I love what I do, and I do love Mondays."

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Key Takeaways

• User Acquisition: Implement a strategic seeding plan with passionate early adopters to build initial momentum.
• Fundraising: Focus on building a compelling pitch that highlights your vision and personal commitment.
• Community Building: Create features that foster genuine connections and support among users.
• Support for Women Entrepreneurs: Initiatives like micro-funds and networks are crucial for bridging the funding gap.
• Leveraging AI: Utilize AI to enhance platform safety and user experience while maintaining human curiosity and engagement.
• Continuous Learning: Embrace opportunities to work in smaller teams or diverse roles to gain comprehensive experience.

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Notable Quotes

• Michelle Kennedy at [07:26]: "That was because when I was pregnant with Finn, I had read that my baby was the size of a peanut. So that was it forever. It's after him, dedicated to Finn."
• Michelle Kennedy at [10:40]: "People are investing in the person. They have to really believe in you because there's going to be ups and downs."
• Michelle Kennedy at [24:46]: "We just gently seed with different people and see."
• Michelle Kennedy at [54:14]: "Framing is everything. I love what I do, and I do love Mondays."

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Connect with Michelle Kennedy and Peanut

• Peanut App: Available on Apple App Store and Google Play by searching "Peanut app."
• Book Release: "It Takes a Village" available for pre-order on Amazon and Waterstones.

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Tune in to "James Reed: All About Business" for more inspiring conversations with industry leaders and entrepreneurs.

Transcript

[James Reed]

Welcome to All About Business with me, James Reed, the podcast that covers everything about business management and leadership. Nearly 10,000 apps are uploaded to the App Store every week and most are ignored. So how do you launch one that's a hit with your community base? Joining me today on All About Business is Michelle Kennedy, the former deputy CEO of Bumblebee. In 2016, Michelle founded Peanut, an award winning social media app that supports women through important life changes. In this episode, we discuss her strategy for building a matchmaking app that attracts millions of users, how to validate your idea before you build it, and the lessons she's learned as a female founder. Thank you for coming in to talk to me, Michelle. Michelle is the founder and CEO of social networking app Peanut. And Peanut is particularly focused on creating a community of women who need connection and support through various life stages. And this was your idea, wasn't it, Michelle?

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was.

[James Reed]

Why did you think Peanut, as now constituted, was needed?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Great question, long answer, I'm afraid. I was working in the dating industry, so I was building dating apps. Dating apps, very different. But I had a newborn, so I was working in this environment where we were building incredible tech products. And by night I was, you know, searching the Internet for answers, Googling like a true millennial for answers to why won't he sleep? Will this ever end? Is it normal? All of the. The questions that a new mum goes through and it just felt like there wasn't anything that really spoke to me as a mother. There were products on the market, but they didn't feel like the products I was building or using in any other part of my life. And so kind of live with this idea of we should have something where I can find some friends or find some connections to ask questions to this life stage. And did nothing. Carried on with the day job because that was pretty full on and I loved.

[James Reed]

So what are you working at this time?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was working at Badoo, which is a. Or was at the time the biggest European dating platform. And we were building Bumble.

[James Reed]

Bumble.

[Michelle Kennedy]

So Bumble was.

[James Reed]

I have to say, I've never used the dating.

[Michelle Kennedy]

No, that's all right. We forgive you.

[James Reed]

So old.

[Michelle Kennedy]

We forgive you.

[James Reed]

So what. What was special about Bumble? I think it was obviously very successful because I've heard of it.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

And I think it's still around.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It is very much so. I mean, it was very exc. You know, Baidu was this incredible platform that had 52 million users when I joined it and I'd never heard of it. And it was just this Explosive growth and bumble. We were building within Baidu and it was really just an answer to having a native first product which spoke to women. It was incredibly exciting. But I had a six month old so, you know, I felt like I was leading a double life. By day, you know, brainstorming, is that the right color? Is that the right name? Who's the right person to seed this? You know, all of these things with Whitney Wolf and, and by night, you know, 3am feeding feeling like the loneliest girl in the world because there was no one else awake or if they were, they were in the nightclub and not searching.

[James Reed]

What I was double life.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was, it was so. It was surreal at the time and.

[James Reed]

So you could see all this sort of investment and capability or digital support around dating, but you couldn't see it around parenting or young parenting at that point.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It wasn't very cool. It wasn't really anything that was out there that was focused on Motherh in particular.

[James Reed]

Mum's Net, surely, I mean, is that.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think Mum's Net did something phenomenal, but Mum's net is 25 this year.

[James Reed]

Is it?

[Michelle Kennedy]

And I think that speaks generationally to where we were and how I felt with that product. I think Justine did something amazing and I would never ever say anything to the contrary, but it wasn't the product that I needed at that point in my life.

[James Reed]

So people at different stage were typical mums there.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah. I wanted to find friends, I wanted to find like minded women. Like minded didn't just mean you have a baby, I have a baby, let's be friends. It meant, you know, what are you into? What are you doing in your personal life and asking questions and feeling safe and feeling like it was just for women, where I could share, you know, my C section scar looks like this. Is that normal? Or whatever it might be. So being able to be very vulnerable, very open and also just find community because, you know, I'm not from London and my girlfriends weren't having babies and it's very different from originally I'm from Peterborough. Peterborough, yeah, for my son. But you know, when you're not living around the family and you are trying to build connections and community, it's hard. We don't live where we grew up anymore. You know, we move for work, for better lifestyle, whatever it might be and we need products that help us build that community.

[James Reed]

So that was, that was your motivation?

[Michelle Kennedy]

That was the motivation. And I did nothing for two years and carried on with one.

[James Reed]

You were just aware of this problem.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Just thinking about It. Living with it. Boring my friends and the pub on a Friday with it. And then my son got to kind of two and a half and I was like, this is not going anywhere. The bigger the kid, the bigger the problem. Now I need to understand what he should be doing for nursery and how these other people are coping.

[James Reed]

Terrible twos. I remember.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Very much a thing I would like to confirm.

[James Reed]

I'm very pleased to hear that.

[Michelle Kennedy]

No, no, that's very much a thing. And so that was. And that was it. I really felt that that was the time and that was the moment and I took a big risk and I left my lovely job, which I loved.

[James Reed]

And you were pretty senior at this point?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was.

[James Reed]

So what was your job title?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was deputy CEO And I was Deputy CEO. Yeah.

[James Reed]

Of what? Badu.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Of Badoo.

[James Reed]

Which would have had many millions of.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

People.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I mean, it was. It was such an exciting time. It was a very, very big decision to make. But I probably got the bug from Bumble. I wanted to build.

[James Reed]

So you left Purdue and you started your own app?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

But how did you do that? I mean, where did you start? I mean, it takes money. You have to find people. You have to. Yeah, it was technologists. What did you. What did you do first?

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was really hard. I was under massive restrictive covenants because I stayed on the board of Purdue and Bumble. So I couldn't go and hire anyone basically that had worked with me or was working with me. And at the time, the London tech scene was pretty small anyway, so if.

[James Reed]

You weren't working about now, so this.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Was 16 and it was a different tech world. And if you weren't working at Purdue or Bumble, you're probably working at Google or Facebook and there weren't. Or a fintech and there weren't that many options, actually. So it was challenging. But I knew what I wanted to build. So I had me and a deck and one person who left with me. Like Jerry Maguire. I will go with you. One person who would go with me. And that was it. We started.

[James Reed]

So that one person, what was their role?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Cheerleader.

[James Reed]

No, she started off with a team of two, basically.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Team of two.

[James Reed]

Is that person still with you?

[Michelle Kennedy]

She has actually gone on to do something else. Amazing. But she was with me for over six years.

[James Reed]

Right, so you began with two people?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

And why did you settle on the name Peanut? How did that happen?

[Michelle Kennedy]

That was because when I was pregnant with Finn, I had read that my baby was the size of a peanut. So that was it forever. It's after him dedicated to Finn.

[James Reed]

So that was the beginning. So that's the beginning of that journey. Yeah, I guess.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

Yeah. Well, that's a. That's a good reason for. So did you know straight away that that was what you wanted to call your business?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely not. In the office at the time, everyone would call my bump Peanut. How's Peanut? When he was born, I got all of these presents that were all peanut themed. So it was started very early. So that was 2013. It was another couple of years before little Peanut became the focus for the business.

[James Reed]

Digital peanuts.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

Okay, so, so you started out and you raised, I understand, a lot of money for this project. How much did you raise and how did you go about it?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think in total we've raised over 23 million. But it's been hard and I don't want anyone to listen and think, wow, she raised 23 out the bat. You know, you start incrementally. I had me in a term sheet and a deck with no product for a very long time.

[James Reed]

A slide deck.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes, basically a story.

[James Reed]

So you had a pitch?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, I had a pitch deck and a term sheet and then I got a term.

[James Reed]

It was on the term sheet.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was very vanilla, actually. It was very nice. But it was, you know, it was from a US fund and I had a, what I thought at the time was an incredible valuation and I now know was pretty low. But anyway, at the time it felt amazing and then I had to go and fill the round and I was, you know, really learning as I go, understanding the difference between US Venture and UK and European venture.

[James Reed]

So what is the difference?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I mean, U.S. venture, the valuation are headier, I would say decisions are quicker.

[James Reed]

And here sounds like a reason to go to the U.S. yeah.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Particularly at that time we didn't have such an array of early stage venture funds here. Actually, a lot of, a lot of funds were put off by the fact that my lead investor was going to be a US fund. Why the valuation? They thought that they were going to do all the work and, you know, I was based here and yes, I.

[James Reed]

Think you achieved your goal, didn't you? You got the money you needed. So where did that come from in the end? From the US or was it also both actually persuaded people here?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. Because, you know, I think now I. I do think the landscape is different and I think actually it's a huge kudos if you have a term sheet from a U S fund.

[James Reed]

I thought that's helpful. Yeah, that's what I was wondering.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, but at the time, I think there was a lot of. I think that people did feel that it was, that was thrown around a lot. The terms aren't Market.

[James Reed]

Market. What's that mean?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think they, what they meant was it feels expensive.

[James Reed]

They just didn't say it like that. Yeah, didn't they?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

All right, I would have said that seems expensive.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Okay, so just rolling back a bit. A lot of people, you know, dreaming of starting a business or thinking they might go and try and raise some money for a project they've either got underwear or about to start. What would be your advice to them in terms of what should be in that deck? What should be in the pitch? How should you land your proposition?

[Michelle Kennedy]

So I think a lot of people say this, but I do believe it's true. And I, I believe it's true also for me now when I do investing, which is people really are investing in the person. Yes. They have to be interested in the product space, but actually they have to really believe in you because there's going to be ups and downs. The market can change, everything can check. Technology can change. You don't know what you don't know yet. And so they have to believe that you are the right person to adapt and change and move and still bring them a return on their investment. And I think that is the absolute key to remember it's really about you. So you have to set out in that deck why you're the right person to solve this problem. What is the problem? What's the size of the opportunity? But most importantly, why are you the only person who can solve it?

[James Reed]

So what, what were the qualities you felt you needed to get across then?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, firstly for me, size of market was really important because there was a lot of immediate dismissiveness around mums, motherhood.

[James Reed]

Do moms really want this dismissiveness from who? Men?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes, mostly. Sorry. Yes. But also because we didn't have a lot of women who had check writing capability.

[James Reed]

You know, things have the authorization.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Correct, things have again.

[James Reed]

So you were presenting a lot to.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Men at this point, almost exclusively.

[James Reed]

Who then said they didn't see a need for this.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I need to talk to my daughter, niece, cousin, wife, assistant. But you know, I don't know if I need this. I remember one man saying, God, not another social network. My wife will never talk to me. I was like, all right, I can see why she doesn't. So you know, there was a lot of that that happened at the time.

[James Reed]

Did you say that? Because I'd have invested in you straight away.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was much more charming than that. But mentally I can tell you some of the things I thought were less than complimentary. I think that, you know, also some of the things that I experienced, I definitely, I'm a bit more grumpy in my old age and I wouldn't.

[James Reed]

People say that about me as well. I mean, maybe it happens, you know, on the journey you just become a.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Little less tolerant to things and I wouldn't have accepted some of the things that I accepted then. What does your husband think about you doing? This was another one. I was like, what's it got to do with him? I don't know, why don't you ask him? You know, there were a lot of these kind of things. Who's going to look after your child? You know, lots of comments like that along the way.

[James Reed]

And so most importantly, going back to the, the key point which you've made very well is in the end they're investing in you, the person and they're looking for what qualities or experiences you bring that make this a good investment, this particular pitch. Yeah, that's what you said. So, I mean, what are the top three things that you would say? I'm going to back Michelle because X, Y and Z.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, she knows her market. I knew, I knew that market and I, it wasn't an accident. I spoke to over 250 women, so. And by the way, I didn't know 250 mothers. If I did, I probably wouldn't have built the app in the first place, but.

[James Reed]

I'll ask you why in a minute, but go on.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, I would speak to a woman and ask her to introduce me to another woman. So I had all of these interviews. So of course it was qualitative data but it didn't matter. It meant that I had a pool of women.

[James Reed]

You've done your homework.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Who had spoken to me about the issues they had and what they wanted to see. So that was the first thing I knew my market. The second thing is I'd been working in apps and actually pre apps. I'd been working in connecting people. And thirdly, a belief that I could continue to go and raise but attract the best talent. I'd worked with some incredible people. I actually co founded Peanut with a technical co founder who was the technical co founder at Deliveroo. And so it was really about can I pull together networks? And really that's what you're taking a bet on when you're investing in anyone. Do I think that that person can hire the best people and can Continue to get support and investment.

[James Reed]

Yeah, yeah. So you, you tick the box for those, I mean, for some investors.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. Going exactly.

[James Reed]

Well, that's really useful advice for anyone thinking about pitching to a venture capitalist.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. And I think it's, it's really important as well. Firstly, venture is not the only way to fund a business. And I always say that to everyone. Venture puts you on a path that you don't necessarily need to go on.

[James Reed]

Not every, what is that path?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, not every business is suited to it. When you take venture, you are immediately on someone else's clock. So not every business will become and reach its fullest potential within a five year window. But that's the return, that's what they're looking for.

[James Reed]

Five years on their clock.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You might have a business that you're building over a decade, you might be building it over several decades and it will still be an incredible business. That's amazing. It just doesn't mean that venture is right for you. And I think there's a lot of seduction around venture capital and getting a term sheet now and it doesn't suit every business.

[James Reed]

So you've got to be prepared in a sense to do something else after five years or have another round of this. Is that what you mean?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think what I mean is it doesn't come for free. You're not, when you take money from someone else, you're giving away something that you own in the business and so you're selling it.

[James Reed]

I suppose.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes, you are, you're, you're, you know, but you're, you're diluting your ownership. And once you do that, you have to continue to, to raise if you're on a certain growth trajectory, which might not be right for every business. That's how I would frame it. And some of the most incredible businesses are bootstrapped and they never take money. And that means you own 100% of your business.

[James Reed]

So from your own revenue.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Correct? Yeah. And some you can do it through debt. So you're taking a small loan or you can leverage at a later point, but you don't have to take it day one. And hindsight's perfect. And quite honestly, I took venture very early and had. I have.

[James Reed]

So you saying that that was the right decision or you. No, I would have regret around that.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I definitely have regret around that.

[James Reed]

You do. So where are you now? I mean.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, now, now I'm very fortunate that we're profitable and I'm, you know, I've, I've pushed hard, but you are. The market is Very challenging. At certain points you're very. When you're in that trajectory, you're very vulnerable to market change. So if it falls out of favor, for example, for venture to invest in consumer. And actually all they want to invest in is FinTech or at the time Web3, or at the time crypto or at the, or at this presentation time, AI, you're all of a sudden, you know, in a less favorable position. You've still got to keep going. So there are lots of things that you can do. I would always say to.

[James Reed]

So look at other options first. You'd say people starting businesses and, and that's.

[Michelle Kennedy]

There are some businesses that venture is perfect for, but it's not every business.

[James Reed]

And it can be a bit faddish. It sounds like AI is.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I'll let you, I'll let you say that bit.

[James Reed]

Yeah, well, it sounds like it might be. Everyone's looking in a particular direction. That can be trends. Yeah, there are some big trends on there.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

So you went through, you went through that process successfully.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

And you've.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Several times.

[James Reed]

So you've done several rounds.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Several times.

[James Reed]

Several rounds. But you're still CEO.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

Which is, I mean it can be high risk bringing in venture.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

So absolutely gone well.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes. But, you know, not, not exclusively. Well, that's the other thing and I think it's really important.

[James Reed]

That's the nature of business. Every year is not a great year. And absolutely, absolutely every target is not necessarily hit.

[Michelle Kennedy]

That's it. And when you do hit it, you feel a bit like, what's next? What's next? And you know, the, the lows still feel low and the highs become less high. That's how I would describe it. Which is a weird feeling.

[James Reed]

But so that speaks to me of the relentless nature of business.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It is relentless.

[James Reed]

It never stops.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And therefore you better be building something that you absolutely love because you get better get up every morning and think it is unrelenting. But I absolutely believe in this and I love it so much. And I am so excited by this part or this result. And I think for me with Peanut, I'm so lucky in that I know every day we leave the world a little bit better than the day before. And you know, I've worked in various different industries and I haven't always felt that way, but I do.

[James Reed]

You said, Michelle, a few minutes ago that if, if you'd known 250 mothers.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

You wouldn't have started this. I want to understand that. What, what do you mean?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was, I wouldn't have been lonely. You wouldn't have been lonely.

[James Reed]

So you'd have had the connection.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think I would have had the community, yeah.

[James Reed]

So like in the sort of old days when everyone lived in a village.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

You know, hung out together, your kid.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Played on the street and your kid was the entire streets kid. You know, that, that was kind of. That was my mum's generation.

[James Reed]

Everyone knew each other.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You knew the families and you lived near one another. Your around the corner, your mum was, you know, five minutes away. And that was the environment we lived in. And we don't live like that anymore. You know, we don't live in the village anymore.

[James Reed]

It's much more isolating.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Much more isolating.

[James Reed]

So your, your peanut app addresses that. But I mean, can it replace those sort of contacts?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. I think you really feel it does it or it already does.

[James Reed]

Tell me how it works because, you know, I'm not on Peanut. I'm not in your target audience. I'm pleased, I'm pleased that you're. Please. So you want to make sure it's a safe environment for women.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly, exactly. So there's an onboarding process and we look at bringing women into the app. So you create a profile and then based on your location, based on certain things, you tell us how you engage with other people. You can find connections so you'll see other women who are nearby.

[James Reed]

And that's driven by an algorithm.

[Michelle Kennedy]

An algorithm? Yeah. And the, the more you use it, the more you engage, the better it becomes about showing you women who are going to be closer to who you'd like to be friends with.

[James Reed]

So it's helping people find friends, Find friends, join groups.

[Michelle Kennedy]

So you join groups.

[James Reed]

Either sort of groups, are they either.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Around the month that your child was born, month and year, or is due? So those kind of cohort groups.

[James Reed]

So your son's an Aries, so you can sympathize with all the others.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's more around like tracking at the same time. So if you've got a four month old stage.

[James Reed]

Yeah.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Should they be rolling? When should they smile? You know, those kind of things, but also about you. How are you feeling? You know, what, what's going on with you? So you have those groups, you have interest groups. We have one group which I love. It's called, it's a poll world and it's just women. They just send these silly polls all day. It's really hilarious.

[James Reed]

What you mean.

[Michelle Kennedy]

In terms of voting, Voting on different things. We have groups which are called Stitch and Bitch and you know, women sit and talk and do things. It's amazing. So we have every single group.

[James Reed]

Can they connect visually?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

So you can see each other.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. And then we have live audio, so you can join an audio room. And women, sometimes they're just shooting the breeze, talking all day. They watch movies together via audio.

[James Reed]

At home, you're watching a film and you're in the.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And you're on audio, like talking to each other. I love this part or whatever it might be. So it's just about that having connectivity of you. You know, if you live in a rural part of America and you don't see someone all day and you've got children at home, how do you have that connectivity?

[James Reed]

You know, you cater to a large audience in America.

[Michelle Kennedy]

70 of our users are in the US.

[James Reed]

I didn't know that. So where are the other 30?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Pretty much UK. And. And we'll give a small sliver to Latam because it's. We're starting to grow that.

[James Reed]

So. So if you, if you're listening and you're interested, how does, how do. How does our audience find you online?

[Michelle Kennedy]

What's.

[James Reed]

So what's the address, Michelle?

[Michelle Kennedy]

So you go to the App Store and search for Peanut app on Google Play or on the Apple App Store and that. That's it.

[James Reed]

Peanut app.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Peanut app. And you will find millions of women just like you at the same life stage. Whether you're trying to get pregnant, whether you're pregnant. You can track your pregnancy as well. We'll tell you whether you've got baby the size of a watermelon or whatever it might be.

[James Reed]

How'd you do that?

[Michelle Kennedy]

So we can tell you by the stage of your pregnancy.

[James Reed]

Two of my daughters are pregnant. I can't tell you how excited I am.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, there you go. They need to go on Peanut track and they can track it. And you can see the size of the baby's foot. So adorable. And join groups. So they'll join a group with other women who are due in the same month.

[James Reed]

Well, that sounds fantastic.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Thank you.

[James Reed]

So how many people are now on board?

[Michelle Kennedy]

We have about 5 million a month that use peanut.

[James Reed]

5 million a month using it?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Because isn't. I mean, when you started, I suppose a key success factor was to get this to critical mass. You know, if you go on and there's no one else there. So. So how do you do that? Because that's a challenge for lots of startups.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's so hard. I'm so glad you mentioned it, because getting Critical Map, people don't really think about this. Sometimes people come to me and they're like, I want to build an app. I'm like, how do you get people to do it? There are thousands of apps released to the App Store every month. Thousands. And we'll never hear of them. They'll never get anywhere. And it's not good enough to say, well, I'm just going to run some ads on meta that won't do it either. So I think that you have to have a seeding plan. Who are the people that you're going to seed this with? Are they going to evangelize about the product so that they kind of share and do the hard work for you? And from there, can you get enough momentum that you then start plugging in other marketing strategies? And for me, it was those 200 women.

[James Reed]

So the people you've spoken to before.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

You got them all on there.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Day one. I was like, launches tomorrow. Do you want to try the beta? And they already feel a connection with the business.

[James Reed]

And 200 was enough.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was enough to get going. And then I was very fortunate that we got.

[James Reed]

Use your research pool.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. They feel an emotional connection to it because they've already answered questions, they already are interested and nosy enough to go and test it, and from there it can grow.

[James Reed]

So you call that a seeding strategy?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, I like that expression. Yeah. So you just gently seed with different people and see.

[James Reed]

And were those women in the UK or in. So you had both.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Both places, majority in the U.S. right.

[James Reed]

And they got to know each other.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. So they don't forget. Also, the US is really difficult market because every state is almost like a little country or a different country. So you have to really understand east coast versus west coast versus. Yeah, you know, the north. So there's lots of differences. There's a lot of difference. And it's just about understanding that.

[James Reed]

So you got started, but now you've got 5 million. So do they refer people? Is that. Is there a. Yeah, so you can tell your friends.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

Come and join us.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Invite your friends. We have amazing ambassadors who we called MVPs most valuable peanuts. And they. They hold events and they invite people to join. They really evangelize about peanut. And in exchange and as a appreciation, they'll wear their peanut T shirts or tote bags and we give them, you know, the opportunity to have these peanut events. We do occasionally do them, but often it's the user base that arrange them.

[James Reed]

They do that independently.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. Because it's not scalable for peanut just to do events.

[James Reed]

No, but it's not. But I just wondered if sometimes people like to come together.

[Michelle Kennedy]

We do. We do. Yeah.

[James Reed]

So that's, that's the seeding strategy for those listening you want to get going is a good example. And using your research base to do that.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. And think about who your desired audience is. You know, if you are building a SaaS business, go into that business and say, look, I'm building this and can, can I give it to you? Can you trial it for me for free? And that's the best use case that you can get. You get to see it in the world. So there's always an example of how to get it out there and be able to observe it. And the starting point doesn't need to be building an app. That always makes me anxious when people say they want to.

[James Reed]

Where should the starting point.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You can build an environment to test something and it's so, so brilliant now. So it might be. If you wanted to build a community product, for example, you don't have to build a community app. You can build a WhatsApp group. It's free.

[James Reed]

Right.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You can test. Can you get people to join that group? Can you get enough engagement going? What are they talking about? You can create these environments in whatever scenario might best suit your business. Readily available technology and AI is incredible. Now you know, there are no code solutions where you can build something very, very inexpensively and test it before you go into AI to do it. Well, get a, get a. You can get a clickable prototype. Get it in people's hands, watch how they use it. It's very easy to do. There are tools like figma where you can do that. There are amazing things that we, we should all be doing now. And. But.

[James Reed]

So this is all about some bootstrapping.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

And go and finding huge amounts of money to build something thing.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

You can start.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You can start. Exactly.

[James Reed]

And find out a lot and learn a lot and take it from there.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. And in fact.

[James Reed]

That's right.

[Michelle Kennedy]

We should all be doing. It's so exciting.

[James Reed]

This wave of AI is potentially going to create a whole lot of new businesses.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I'm obsessed with it. I mean there are. I am.

[James Reed]

Why?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I just think there is so much that is unknown. It is doing so much for us. You know, at Peanut we had large language models for a very long time and we used our own that we.

[James Reed]

Built using AI for a long time.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes. Before it was fashionable in a buzzword, we had our own in order to. For safety. So we were using it to moderate the site to help Us predict the likelihood of you being a good or a bad actor on the platform to really keep the community safe. And that was amazing.

[James Reed]

But your police force.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, almost. But I can't do it as quickly as the new LLMs that are out there. I mean, they're just, they're just amazing.

[James Reed]

So I use them. Do you?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely, as much as I can. Because I think that there are just so many exciting advancements and do you.

[James Reed]

Use them for other purposes?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I always want to know who AI is recommending for the best mum app. It's Peanut, don't worry. But I always want to check.

[James Reed]

Yeah, of course. Checking that.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Of course. It, it is just an incredible tool.

[James Reed]

What would you do if it said someone else?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Oh, I'd be very upset. I would be very upset.

[James Reed]

Convince it.

[Michelle Kennedy]

That's it.

[James Reed]

Made some changes.

[Michelle Kennedy]

How dare you. No, clearly AI is very intelligent. That's all I could say.

[James Reed]

So it recommends Peanut. It's the best mama.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Does it?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yep.

[James Reed]

Okay, well, that's good to know.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It is. It's amazing. I only know this, by the way, because a user messaged me on Peanut saying, I found out about Peanut through chat GPT.

[James Reed]

Right.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And I thought, that's strange. So I tested well, I heard the.

[James Reed]

Other day that MATTER had taken the contents of two of my books and put them into their AI engine to help people find jobs. I wasn't sure how I felt about that because I did write the books to help people progress and find jobs.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

That it did feel a bit sort of abusive.

[Michelle Kennedy]

No comment on anything to do with copyright and that area.

[James Reed]

I think it's a difficult space.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Very difficult. Very difficult. Yeah.

[James Reed]

So that, I mean, that's still to be played out, but. No, very interesting. Now, you, you mentioned that some of your experiences when you were going out to raise money were less than ideal in terms of your pitches and the questions and the responses you received. You have actually been. You've done something about this, haven't you, Michelle?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes.

[James Reed]

What have you done? And, and tell us, you know, why it's good.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Despite massive, massive progress and there has been progress, we must accept that we do now have more women who are working at senior levels in B.C. who have check writing capability. Absolutely. And we do have more female founders. Absolutely. In fact, we talk about things. Female founders. We never spoke about that before. That wasn't even really a title that anyone had. So we do know that that has advanced. But women still receive less than 2% of venture raised. 2%. And we're 50% of the population It's a real problem. And when I was first raising for Peanut, people would talk about doing a friends and family round.

[James Reed]

I've heard that expression.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was like, what is that? And it's a round where you meant to explain you're meant to go and ask your friends and family to write you small checks to get your business off the ground. Well, I had zero friends and family who could casually write 25 to 50 checks to get my business off the ground.

[James Reed]

Yeah, I can imagine that's true of most people.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Right. That was just not something that I had in my network and. Or in my friends and family network anyway. And furthermore, the people that I could see who were doing these friends and family rounds were, you know, these young, generally men in the US who, who kind of had this extensive ability to do it. And that for me.

[James Reed]

So young, young American men who had good, good financial networks in, in the.

[Michelle Kennedy]

US were the people and, you know, came from families where that was normal or could be done. And that for me is the exact point at which it's a problem. The very start. Because if you have access to capital that early, you can start to play around, test things, get going before you take venture or whatever it might be. But if you don't, what do you do? How do you get your business going? So I was very fortunate that Bumble eventually IPO'd, and we had a very good return from that.

[James Reed]

And you were a shareholder?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was. And so I was very fortunate to participate. And one of the first things I said was brilliant. Now I can actually do something about redressing the balance.

[James Reed]

So you use the money that you made from your Bumble IPO to start your own business?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes, to start this part. It's called. It's a micro fund. So it's.

[James Reed]

Explain this.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's called Peanut. Start her.

[James Reed]

So this is another business.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's exactly. It's just adjacent to Peanut, to Peanut. And basically start her.

[James Reed]

Start her.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And we invest small checks, micro checks. Think of us as like your rich auntie that you didn't have your friends and family. We are your friends and family. That's it. We are your rich auntie who can write you a 20k check or a 25k check to keep you going and get started. And. And more than that, because most importantly, it's not just about that first check. It's about access to a network. I wish I knew when I was younger how important a network is. I never understood networking. No one ever explained it to me. I didn't know why it was important. And so I've got a group of women and we look at these businesses that come in and we decide which one we're going to invest in and then we open our networks. So that might be pr, marketing, vc and we make referrals to all these different people in our network to help.

[James Reed]

That's so interesting. So, so how much money is in the Auntie Peanuts?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, it's variable. It's variable.

[James Reed]

Have you built. Is it like a venture capitalist through funding round?

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's, it's.

[James Reed]

Have you done that?

[Michelle Kennedy]

No. No, it's not. No.

[James Reed]

So it's a bit sort of, of.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's much more reactive, I would say, to the opportunity. You think you're doing that Maybe one day.

[James Reed]

I think that might be an interesting thing to explore because maybe one day network and experience.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

Maybe one day of venture fund.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I would love to do that. You know, we need to see more exciting businesses being showcased by women because women make incredible businesses which are highly revenue generative but also solve problems.

[James Reed]

Because my first boss was a wonderful entrepreneur called Anita Roddick who started the Body, the Body Shop and I wrote her because I wanted to work for her and learn from her as a student and she was kind enough to give me a job with her husband Gordon and. Yeah, amazing entrepreneur and. Yeah, so. And it's obvious to me that that's the case and also that half the population being women are probably, probably not as well served.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It is, it is.

[James Reed]

They could be if more women ran businesses and started businesses and were supported in doing so.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's about kind of encouraging young women to think that they can and they should. But also we have to be realistic. There are many moments of time that women might want to take that leap to start that journey to be an entrepreneur. And at that moment in time they have children, mortgage, bills, responsibilities, and it feels impossible. And so I think there is a lot of work to be done around the fact that actually so many women who are in that kind of familial life stage actually have these incredible business opportunities and ideas and we should be able to support them.

[James Reed]

Those are real sort of challenges, aren't they?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

How did you navigate them yourself and how would you advise them? I mean, women at that life stage.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Want to start a business, to approach.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It, it was really hard. I. And I was really fortunate. So I would never pretend otherwise. I had saved a lot of money in order to have a war chest to start this business. I did not go in with nothing and think I'm just Going to do it from nothing. I had. I could bootstrap my first, you know, four months. So I had done that. The second thing is I had to de risk. So I had to stay on the board of the companies to get. Have some income. It was quite passive. And so it was great for non execs. Exactly. So I'd stayed on the board of Bumble and Badoo. So I had this small amount of money where I could have that income, and that was really important to me. And the third thing was, if it all went to the wall, I could go back in and, you know, carry on doing what I was doing before. But I remember reading at the time.

[James Reed]

What'S an important thing to remember? Because that's true of everyone in a way. You know, you take a risk with starting something, but there are always other options if it doesn't work.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You know, I spoke to someone yesterday and he said to me, sometimes the biggest risk is taking no risk at all.

[James Reed]

I think that is always the biggest risk.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah. And I was like this. It's true. Sometimes you get so paralyzed by the thought of what if it doesn't? But what if it does?

[James Reed]

You know, the what if it does doesn't get enough attention.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

In our culture.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Totally. And. And actually it is a very British thing. I think in America, the what if it does is much more celebrated and applauded. And I think we need a little bit more of that optimism here.

[James Reed]

Yeah. That sort of have a go hero approach. Let's have a go.

[Michelle Kennedy]

What's the worst?

[James Reed]

Yeah, what's the worst?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Go back to doing something similar to what?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. Exactly.

[James Reed]

And the world keeps turning. Michelle, you just explained that you were able to use some of the equity that you had in Badoo to start your next venture. Peanut, can you just roll back the clock a little bit and explain to me why you joined that business and what advantages, if any, there are of joining a small business like that would have been when you started.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah. I think it's really important to decide what you want to do, but you can't underestimate how important it is to join a smaller team. In a small team, you get to touch everything. You can absolutely insert yourself into conversations and meetings and decisions that you might not be able to in a huge organization. It doesn't suit everyone. But if you really do have that hunger to learn, if you are curious, if you want to build in the future. But for me, being in, you know, one of the earlier employees in Badoo and then being there for, you know, the inception of Bumble, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing now. And so there were definitely people at the time who were probably raised eyebrow that that's the route that I was going to take. I was working in biotech so it was very different organization and, and stability and, and structure. But for me it was just so exciting to get to be in, in the room even if I didn't get to do anything at the start and it was just listening. It just so happened that I listened and then asked and then did a bit more of that.

[James Reed]

So, so what you're saying, someone listening is if, if you think in the future you might like to have a go at being an entrepreneur or starting a business, a really good way of training and learning is joining a smaller business where you're right in the thick of it.

[Michelle Kennedy]

We've all been there where you've interviewed someone who's worked at a really big company and you ask them what they've been doing and their experience is so narrow and you know, that might be fine if they're on a certain trajectory. But narrow experience means that you might be, be very deep and narrow in your experience. But that's not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for someone who can get involved and learn quickly and adapt. And it does mean that in a smaller company you can do those things. I know if you've worked for a smaller business you will have done everything and that is really exciting.

[James Reed]

But there are certain risks involved with smaller businesses, of course. I mean, you know, their viability, you.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Don'T know what that's going to look like. But again, for me that's just part of the journey and it's exciting. And I must just say it again, it's not forever. If you join a business and it doesn't work out, go to the next one, you know, that's fine. There are plenty of huge businesses that we don't talk about anymore because they've disappeared. So I don't think that that's exclusive to a small business. It's just being adaptable and being willing to just get stuck into something else.

[James Reed]

Now see, I think seeing a career as a series of learning opportunities as well.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Definitely, definitely. It's really interesting. When I was younger I definitely only appreciated like, here are the professions. Chose one, I thought that would be my entire life. And it wasn't until I was doing it that I was like, I don't love this enough to do this all the time that I started thinking about what could Be next.

[James Reed]

Right. And I mean, that's true of so many people.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

There's always something next.

[Michelle Kennedy]

There's always something next. If there isn't, you can always go back.

[James Reed]

Yeah. I think the great thing is if you are in a small business and it's sort of maybe not flying as well as you would hope, I mean, you can actually have an idea or make a contribution to improve that as well. You can, you can be in the sort of.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And you will be heard because actually it's welcome. Your input is welcome and it's invited. And that, I think, is incredibly exciting.

[James Reed]

I think it's important to be in a. In an environment where ideas are appreciated, championed and followed through.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I wouldn't be able to work in a situation where I wasn't able to discuss with everyone in my team an idea and feel like everyone was contributing. That just wouldn't suit me ever.

[James Reed]

So you ask them actively for them.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Always. We, we talk all the time. You know, we're constantly.

[James Reed]

What's the question?

[Michelle Kennedy]

You ask, what should we do about this?

[James Reed]

What should we do?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, what should we do about it? It this didn't work. What should we do about it? And it's. It makes it a collective problem and everyone's got ideas and everyone has a different vantage point. You know, you might be a gamer. Your vantage point and solution will be totally different to mine.

[James Reed]

Right.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Amazing.

[James Reed]

So you're going to get a whole variety of input.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

And it's your responsibility as the CEO to make sure that happens.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I'm here to get it.

[James Reed]

Otherwise you're not doing a job really well.

[Michelle Kennedy]

What. What am I there to do if. If not to make sure that we've got the best. Best. My only role I see is to keep the lights on and to make sure I've got the best, best possible team who then have the freedom to.

[James Reed]

To build and run CEO's job. Keep the lights on. I have the best possible team.

[Michelle Kennedy]

That's it. Right. And you know, there are many, many times during this journey where I'm like, what if this, you know, all goes wrong tomorrow? And one of my very, very good girlfriends from law school said to me, well, then I'll still look at you and think, you're amazing. You're my hero. And you stepped out of doing what we were doing in something else.

[James Reed]

So you started out at law school?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I did. I was a lawyer.

[James Reed]

So you were a lawyer first?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I was.

[James Reed]

Do you know many lawyers who've become entrepreneurs?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I mean, it's not a natural progression.

[James Reed]

I Would say I'm not aware of many.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, there aren't many because we're trained in a totally different way.

[James Reed]

That's what I was wondering.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, we're trained to avoid risk.

[James Reed]

That's what I was thinking.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

It's quite a colleague in our legal team about a risk that he'd seen that had grown.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, it's quite a weird. I mean, when I was walking into your office, I was so excited because I was like, God, I used to love walking down here, you know, it always felt very well for people listening.

[James Reed]

We're in Chancery Lane, which is the sort of legal center just behind the Royal Courts of Justice.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was always. For me, it was such a, you know, a thrill and it is still thrilling. I still felt it when I was walking down here. It was amazing feeling.

[James Reed]

So you enjoyed being a lawyer?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Lawyer, I think I loved. I loved a lot of the ceremony and the kind of discipline around it. And I'm. I'm so happy that I did what I did in the trajectory I had, because it taught me things that I, you know, couldn't have hoped to learn elsewhere.

[James Reed]

But that's another really interesting thing, is that you can have one career and then something very different and enjoy and be successful.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Definitely.

[James Reed]

But you're an exemplar of this, having been a successful lawyer and then, you know, moving into the digital venture space.

[Michelle Kennedy]

My mum will still tell you I'm a lawyer. That's her proudest moment, so you better not tell her any different. Yeah.

[James Reed]

Hopefully she won't be upset by this podcast.

[Michelle Kennedy]

That's still her proudest moment. But it's. It's true, it's you. There's not one route. And that's the only reason, maybe.

[James Reed]

What is that about? Mum's being pleased when people become. Because it's a job that's pretty secure, I suppose. There's always going to be litigation, isn't there? Yeah, I think lawyers are always going to be needed.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think for my mum, actually, it was that kind of have a profession and that felt like a, you know.

[James Reed]

A profession, whether it's medicine or the.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Law or accounting or accounting or teaching. They were the options she gave me, actually. So I went with.

[James Reed]

There's a lot to be said for that. I went with those. There's ongoing demands for those things totally. But they are different from being an entrepreneur and stepping out into a. It's totally different known space, like you've done totally different.

[Michelle Kennedy]

But I. I learned a lot. I. You know, when I joined Badoo, I joined as their council. I joined as gc.

[James Reed]

Oh, did you? And so you went there as their in house lawyer.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. And I just am so nosy and asked so many questions and became responsible for setting up so much functionality outside of legal that I started working with the founder and became his right hand and, and that's how I kind of progressed through it. And I learned so much from him and I'm so grateful and fortunate to have been in that position.

[James Reed]

So that's interesting because the risk aspect might be different, but the curiosity bit is really connect because a good attorney is very curious.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Well, because also you have license to be. You're the lawyer. So everyone tells you, everyone tells you everything. They feel they have to. They're like, let me confess, it's like being a priest.

[James Reed]

Oh, is it?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, a little bit. I've never been a priest. I can only imagine.

[James Reed]

But no, I've never been a lawyer or a priest. So I'm fascinated. But I think it's sort of this curiosity is so critical, isn't it? To, to coming up with new ideas and using it to try and solve problems and innovation.

[Michelle Kennedy]

You know, there is what you asked me earlier about AI and I said I'm obsessed with it and I am. But there is one downside to it which is there is an element of lacking. You start to reduce your curiosity a little bit. I'll give you an example. You're searching for something and you know, our immediate reflex is to go for Google and you, you know, you do a search and when you're looking for the answer, you start reading around the, the area. So something triggers where you're like, oh, that's interesting, I must come back and read more about that. But that wasn't what I was looking for right now. And obviously the evolution of AI is, it's so advanced you don't have to do any reading around. It just gets right to the heart of the answer. And so you have. We have to be alert to that as curious people that we can't dull that curiosity. We have to find it in other ways.

[James Reed]

Yeah, yeah. I mean if you just sort of channeled down a particular route. Yeah, that doesn't work.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It is a risk for the curious. It is a risk.

[James Reed]

That's interesting. And Google are doing that more and more, aren't they, with their AI. Summarize.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

Overview.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah. And even if you don't Google and you go straight, straight to perplexity or chat GPT or whatever you use, you're spoon fed an answer, you know You. You can go and be curious and read around the links that they might serve you, but ultimately you don't.

[James Reed]

So, Michelle, I'd like to get a sort of overview from you about what's next for Peanut. So where are you headed with this? What. What do you want to do?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Domination, I hope.

[James Reed]

World domination, I hope so. How's that look? Where do you begin?

[Michelle Kennedy]

We launch in Germany later this year, which is really exciting. It's like it's our first new language, first European market outside of UK and Ireland, I should say. So we have a new language and that's very exciting. And obviously, again, AI makes you choose Germany. It's a big, exciting market. We get quite a lot of demand, actually for the product in Germany.

[James Reed]

So we've already got some customers.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. So that's quite interesting and exciting. And I think AI has really opened up our ability to get into new markets more quickly from a translation and localization perspective. So that's exciting. And we have a book which comes out in September, which is called It Takes a Village and it takes a village.

[James Reed]

I know that expression.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, yeah.

[James Reed]

Because when you complete it, it takes.

[Michelle Kennedy]

A village to raise a child is the expression. But it also takes a village to raise a mother. We spend a lot of time on Peanut looking at the stories of women, how they've made it work, how they find their village, and particularly in that first year of Baby. So will I ever sleep again? Will I ever feel like myself again? Is it normal, all of those feelings coupled with I feel lonely or I don't want to admit how I'm feeling or whatever it might be? So this is lots of different women's stories of how they've made it work, coupled with experts, so therapists, gynecologists, doulas, giving kind of their. Their thoughts on it too. So it's a really, really amazing, essential read for that kind of.

[James Reed]

I mean, in this digital age, why did you do a book?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Because what we're still looking for, and. And this is. It was a. A question that I asked when we were first approached about it. Why are we doing a book? Because Peanut already has all of those women sharing those stories every day.

[James Reed]

Yes, that's what. That's sort of what I'm wondering.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

A book feels like a bit of an old legacy idea.

[Michelle Kennedy]

What does the book do? So the book highlights these stories in a different way. So it's not real time as it's happening. These are women's stories as they reflect. Maybe because you're a single mom, maybe because culturally you live with your in laws and extended family, maybe because you're new to the UK or new to the US or wherever it might be. And so it's, it's really a curated highlight of those different examples so that every woman feels they can see her own situation there and find that kind of relevance. And you can do that on Peanut every day, of course. But to have that curated kind of list that you can take with you and examples that you can take with you with the overlay of experts, I think is the difference here.

[James Reed]

So you're the. Are you. You said we, but are you the author of them?

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's all the women's stories.

[James Reed]

It's all the women's stories. Absolutely. It's all the women from Peanut, say by Peanut.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It says Peanut. Peanut, yeah.

[James Reed]

Okay.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And the community of Peanut.

[James Reed]

So that's the. So, so how do we find this book? How do people pre order this book if they want to.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yes, please, please tell me, please go and pre order our book. You can go onto Amazon or onto Waterstones and you can look for it. Takes a Village by Peanut.

[James Reed]

Takes a Village by Peanut. So I hope Peanut is a best selling author.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Thank you. So do I. We need that.

[James Reed]

Well, I, I like doing books. I. And I think there's something about them. I was slightly mischievous in asking, why are you doing it? Because we do it too.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

But I think they hold information and you can put your best ideas in a book or your best stories, as you were saying, that will help and inspire and inform other people.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's something about curation. It's something about being able to dip in and out of it and hold that moment of, oh, I must go back and refer to that. That I think is really important. And if, like me when I was having my son, I must have read every book going. And there was nothing in there that told me how to be a mum, actually. It told me, you know, it's surprising.

[James Reed]

Yeah. We go to school, we get all this education and no one tells us how to be parents. Really?

[Michelle Kennedy]

You have no clue. I didn't know what I was doing.

[James Reed]

It's kind of an important job.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It's the most arguably. Arguably the most important in the world. Right, Right.

[James Reed]

Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's interesting because we, you know, I'm aware that sort of 80% of managers in the UK receive no formal training.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Wow.

[James Reed]

But you could probably say 100% of parents receive no formal training.

[Michelle Kennedy]

We get no formal training. And an odd thing, it's so strange and therefore, if you have something which will guide you, not to tell you how to do it, but to give you examples of what has worked for other people and to give you advice from experts who can say, you know, know, scientifically, this is hormonally how you're feeling and this is why. And this too shall pass. For example, that actually would have been really, really life changing for me. I really struggled when I had Finn and I would have really appreciated someone saying, it's actually very, very normal and here's what's going to happen next and then you're going to be through it.

[James Reed]

And you can find that on P. Exactly. Right. Well, I can see that that's hugely valuable.

[Michelle Kennedy]

It was. It really is. Quite, quite.

[James Reed]

I see why AI would recommend it. Because, I mean, that would be. I mean, I remember we have six children. I remember when the first one was born and was sort of screaming all night thinking, how long does this last? Because I've got to go to work tomorrow and I'm not getting any sleep.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I mean, I remember driving Finn around in the car. You don't know what you're doing. Is that like, you know, he didn't even like being in the car seat, but I felt like he would get some kind of motion. I mean, the whole thing was very, very, very strange.

[James Reed]

Times to go for walks up the Edgeway road late at night.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah, exactly.

[James Reed]

With a baby in the pram.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

So she'd go to sleep. But it. But. And I suppose it's very useful what you're offering because one's own parents, I recall, couldn't really remember, you know, I can't really remember all the stages of.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely.

[James Reed]

Having small children now.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. And that's assuming you've got your parents around. You know, for many people, your parents are in different countries or you don't have them anymore, or for whatever reason, they're not involved in your life. What do you do? You know, we've got some great friends.

[James Reed]

Whose kids are a little bit older than us, so I just watch and see what's happening there. That helps me prepare for what's next, what's coming. Yeah, yeah, it's good. So you can help people connect each other.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly.

[James Reed]

Well, that's fantastic. And. And what a wonderful idea that you've brought into development and wonderful service. And you say it improves the world a little bit to. Every day. I like that mantra. So I'm going to ask you, Michelle, before we wrap up, just two questions.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

And I ask everyone these questions.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Okay.

[James Reed]

The first is what gets you up on a Monday morning?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Ah, I love. I love what I do.

[James Reed]

I thought you were going to say I love Mondays.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I do love Mondays.

[James Reed]

Close. You love what you do.

[Michelle Kennedy]

But I do, I do. I really love what I do. I love. I. There is something that I framed a few years ago because I, you know, there are tough days and I thought, how lucky am I that I get to do this? This is my actual job. I get to do this. I get to go into work, work with people who are infinitely smarter than me, and we get to build something that has a positive impact on women's lives. Like how lucky am I that I get to do that? And I think framing is everything. So I love what I do and I do love Mondays.

[James Reed]

Actually, if I might ask what you say, I think framing is everything. That's an interesting thought. What do you mean?

[Michelle Kennedy]

I think that sometimes you by accident fall into the. I have to go to work, I have to do this. And actually it's really easy to change it and say, I, I get to do this. We were doing a campaign at the moment and we're working with a brand that I really love and admire and we were working on this piece of marketing content. I said to my team, how lucky are we that we get to do this? Like, for me, I think that is absolutely thrilling. But it goes back to. Because you're going to have those hard days, you better absolutely love what you do so that you do get up and love Mondays.

[James Reed]

Yeah, I like that. And then my final question, which is a question from my interview book. Book?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Yeah.

[James Reed]

Why you. 100 interview questions you'll never fear again is where do you see yourself in 5 years time?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Great question. I love peanut. And so I hope that we're still building and continuing this legacy. It's like the greatest honor of my life to build this business. So I, I hope that we're still continuing to, to build there and, you know, maybe I'll have a go at that fund you mentioned. Yeah, at some point.

[James Reed]

That would be fabulous. Well, I think it'd be a good contribution to the sort of UK business landscape.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I love that.

[James Reed]

Yeah.

[Michelle Kennedy]

I'm gonna say that you're. You're my first lp.

[James Reed]

Yeah, well, we'll, we'll join you if we' now. And, and also I think what you're doing, expanding into other geographies will be very interesting to follow. Do you have other countries after Germany in mind?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Oh, yes. Well, then we have to go across Europe, so we have to do the, the Spain and France and, and follow that route. But it, it's really exciting to me. We, we generally follow the noise of what's happening in the user base. And so when we launched in Mexico as our first out of U.S. uK market.

[James Reed]

Right.

[Michelle Kennedy]

And that was because women in Mexico were using the US App Store to access Peanut and we can see it.

[James Reed]

So is there now a Spanish version?

[Michelle Kennedy]

Exactly. Yes, there is. So.

[James Reed]

Because these are widely spoken languages.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Absolutely. So it's very exciting.

[James Reed]

Fantastic. Well, I wish you continued success and I hope you'll come back one day and show us.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Thank you.

[James Reed]

What you've done since.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Thank you.

[James Reed]

Very interesting. Thanks for coming.

[Michelle Kennedy]

Thank you for having me.

[James Reed]

Real pleasure, Michelle. Thank you. Thank you, Michelle, for joining me on All About Business. I'm your host, James Reid, chairman and CEO of Reed, a family run recruitment and philanthropy company. If you'd like to find out more about Reed, Michelle or Peanut, all links are in the show notes. See you next time.