Meet the Entrepreneur Behind Qualified Digital

Jaqi Saleem is the founder and CEO of digital expertise company Qualified Digital, and founding father of Jaqi Purpose Co., a mission-driven funding fund. Right here she breaks down her finest recommendation for sustainable progress, fundraising, and making a tradition of collaboration.

Please give us the elevator pitch of your corporation.
My firm, Certified Digital, is an award-winning digital expertise company that competes with high consultancies 100-1,000 occasions our dimension to serve Fortune 500 shoppers like Mayo Clinic, CVS, Hitachi Vantara, CommonSpirit Well being, Kaiser Permanente, Novo Nordisk, Bristol-Myers Squibb and TransUnion. Our 360° method, in partnership with trade leaders like Adobe, blends B2B and B2C experience to craft seamless buyer journeys. Our tagline is “The Expertise of Connection”.

Or, if you would like an easier delicate pitch, we are able to use my Mother’s description: “I feel they put the buttons on the web.” You aren’t fallacious, Mother, we do this too.

What impressed you to create this enterprise?
The reality is, I began this digital buyer expertise company utterly by chance. After over 15 years at businesses — and getting the sensation I had hit a glass ceiling — I made a decision to offer unbiased consulting a attempt. A few months in, a buyer provided me a possibility to construct and fund my very own guerrilla dream crew to select up some business-critical tasks after an surprising and fast cut up with their earlier digital company. I did not hesitate — I referred to as the entire smartest individuals I knew and requested them to hitch me. I used to be gratified and humbled after they did. Quick ahead 7.5 years, Certified Digital is personal fairness backed by Stella Level Capital, and has 100+ teammates composed of the neatest individuals I now know.

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What recommendation would you give entrepreneurs searching for funding?
Be sure to are searching for a accomplice who provides worth and is aligned to your imaginative and prescient, not only a verify. Do not be pompous, however be curious in ways in which present you might want to know in regards to the potential investor, as properly. Do not ask them questions you would discover on their web site; welcome them into the dialog; go away room for his or her voice, because the dynamic adjustments and creates extra alternative to attach. They’re investing in you as a pacesetter, as a lot as in your corporation, so be human, not a well-dressed robotic. When you need to be ready to talk your complete time, hope and invite a dialogue and anticipate what they could ask so you do not freeze or skip a beat. Follow, apply, apply, not only for presenting your investor deck within the order it’s laid out, however for any path that the dialog might go. I usually maintain an appendix of things that probably would not make it into a quick pitch, however could also be a confidence builder in the event that they ask a pointed query and you’ll present you’re on high of it.

Lastly, and that is extraordinarily vital: guarantee they do not see you as a mission. Buyers do not need to do your job; they should consider which you could execute on an unbelievable thought, not simply that you’ve got one. Particularly if you do not have a monitor report to level to, develop a transparent plan or embrace a accomplice who can lead on the enterprise entrance. Clear plans are vital, both means, so that they really feel they’ll press the simple button by simply funding and advising.

Feminine-owned companies solely get 2 per cent of VC funding — what particular recommendation are you able to give to ladies enterprise house owners looking for to emulate what you achieved in getting PE funding?
Figuring out that stat may be intimidating, however do not let it get in your head. It would cease you from asking in any respect, and we have to change that quantity, not perpetuate it.

I didn’t run into any resistance in my course of, and ran a aggressive one, which I extremely suggest. This allowed me to command the worth I knew Certified Digital was value, gender id apart.

If you’re on the proper stage, actually think about bringing on a banker to characterize you. They arrive with charges, however the fitting ones, with the fitting community, are value their weight in gold.

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What sort of progress have you ever seen?
Within the early years, ranging from scratch, Certified Digital grew 100% YoY+. As our income numbers elevated, that proportion has naturally modified. Final yr, we delivered 45%+ progress. This yr, by means of the mixture of natural progress and our latest acquisition of Xpediant Digital, we’re on monitor to ship one other 40% progress yr for 2025 and are projecting $31.5M in income.

What ideas are you able to give to different founders on sustaining firm tradition when your crew is both partially or totally distant?
I am happy with the work-life stability that we’re in a position to give our crew by being a totally distant firm. We now have over 100 staff and FTE equivalents on our crew, primarily based all throughout the US and around the globe, and that crew is ready to choose up and drop off their children in school, handle their psychological and bodily well being, and do the issues they love like journey, or no matter passions or hobbies they’ve. QD’s firm tradition encourages a mindset that’s each entrepreneurial and collaborative, and I really feel that is among the issues that basically units us aside.

My recommendation is: create an power that multiplies, and it’ll. Tradition cascades from the highest, so your crew has to need you to win, they need to need one another to win, they usually need to need to win themselves. And most of all: rent nice people and attention-grabbing individuals. Your crew is the magic, and it’s your job as a pacesetter to guard that tradition from those that draw down on it.

What recommendation are you able to give about making the choice to amass one other firm, corresponding to your latest acquisition of Xpediant Digital?
See a transparent 1+1 = 3. Don’t purchase income, purchase a price multiplier, whether or not that may be a new functionality, new industries, or merchandise that speed up what you do. Is it a price add to your present shoppers, or is all of it about new shoppers you may add worth to? Both means, simply guarantee you’ve got a transparent imaginative and prescient that helps your crew and their crew get excited to execute on that imaginative and prescient. Be certain the corporate is a tradition match; that your crew and their crew shall be proud to face shoulder to shoulder and excited to collaborate.

Bear in mind, when you find yourself hungry, all the things can appear like a steak (or a portobello mushroom burger if that is extra your fashion).

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You additionally make investments by means of your funding fund, Jaqi Goal Co. What ideas are you able to give entrepreneurs looking for to pitch to traders such as you?
Present me the issue, present me that fixing that downside provides a social or mission-oriented consequence, after which present me the answer you’ve got for that downside and the way you’re doing so. Present me there’s a market or want for it, that nobody else is doing it (properly), and that in case you had the cash, you’d be capable to ship what and by when. Be prepared to point out me that you’re prepared. I need to put money into issues that matter, which suggests I would like that funding to achieve success. It can’t simply be an thought, it must be a plan. A plan which you could execute on with steering and cash, not one that will be a mission I’d tackle.

What does the phrase “entrepreneur” imply to you?
If I’m trustworthy, the phrase entrepreneur continues to be a phrase that I’ve to recollect to match myself to. I really like this query, as a result of it challenges previous considering I had across the phrase.

Taking a step again, acknowledging that I’m an entrepreneur, I’d say this: It’s somebody who’s relentlessly passionate in regards to the enterprise, product or downside they’re fixing; somebody who will not be afraid of failing, however largely as a result of they assume they will not in the long term; know that managed failure is an important a part of the method in any type of significant success; somebody who teeters the road of confidence and delusion, simply sufficient to take the massive dangerous swings essential to drive significant influence, however with the humility and pragmatism that retains them grounded and taking the fitting swings; somebody who builds with the tip in thoughts, making house for the correct amount of uncertainty and evolution, however with some sense of what success seems like in the long run.

Is there a selected quote or saying that you just use as private motivation?
“I’ve no specific abilities — I’m simply passionately curious” – Einstein. I really like this quote, and in reality, “passionately curious” is certainly one of our 5 core values at Certified Digital. It was simply so relatable to me. It eroded a few of that “them however not me” impostor mindset. If Einstein says he has no particular abilities, and his superpower is curiosity, properly then, that may be a recipe I might put to motion.