Asher Ismail is the Co-founder of Uncapped, a European revenue-based finance provider that helps entrepreneurs raise working capital without losing control of their businesses. Uncapped offers fast, flexible funding for marketing, inventory, or hiring needs. They are now in now in 22 countries, including the US, UK, Germany, Poland, and Spain.
Asher has raised millions in capital from angels, VC, crowdfunding, and banks. In 2017, he was named Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year. He is a Board Member of Tech London Advocates (TLA) and the Founder of Intertech Diversity Forum.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- [2:36] Asher Ismail shares the successes and setbacks he experienced as an entrepreneur before founding Uncapped
- [7:54] What Asher has learned from building a business
- [9:03] Asher’s key business dynamics that drive his company’s growth
- [18:17] How companies can make use of Uncapped’s capital advances to increase their revenues
- [21:34] Common mistakes businesses make when raising capital
- [24:20] How ecommerce businesses can raise capital amidst growing interest rates
- [25:47] Asher reveals his future business goals for Uncapped
- [32:37] Asher’s advice for entrepreneurs facing challenges in the ecommerce industry
In this episode…
Investing in capital can be a great way for ecommerce businesses to generate returns. But, traditional financing options often contain hidden equity fees and interest rates, making it difficult for companies to increase their revenue.
Asher Ismail of Uncapped understands that options for ecommerce businesses are limited, so he’s developed a company that provides capital advances between £10K and £10M at an affordable rate, so you can focus on scaling your business. Uncapped works with entrepreneurs to help them determine their individual business needs and create innovative ways to utilize capital for growth opportunities. Whether it’s digital marketing or generating returns on your inventory, Uncapped’s financing provides you with the right capital to regain ownership over your business.
In this episode of the eCommerce Profits Podcast, Joshua Chin joins Asher Ismail to discuss raising capital to increase revenue. Asher shares how Uncapped’s capital advances help companies increase their revenue, some common mistakes entrepreneurs make when trying to raise capital, and his advice for entrepreneurs facing setbacks in the ecommerce industry.
Resources mentioned in this episode
- Joshua Chin on LinkedIn
- Chronos Agency
- eCommerce Growth Hackers Facebook Group
- Asher Ismail on LinkedIn
- Uncapped
- The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
- Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones
Sponsor for this episode
This episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency.
If you are a direct-to-consumer ecommerce brand that wants to unlock the optimum customer lifetime value through email marketing, then look no further than Chronos Agency!
Our team of passionate email marketing experts has helped hundreds of brands generate over $70 million in return from email alone, and our clients receive an average of 3500% ROI from our efforts.
Chronos Agency has worked with a variety of brands, including Truly Beauty, Alya Skin, and many more. Our mission is to help real businesses achieve real results.
If you want to take your revenue to the next level using email marketing, be sure to email our team at sales@chronos.agency or visit chronos.agency to learn more.
Episode Transcript
Intro 0:04
Welcome to the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top founders and experts in the ecommerce Industry and take an in depth look at the struggles and successes in growing ecommerce brands profitably.
Joshua Chin 0:21
Guys, Josh Chin here, I’m the host of the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top founders and experts in the ecommerce Industry. Here we go behind the scenes of the struggles and successes in growing a brand. Now this episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency if you run a direct to consumer ecommerce brand that is ready to scale and to double your customer lifetime value through lifecycle marketing. Chronos is your company. We’ve helped hundreds of brands scale profits with email, SMS, and mobile push, while getting an average of 30 500% ROI from our efforts. We’ve worked with brands like truly beauty, the odd ally skin, and many more. And the next step is to email us at sales@chronos.agency or you can go to chronos.agency to learn more. Today’s guest is Asher Ismail Asher is the co founder of Uncapped, which helps entrepreneurs raise capital without giving up control of your business. It’s fantastic. It offers revenue based financing growth capital, ranging from anywhere between 10,000 pounds to upwards of 5 million pounds for a flat fee, without credit checks, personal guarantees, warrants equity, or interests, and all the non, the not so nice stuff about raising money as a serve as a as a business. And as a founder, he’s been on the other side of the table, raising millions in capital from angels, VCs crowd through crowdfunding, and through banks, and private money. And in 2017, Asher was named the Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year, and along the way, he’s given away a little bit more equity than he would have wanted to. So today, we’re going to talk a little bit about what the process looks like as an alternative to raising, raising money by giving up equity, and some of the mistakes that we’ve that Asher has seen in his journey, and a little bit about his background as well. So actually, welcome to the show. I’m super excited for this conversation.
Asher Ismail 2:19
Hey, thanks so much for having me, Josh, really looking forward to the discussion.
Joshua Chin 2:22
Asher so prior to uncapped, you were CEO at Midrive, which was eventually acquired as a company, tell me a little bit about your journey. At that point.
Asher Ismail 2:36
Yeah. So it actually started, you know, way before that, my you know, my background is definitely in startups is the third business that I’ve started over the years. And I think, you know, the biggest challenge I always had was getting the funding that I needed. And I think, you know, working with, like, hundreds of ecommerce founders, I’ve really seen how they’ve struggled to so for me, you know, it’s been a dream, basically, now to get to work on Uncapped. Because, you know, every day, I get to help other entrepreneurs get the funding that they need. But yeah, you know, it’s really all born out of my own frustrations when, you know, as launching and running my first business, which was all the way back in 2003. You know, I was young, and I just wanted to raise 100k. And I probably had 100 meetings, and I got 100 nose. And, you know, I didn’t want to take financing from the banks, because they all wanted personal guarantees. And venture capital, it wasn’t ideal, either, because I didn’t have a track record, or connections, or that warm introduction. And so I just repeatedly missed out on growth opportunities. And then when I was raising money for my second business MyDrive, you know, I actually thought I had it all figured out. And I raised like millions of venture capital, but then I also got terribly diluted. And I start to realize, like, the options for me were really limited. And it was just depressing to think that I could work so hard, and on so little of my company. And, you know, what I noticed is, you know, that it wasn’t just me, right, like growing businesses, they’re just often left to choose between raising costly venture capital, or burning themselves with traditional debt. And so yeah, I just thought, you know, there must be a better way. And, you know, which is when we start to work on Uncapped. And really, the idea was to try to bring this more fair funding alternative, first to Europe, and North America, you know, now, you know, across the world. So we’ve now given over $150 million of funding to businesses, who’ve gone on to create tons of jobs and opportunities. And we’ve also helped, you know, the founders of those businesses, own more of their businesses, and you know, save.
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