Building a B2C app & community with 20M registered users | Tobias Dickmeis (Tandem)
#14: Tobias Dickmeis, CPO and co-founder at Tandem, sits down with Axel to talk about the journey of building Tandem, a language exchange app with over 20 million registered users.
In this episode, we talk about Founder-Product fit, the challenges of acquisition and network effects in the context of a B2C app. We also touch on the tenets of community building and experimentation opportunities with a large user base.
Where to find Tobias
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dickmeis/
Where to find Axel
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/axelsooriah/
About Panash
We provide training and coaching programs to help product professionals unlock their true potential and become high performers.
You can learn more about our programs here: https://www.panash.io/
Our blog contains articles and free resources on key topics for product managers and leaders.
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Referenced in this episode
- Tandem language learning: https://www.tandem.net/
- Silicon Valley Product Group: https://www.svpg.com/
- Reforge blog: https://www.reforge.com/blog
- Polyglot conference: https://polyglotconference.com/
- Stratechery by Ben Thompson: https://stratechery.com/
- Brighteye VC: https://www.brighteyevc.com/content
Show notes and highlights
(01:27) Tobias' background
(02:28) Tandem's origin story
(05:26) Building a 20M strong community
(06:47) Nailing paid marketing is not easy
(07:30) Founder-Product Fit
(09:22) The flipping moment for Tandem
(12:07) Network effects and growth
(13:17) How does Tandem make money
(14:04) Language learning insights from Tandem
(16:59) Tandem's biggest product challenge
(19:15) How Tandem is planning to address this challenge
(21:17) How to build for a diverse group of users globally
(23:09) Leveraging user base for experimentation
(26:38) How is Tandem organised internally
(27:30) Tobias' Treasure Chest
Mentioned in this episode:
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