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Hey Mark. Rob from Brandfire or Adina from Napkin Marketing can likely help you out.

Feel free to contact Alice MO. She is a freelancer, but she’ll get her agency and team ready in September.

Mark Evans sent you a PM. We can help your client for SEM/SEO services.

Hey Mark Evans I run a marketing studio alongside a writer and a developer. We can absolutely help out with SEM/SEO as our developer is an SEO specialist. From writing to the execution, we can cover all aspects of a SEO/SEM strategy. I'd love to learn more about your project. You can find our website here: www.fookcommunications.com or on Instagram at @fookcomm. Feel free to reach out to us on our website, Instagram, or message me directly.

Check us out at continuumsoft.ca/services/digital-marketing-agency-toronto/local-seo-services-company/

Ghaith Rajeh

We use these guys at HigherMe. Very good. Small group. singluaritie.com.au/

Highly recommend New Digital Marketing Agency, Alex is a wizard with SEO.

Talk to George at GS. Very good. www.growingsearch.com

Hey Mark, we do SEO for SaaS at rocketlabs.co/ Hit “Free analysis” button to schedule a call and see how we can help.

Chat with Tiffany DaSilva she’s as SEO expert who knows her stuff

We do everything and do it well. Will work with the budget you outlined and worked with hundreds of clients in all industries. www.xi-digital.com

jumpfactor.net

We kept our offices specifically for this reason as we want to make sure an office is a part of our policy. Having said that, we haven't published our proposed policy yet as we're waiting to see what others do. That might change as there is pressure to clarify the policy. The last thing is unless there is a commitment to in-person schooling without onerous rules -- like sniffles means 14 days at home -- it will be impossible to mandate people back to the office. Ontario has still not published it's school plan and that is a big risk. I think BC and Quebec are safe on that front though. There is also a lack of faith that gov't restrictions won't be rolled out again if/when the winter infectious disease surge arrives in Sept/Oct/Nov and the cases go up as expected. My gut says you won't have to worry about it until next spring/summer in Ontario because we will likely roll back into lockdowns in the fall. Just a guess though.

I'm following to hear people's experience, because I'm in a similar (but quite different) boat - we all continued to work in office, fully, for the whole pandemic. All employees are fully vaxxed. One, and only one, does not feel comfortable removing masks at the work place...so everyone is still wearing their mask out of respect. But I can tell that my employees are getting really, really tired of it, and very anxious to know when they can finally take their masks off at work given we're all double vaxxed and everything is opening back up.

Oh god definitely not ADP. Do you have a US entity set up yet?

I would not recommend ADP and am happy to help you with the appropriate contracts and payroll.

Independent contractor to start.

If you have US entity (I think you need an entity but not 100%) a PEO can be a big time saver. JustWorks has been great to us. Let me know if you want a contact there.

You need to register a us company but under 10 employees your best to try a peo like insperity or trinet. You won’t be able to get them benefits and even with a Peo benefits are expensive

You need to consult a tax specialist on this and there are legal implications- Maybe go to WTC or EDC for free advise

We use trinet, they are great. Also heard good things about justworks. We were also warned away from adp.

If you don't have a U.S. entity then you can't hire Americans legally unless you hire them on contract. Your best bet is to partner with a PEO. I saw someone suggest TriNet. Do not partner with them. There are many others that are more cost effective and will provide better service. I can Introduce you to a couple -- www.panther.co and www.letsdeel.com are excellent providers.

Use Communitech Outpost to hire and handle payroll for your US employees until you have grown to justify hiring someone to handle Nexus concerns, state and federal taxes and such.

You may want to try paying them as an independent contractor for a while to see how the startup goes (assuming they agree). That will avoid taxes, benefits until you pay them 60K, I believe (my info may be a bit out of date). Otherwise, you will add costs over and above what you are paying them. Paypal, transferwise, etc. can be used to pay them in that case.

I will definitely echo the “DEFINITELY NOT ADP” crowd! We use Wagepoint to handle our US entity’s payroll (and our Canadian payroll, too). They’re great, very automated, very cost effective, and very easy to use.

Try Gusto for payroll. We use it for US staff and started when we had just one US employee and it’s been great. Also, until you’re ready to incorporate in the US, best to pay them as a contractor after topping up for any benefits you’d have paid for otherwise. Lastly, I assume you have very good reasons for incorporating in the US and paying employees is not one of them!

What University is this, and are you looking to incubate tech startups or some other area of focus ? The answers will likely depend on knowing your goal a little better.

Adam Singer is the only choice

David Drummond has been my go-to for about a decade. www.linkedin.com/in/david-drummond-79862b4b

Anyone ever used honeybee benefits? How does it compare with League? I am also looking for a basic plan for my early stage startup if anyone has any suggestion.

How many employees

We use Humi, an HR and benefit startup to broker our benefit. Super nice www.humi.ca/

Maureen Campbell at Flashlight Benefits has incredible knowledge.

Trust Chris Gory entirely

HUMI is great.

Do you need an advisor or a link? I have an advisor who is excellent. lmk

Jeff Bernstein

Orchard Benefits. DM me if you’d like an intro.

You can take a look at www.friendbuy.com - we have used them in the past. It was reasonably priced and easy to implement.

Matty McComb cool question...

It’d be traditional tracking platforms plus a bit of back end work. You’d use a custom link or utm to track referral on sign up, assign that in your user table as a referrer_id which is the person who referred user id. When that user takes a later stage action you’d credit the referrer. Idk of any platforms that solve that a different way.

I'll tag onto that. If you have an answer, please let me know :)

The way to do this is to pass a referral code in the URL used to refer people. Ensure you are using a solution to ingest that referral code and associate it with that visit regardless of whether they convert on that visit. Then once they convert ensuring that the referral code is passed to their profile/account/CRM record. Then when that person makes a sale you can reference the referral code from their user/profile/account/CRM record.

I have Growsurf implemented. They just rolled out a HubSpot integration (but I haven’t used it yet.)

And combine codes in URLs with cookie storage if possible. That makes sure there is minimal loss in attribution.

Adam Gellert

Take a look at Commit.dev. They've got a really interesting model if your a startup.

Where in Canada? Different cities have different places that are the best place to find devs

What’s your compensation like? The Canadian market has become a lot more competitive

How senior? We've had pretty decent luck with career fairs at U of T - our newest hire was a co-op two summers ago that we brought back full time, and he's fantastic.

Ali El-Shayeb

Bootcamp grads! If you DM me I can get you in touch with a bunch of developers :)

It’s really competitive in Toronto. If you rely on Linked in and Upwork, you’re only getting those actively searching. You may want to add a recruiter to the mix.

What skill sets are you looking for?

You may want to give www.candidly.me/ a look. They're a Toronto-based startup and I can introduce if you're interested. However, the best way to find what you're looking for is to "directly source" (a.k.a. build your talent pipelines) + build a magnetic employer brand.

Hey Peter, you mentioned Upwork and LinkedIn. Are you looking for a full time hire or a freelance contractor??

Upworks

Honestly, you'll be hard pressed to get anyone who wants to go into the office. Especially for devs where it's not really needed.

Make sure you have an amazing careers page and a good to great developer blog. GitHub. Takes time and dedication but you can find good profiles with their email, look at their contributions and then email them and start a relationship. Twitter. do a search on keyword + geo. Like for example "rust Toronto" or "reacts". You can find quickly devs in your area. Then go into DMs. Like GitHub above This is not straightforward like post a job on indeed. But the quality of contacts will be high.

It's never a supply problem, it's always a recruiting problem. You can find engineers anywhere with the right pitch, idea, compensation, and team. My go-to play in desperate times is to find company/product that matches your talent bar and domain skills needed, and who you can compete on in comp/culture/or recruiting pitch, and aggressively target their engineers through Linkedin. Lot more nuance to using Linkedin right, and I probably benefit from not being a recruiter. Also, unclear what level of talent you need. My experience advising has shown me every startup wants the best "on-paper" talent, but their product doesn't require it. Message local bootcamps, college engineering departments. If you truly want the best talent, know the majority are passive candidates and already working somewhere (i.e they aren't on job boards).

Josh Schachnow

Peter Faist if you'd consider engineers from outside Canada, let me know - happy to discuss how we're making the immigration part easy!

HiredHippo has an a la carte with low % (lower than typical recruiters) for engineers I would highly recommend spending a few minutes chatting with Adam Gellert Peter Faist

Fractional CTO if you don’t want full time staff yet.

You can talk to me, but I only do contracts, no ft.

Not saying it’s a futile effort but I’ve heard many many people say the same thing - hiring devs in CA seems to be a huge problem. You may have a better chance with full remote whether in Canada or overseas. Also look at Braintrust if that helps take care of the immediate work on hand.

Hey Robert Lendvai I run a design studio, Fook Communications, alongside two partners in Toronto. We can absolutly assist you with consulting and strategy when it comes to the design of the new website. We can even take it from start to finish, from design to coding, if you find yourself in need. We've done UX and website work for a variety of applications including finance, tech startups, and health & wellness. You can find our work at www.fookcommunications.com or @fookcomm on Instagram. I'd love to learn more about the project. Feel free to get in touch over any of those platforms or message me on Facebook.

Nightshift.net

We would be happy to help. comfable.com/consulting

Ghaith Rajeh

Hi Robert, Grintex’s software team supports companies from large organizations to new innovative startup ideas: grintex.com

They are generally as effective as not using one

Alex, I’ve DM you.

My clients at Bevy have an incredible platform that has everything you’re looking for and more. It’s the only virtual, hybrid, and in-person event platform to focus on community engagement. It was created by the team behind Startup Grind. Bevy

Talk to Sue Morton @ forj [email protected]

We have been using Airmeet and it's been great.

Have you checked Bizzabo? Never tried them but they are an OC portfolio company that is doing really well..

Hey, my startup is helping organizer with hosting a virtuel event! We can help with choosing a platform (we are not exclusive on any plateforms), planing the event, making the production and even the tech support (both in French and English). DM me! I already have a couple of ideas for you 😉

PheedLoop

Remo - remo.co

Hoppin

Nothing beats www.airmeet.com. I use it for my events and I looked at more than 15 platforms when I was making a decision. I can introduce you to the North American Lead. Really solid people and the product is getting better each week.

Bevy.com Bevy let me know if you want to chat!

Debbie McGrath has a great virtual events solution.

We use Pheeloop! pheedloop.com/products/virtual-events?gclid=Cj0KCQjwxdSHBhCdARIsAG6zhlUBvIvybBn7EH5BcCdalcR4euNPc...

EventMobi Bob Vaez

DMZ Alumni PHEEDLOOP

We’re using Socio right now. It’s good.

Check out Venue.live All TechTO events are hosted on it! Quite a few strong differentiators from other virtual events platforms

N'Focus Productions - Internationally Awarded Wedding Photography

Andro Hanna AFC Creation

My old company does dope stuff: gobastudio.com/

Definitely check out My IT Guy!

Shayne Carter is a very valuable resource and i highly recommend him!

Just sent you a PM

Definitely techfuel.ca - Robert is very sharp.

www.mbccs.com/

Aviad Krief

Darren Fung Check out comments

I've been using Figjam where I used to use Miro.

InVision?

My team loves miro

I heard all the cool kids use Figma and Zeplin now.

I'm not sure about the maximum coverage for cyber liability insurance, but have you checked Zensurance? www.zensurance.com/

apollocover.com/ might help, apparently they're tailored to startups.

I am with Zensurance and they give good coverage

Happy to introduce you to my guy!! He is awesome! PM me!

Hey Scott. Reach out to me at [email protected] I’ll have someone on our team work with you to see how we can help.

We had the same problem. Danish and his team got us sorted out

Thanks for the recommendation for Zensurance! I just requested a quote

Thank you all!

We provide commercial insurance and have a preferred provider for Cyber coverage! www.humi.ca/business-insurance

Gideon Bentata is great!

Try 99 Designs! $399 I think and you get multiple people creating a logo that you can choose from.

You can try Digital Growth Max .. they are reasonably priced.

I’m not a fan of the low-cost platforms. There really is a strategic underpinning to a good logo, and you can get that only by working with a creative talent who can coax your strategy out of you and translate it into the visual. DM me and I’d be happy to pass on a few names at various price points.

Dapo Espada Showemimo

if you're looking for something really budget conscious, Looka is a cool Canadian startup with some automation that might help: looka.com/logo-maker/

Paterson Creative Solutions

Logojoy/Looka?

Virve Aljas-Switzer

99 Designs, as previously mentioned. That's the best route for a startup, if you didn't have friends that can help for free.

FWIW, if it’s just you and an idea, I don’t really think a logo is going to make or break things right now. You could literally type it out in word if you need it for a deck or Wix site. I’d be spending all my time talking to customers and getting feedback on the idea. We spent months doing stuff like this (logos, projections, decks, websites) and I look back at all of it and see now it was a waste of time. Literally nothing else matters other than talking to customers and trying to validate your idea. Logos can always be updated. Don’t mean to be harsh - just hoping to spare you the wasted time and energy we went through. Good luck!

Awesomic is a great curated design agency. A couple hundred for a logo, subscription based (get x amount of things done a month)

Checkout our firm Kleurvision Inc. Greg Masiewich - we’re huge supporters of the startup community and work with those in the idea phase right up to enterprise. Recently we just developed and launched the new Startup Canada website, work with Angel Investors Ontario, the National Angel Capita Organization, and are a brand partner with York Angels. Happy to chat.

I'm a designer, happy to work with anyone's budget and love client feedback. Happy to help if you haven't found what you're looking for already tlvdesignco.com

You can try upwork, and basically create a scope of work for people to bid on..... got a logo designed and some marketing materials made for under $500

Looka

Fivver or upwork. Check their profiles and pay the premium. I've had 3 logos done and the only one that worked was the one I paid a Fivver freelancer $125 (vs the $5 or even $25 ones) after searching many profiles for the right fit. Got it back in 48 hrs, 3 revisions. Had to make minor adjustments after. Or try Chantal Garneau (local)

Sent you a DM

99Designs or CrowdSpring. Keep it broad, then hire from Upwork to tweak if the original designer is too slow/expensive. Done this a LOT.

What's your new idea?