On this episode of Invested, Michael hosts Ben Lang, an early employee at Notion and serial builder.
Ben is an angel investor, former founder and operator at high-growth startups. He served in IDF Intelligence and went on to co-found Mapme. Later, he joined Spoke, which was acquired by Okta. In 2019, he joined Notion, where he saw the team grow from 15 to 600+. He helped scale the team, build out their Ambassador program, influencer function, Consultants program, user conference, education program, template gallery, and more. Today, he actively makes angel investments (50+ investments so far) and advises a few startups. He is building the next play community to help people discover what’s next with curated opportunities, gatherings, and content.
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Michael Eisenberg:
Why should somebody come to Ben Lang for money today?
Ben Lang:
I think I’m a builder at heart. I have a lot of empathy for people starting companies, and I think a lot of the things that I’m working on on my own are things that could be pretty helpful, whether it’s finding co-founders, recruiting talent, getting early users, thinking about how to build your community - those are things I spend a lot of time on personally, and I just hope to be a good service provider on my end as an investor.
Michael Eisenberg:
Super excited to welcome to Invested my old friend, Ben Lang. It's hard to call him an old friend because Ben is still super young, but we know each other a long time, which we'll get into soon. Ben, why don't you tell everybody who you are?
Ben Lang:
Sure. I'm Ben. I'm living in Tel Aviv with my wife. I grew up in the US. in the Bay Area, and New York.
I went to Ramaz for high school. I moved here afterwards and was in the military. Been working in tech for a while now. And I’m a proud Zionist, proud Jew.
Michael Eisenberg:
How'd you get yourself into tech?
Ben Lang:
I started when I was in high school selling stuff on eBay. I think my grandfather gave me some of his camera equipment to sell, and I got really into it. I started putting ads on Craigslist and flyers like on the street saying, “Hey, I'll sell your stuff for you.” This was when selling stuff was really difficult still. It wasn't so simple like to, you didn't, you couldn't just put something on Facebook Marketplace.
So I started just helping people with that, and taking a cut, and trying to scale that.
Michael Eisenberg:
And did you do the box shipping too? Did you box it up and take it to the post office?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, oh yeah, for sure. I was doing that in my bedroom. I was selling collectibles and electronics, and taking care of all the shipping.
So I was doing this after school every day in my little bedroom.
Michael Eisenberg:
And did you make money at it?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, it was like, it's probably better than what I could have been, the alternative of–
Michael Eisenberg:
Mowing lawns.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I did dog walking before that at a certain point. I think this was, like, a little more profitable. It was also more interesting because I, I had to learn how to market myself and get customers.
Michael Eisenberg:
From dog walker to eBay seller. It's quite the career path. All right, but bring everybody up to date on what you're doing now.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, sure. So I spent the past five years working at Notion. Notion is a productivity tool. Companies and individuals use it for project management, notes, tasks.
I joined when it was about 15 people. Pretty small company in the Bay Area. I was working remote most of the time from New York, and then Israel as well. And I had a really incredible time there working on community, marketing.
Michael Eisenberg:
What was your role? I mean, be specific. We'll talk more about that. Just what your role is.
Ben Lang:
We called it Head of Community, but I think it meant a lot of things, because I got to work on all kinds of things over the years. But really a lot of what we, what I thought about in the team that I built there was how we could support our user base to help expand and grow Notion, help people teach Notion, and just help us grow faster.
Michael Eisenberg:
And why'd you leave?
Ben Lang:
Why'd I leave? Mostly because I wanted to spend more time in Israel and it didn't–you know, as the company grew, it was about 600 people, and we didn't really have a presence in Israel and it just made it more and more challenging to manage a team. I had to make a decision at a certain point to prioritize living here.
Michael Eisenberg:
And what are you doing now?
Ben Lang:
Now I’m mostly doing angel investing. I've been doing that for a few years now. I started off helping out a founder with his angel investing. An incredible guy I think we both know named Clark. And I did that for a few years. And then I started investing a bit on my own.
I did that for a few years, and I raised a little micro fund about a year ago. So now I'm mostly investing out of that.
Michael Eisenberg:
Good. Now that we've gotten almost all of your biography, almost–can we tell everyone how we met?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, definitely.
Michael Eisenberg:
So how did we meet, Ben?
Ben Lang:
I think we met–I'm trying to remember what the sequence of events with this Facebook post was.
I think you had posted a challenge about creating a map of Israeli startups. And then I saw that. I think I built it. I think I was in the army at that point. And I thought it was a great idea.
Michael Eisenberg:
I think you were before the army still. Is that possible?
Ben Lang:
Oh, maybe. I don't remember exactly.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah.
Ben Lang:
And yeah, I published it, and I think it got some good traction, and then we met up, and I remember you gave me a case of wine.
Michael Eisenberg:
Right, and I remember you were underaged, right? The prize I offered for whoever could build the map, this visual map of Israeli startups, was a case of wine. And I brought the winemaker, the vintner to come, and give it–Yoram Cohen from Tanya Winery.
And he came, and made this presentation. And without being too cheesy, I'm not sure you were shaving yet.
Ben Lang:
It's very possible. I think my dad appreciated the wine more than me. He's French and he knows good wine. I probably had not had a cup of wine in my life at that point.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, but I think that's how we met. It was like one of these random things. And then I discovered at the time that it wasn't just this mapping project–you had some project around hummus.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
So why don't you tell everyone about hummus?
Ben Lang:
Yeah I think at that point I was really into building side projects. That was kind of my hobby.
I, at a certain point I was in the army, which was obviously most of my time. I was in intelligence, but I think like, when I had time off, I was just hacking away at these different side projects. And so I organized a Hackathon. I think it was, I think it was the first one in Israel actually. We called it Innovation Israel.
And the idea was for people to work on projects that could show Israel in a different light. This is really when hackathons were like just getting started. I think it was like 2011. There had not been a lot of hackathons at that point. And so I, a bunch of people worked on incredible projects, and I wanted to work on my own personal project.
So I had just recently come across this thing called Nutella Day, this holiday, and I thought ‘Oh, this is so cool. We should have our own version of this.’ So obviously, hummus is the equivalent of that, so I bought hummusday.com and built a little, simple website. I made up a day, May 13th, and then it just, a month later, it just went viral, like on its own.
I didn't, I honestly just forgot about it, but it just went viral.
Michael Eisenberg:
What do you mean it went viral? Like, how does that happen?
Ben Lang:
It, someone in, I think–someone sent it out in like a vegan newsletter, and then from there it just started to go viral on Twitter, and these different celebrities started sharing it, and then every year since it's just become this real thing. If you search, Hummus Day on Google, it looks like a real thing, but it's just a totally arbitrary day with no, nothing behind it.
Michael Eisenberg:
Was there any significance to May 13th?
Ben Lang:
No, nothing.
Michael Eisenberg:
And what is the ritual practice on Hummus Day?
Ben Lang:
People–on the website it says “eat hummus for breakfast, or lunch, or dinner,” or I think all of the above, and share photos, and lots of people do.
The cool thing, I think, over the years has been seeing, like, all these different hummus events happening–festivals–I think multiple years now in Dubai, there's been these massive, like, hummus festivals in Dubai.
Michael Eisenberg:
On May 13th?
Ben Lang:
On May 13th, yeah. And there's all these articles like in GQ and Cosmopolitan on like, how to eat hummus.
And even I think a year or two ago, there was like a tour of the best hummus places in Gaza. And just so much, like it has so much reach now, which is, which has been really cool to see.
Michael Eisenberg:
Was there any significance to May 13th? Is it your birthday?
Ben Lang:
No.
Michael Eisenberg:
Okay. So what's the significance to May 13th?
Ben Lang:
It was just, I think, a month after the Hackathon that I'd organized. I just looked for a random day in my calendar.
Michael Eisenberg:
Is there a Hallmark card?
Ben Lang:
I don't think so.
Michael Eisenberg:
Hummus Day?
Ben Lang:
No, but it's on all those websites National Day, National Calendar Day. There's a ton of these websites that keep track of every single possible holiday. It's on all of them.
Michael Eisenberg:
And, like, when you think back about, okay, this was like a Hackathon project. Kind of a joke. And now it's everywhere. How do you think about that? Do you say, what a weird world we're living in? Do you say, “Wow, I made a dent in the world of hummus.” Do you say, “Wow this is incredible.”
What do you tell yourself? Do you say, “Mom, I'm in GQ?” What do you say?
Ben Lang:
No I honestly, I just, for me, it's just a good reminder, like, that you can make an impact, like, pretty easily. I think it's not, I think a lot of people think it's a lot harder to make an impact and requires years and years of effort, and this was like a two hour project, right?
And I think it, for me, it's just always a good reminder. That's why I always tell people–you, if you do something creative, come up with your own niche, whatever it might be, like you can really, you can really do something impactful.
Michael Eisenberg:
Did you trademark Hummus Day?
Ben Lang:
No, I didn't, but I had a really interesting story with that. I actually got into a pretty big fight with Sabra over it, because they sponsored it for a few years.
Michael Eisenberg:
What do you mean, they sponsored it?
Ben Lang:
They would sponsor it to like, to be like the official sponsor of Hummus Day.
Michael Eisenberg:
On the website.
Ben Lang:
On the website. And they would do these events and in Union Square, all these like crazy hummus festival, like, crazy hummus events.
And after a few years, they asked me if they could buy it. And I kind of felt like they lowballed me. So I said no. And then the year after they came out with National Hummus Day, on the same day. And I had called it International Hummus Day. So then they started releasing all these PR releases saying like, it's National Hummus Day now.
And I'd been calling it International Hummus Day. So we got into a little spat over that. And I think they stopped doing it recently, but it was not, it wasn't a great feeling of them trying to like hijack hummus day from me.
Michael Eisenberg:
And they backed down?
Ben Lang:
Yeah. They backed down recently.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. And what happens when you, like, violate the trademark of Hummus Day? People like, throw tomatoes at you or hummus at you?
Ben Lang:
There isn't quite a trademark. I don't think I can really trademark a food holiday. I also have never really spent enough time looking into it, so if you have any suggestions….
Michael Eisenberg:
And what's next for Hummus Day, International Hummus Day, is it like, what is it..?
Ben Lang:
I spend maybe two hours a year on it, so there's not like too much going into it.
Michael Eisenberg:
It feels like there's an opportunity here though, like you'd imagine the International Hummus Festival on the boardwalk in Tel Aviv or….
Ben Lang:
Yeah, there's, I mean–
Michael Eisenberg:
Or the shuk in Jerusalem?
Ben Lang:
Usually most restaurants like, they'll host events and they'll like, they'll give out promo codes, which is cool. I think it would be really–something I always thought about that would be really cool is like, bringing people together from different backgrounds to eat hummus on Hummus Day and kind of create dialogue for people who you know, who normally probably wouldn't be talking.
Michael Eisenberg:
I think–it's two months from today? I think there's an opportunity here, at this time in the Middle East, and you can get a lot of people together to, you know, what they call ‘wipe hummus’ together, you know with the pita or something like that, or the onion slice.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
If Nathan’s can do the hot dog eating contest, you can do the hummus eating contest. You can just imagine what that looks like.
Ben Lang:
I think it's doable.
Michael Eisenberg:
So you're on it. If you got it in a month in a hackathon, two months from now there should be something else.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, you're right
Michael Eisenberg:
This is the year–this is the year for the big hummus eat off.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Lebanese–from Gaza–we can bring everyone in.
Ben Lang:
I mean, I would love that. I would love that.
Michael Eisenberg:
So what are you doing about it?
Ben Lang:
Okay. Okay. Yeah, you're right. I'm inspired.
Michael Eisenberg:
All right. So from, you know, making like, a hard turn from hummus to Notion–what I really want to dig into, I guess–hummus is one way to build community. But I want you to tell me about the job of being Head of Community at Notion.
I think this is important for a couple reasons. One is buying traffic, or buying ads, or what they call demand generation marketing online, seems to be running its course for a variety of reasons on Google and Facebook. And it feels like there's a lot of interest in community building as a go-to-market strategy.
Take me from the beginning of your time at Notion, on being Head of Community.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, so I, I mean I think that one of the interesting parts of joining Notion was like, I actually joined Notion without really applying, or there being a job description. So I had actually come across Notion on Product Hunt pretty early on, and I tried it out a few times. I thought it was really cool. I think it took four, maybe, four or five times for it to click, and I Tweeted my Notion set up. And a lot of people thought it was pretty neat, and asked me if they could, if I could share more pages for my Notion and so, and people started sharing theirs as well.
Another one of these little side projects, I built a website where people could share how they were using Notion. And this was before Notion had, like, a template gallery for their templates. And I posted that. It was called notionpages.com on Product Hunt. It got a good amount of traction. It started to get 20, 30,000 visits a month.
And I was having so much fun, I started buying more Notion domains. I bought all things Notion.com, NotionForBusiness.com, I started a Facebook group for Notion users, I started helping people onboard to Notion. It was just something I became really passionate about, because I thought I could improve people's lives by helping them get onto Notion.
And that's actually how I met the team. I at some point emailed the founder. I was like, “Hey, what are your plans with the API?” And we just started chatting, and I told him I would–“Do you want to hang out? Like I'll be in San Francisco next week.” I wasn't going to actually be in San Francisco and they're like, “Sure, come by for tea.” And so I booked a trip. And I went there, and I met Camille Ricketts who had just left First Round. She had started First Round Review, their blog, and so I met her on her second day at work, and so we were, we were chatting and I think maybe the next day I started working with her on Notion's template gallery.
And that basically evolved into me joining the company. So there was no like, real interview process or job application process. It really just happened very organically, because I really loved Notion, and it seemed like there were great ways to work together. And so the first two things I worked on were, one, Notion's template gallery, where we started to crowdsource templates that people were building through Notion.
And the second thing was building out an ambassador program, because we–our hypothesis was if there were people like me out there who were crazy enough to spend this much time evangelizing Notion, there must be other people out there who wanted to do similar things. And so I found a few people, someone in Japan, someone in Korea, who were doing similar things, and we started to build out this program to enable and empower people to spread Notion.
Michael Eisenberg:
Give me some more details on the ambassador programs, I think it's super important. And it's just an incredible story, right? Which is, you were doing this and there's someone in Korea doing this, someone in Japan doing this, and you happen to find them. And now they turn into ambassadors. So really dig in on the ambassador program.
Ben Lang:
Yeah our, basically what we thought was, if we could find a few of these people and bring them together and have them inspire each other and also give them the full backing from Notion's team, that we could try to, we could probably make this something that we could keep replicating, and continue to bring on more people like this, and just empower more and more people to become evangelists for Notion.
So it started off with a few people, and I really just spent a lot of my early time at Notion just talking to these people, becoming friends with them, figuring out what could we do to support them.
Michael Eisenberg:
And what were you trying to get them to do?
Ben Lang:
So these people on their own were–some of them had been organizing Notion events, some of them had been writing books about Notion, some of them had started YouTube channels about Notion–a whole bunch of different things, anything basically to do with either talking about Notion, like spreading Notion, or teaching Notion. Those were like the two, kind of, themes that we saw.
And so as these people progressed, we started to see more and more people getting excited about Notion and wanting to do something similar, like in their own language, or in their own country. And so we actually like maybe a month into it, we just put out a form on Notion’s Twitter and asked people like, “Hey, would you want to be an ambassador for Notion?”
And at that point, Notion was starting to get pretty, pretty hot, and I think a couple hundred people applied. So I just went through this forum and just looked for people who seemed to be the most passionate about Notion, some of them from new regions, maybe, where we didn't have ambassadors yet, and we built a program to help enable them and empower them and help them feel special.
Michael Eisenberg:
What were some of the details of the program that made them feel special or empowered?
Ben Lang:
So no one really had access to, like, Notion's team at that point. It was, if you wanted, if you had to, if you wanted, if you had any questions, you would have to reach out through support and so people–so what we did was, we would do like AMAs with our team, with our, with the founders, for example, and people were really excited about that.
Michael Eisenberg:
Which I'm sure was great product feedback also for the founders.
Ben Lang:
Yeah totally. But this was totally new to Notion, like doing something like this.
We would give them early access to new features we were building. We would send them swag, which was something we had never done before. So we were making swag for the first time and people felt really excited to, to be a part of it.
So we were constantly just thinking about ways that we could–
Michael Eisenberg:
You didn't pay them though.
Ben Lang:
No, we never, we didn't pay anyone to do that. Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, I think that's an important thing that people lose sight of is, that there's people really passionate about products, and everyone’s always like, “Oh, I got to pay them.” “All right. I got to find an influencer and pay them.”
But if you build a good enough product, and you can include people in the community such that they give you feedback, and they feel emboldened, empowered, and part of something that's bigger than the self–they'll actually do a lot of work just out of the passion.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, totally. I'm curious. Have you seen any companies do really well with this?
Michael Eisenberg:
I think RiseUp in our portfolio is doing a really good job of this. They have, I don't know how many ambassadors at this point. But just people who love the product, love being able to finish the month out on the plus side of their bank account rather the minus side of their bank account, and they've become passionate evangelists.
They do media for us. They reach out. I think there's, for some of them, some incentives. Just being a part of something, and being an ambassador for financial health and financial wellness has become a big one.
We have one at our company now, Sequence. It seems to be brewing. Also Wix had something similar with designers when I was on the board there, apropos templates and, and a few other things.
So yeah, I've seen it work before, but I think there's a small number of companies who do this extremely well. Notion obviously is one of them. And so, you created templates at Notion, and then you made it a template gallery as an employee of Notion. Why was that so important?
Ben Lang:
I think it was so important because Notion as a product, it was like a, it gave you a blank slate.
So people would arrive at Notion and ask themselves like, what do I do with this? Notion started providing templates early on, but at a certain point, we realized people using Notion could create an infinite amount of templates that we would never be able to create ourselves. So once we made that connection, we were able to essentially give people prospective Notion users an opportunity to try any type of use case that was interesting to them.
I mean now there's probably tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of templates out there. At this point also, because it's been a few years now, when you search for, for all kinds of use cases, you'll hit like a Notion template, which is pretty powerful for SEO.
Michael Eisenberg:
And do people get paid for the templates?
Ben Lang:
So early on, no. At a certain point, people actually started charging for templates themselves. And so they would put the template access on a Gumroad page, let's say, and people would have to pay 10 bucks to get access to that link. And then they'd be able to duplicate that.
That became actually, it's like entirely organically, it became a massive thing. There's people now earning hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. I actually just a few weeks ago, I met someone in Singapore who is 22. He started when he was 19, started with no audience, and he started just Tweeting about Notion early on when he was actually in the military in Singapore.
Now he has 300,000 followers on Twitter, 400,000 on TikTok, and 400,000 on Instagram, and he's making probably like $30,000, $40,000 a month just from selling Notion templates. He built an entire audience around it. So this whole ecosystem around it–
Michael Eisenberg:
On the Notion template website though?
Ben Lang:
No, from–
Michael Eisenberg:
Or on Gumroad or something?
Ben Lang:
He distributes it like through himself, like through his platform, through Notion's platform, all kinds of places. But he's built an entire, he's basically rode that wave to build like an incredible business. And he's 22 now.
Michael Eisenberg:
Amazing. Reminds you like of being an eBay seller?
Ben Lang:
Huh?
Michael Eisenberg:
Reminds you of being an eBay seller?
Ben Lang:
I wish I had been selling Notion templates.I think that's much more exciting.
Michael Eisenberg:
Higher margin business than selling collectibles.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
That's incredible. What do you think makes the community stick at Notion? Like, why are people so passionate? Why are they so part of this community? Because it's vibrant.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I think at the end of the day, like the product is, what makes it possible.
I think part of it is that Notion, you can use Notion for anything. There's just an infinite amount of use cases. So there's always something to talk about. There's always different use cases to talk about, templates to talk about. It's also, it can be a challenging product to use. So people always have questions.
People always want to help other people. So it creates this opportunity to just have a lot of dialogue around Notion. I think for products that are just much more constrained and less use cases, there's just not–you don't really have an opportunity to do that.
So I think Notion was lucky in that the product really enabled that.
Michael Eisenberg:
That kind of flies in the face of, I think, typical product thinking, which makes it as easy to use as possible. Make it as this is–Notion is not easy to use. I'm not a good user of Notion, I'll speak for myself. It's too complicated for me.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, and, but yet, because of that kind of blank canvas thing, people have turned up. But what also strikes me is that Excel doesn't have a template community for the most part. There are kind of, things out there, but there's no like business, or business community in the same kind of easy, mix and match way that there is for Notion.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I think something we would always talk about is like the IKEA effect. You know, when you go to IKEA and you buy the pieces, you have to bring it home and build it yourself. So it's like–
Michael Eisenberg:
I'm not that competent at that either.
Ben Lang:
So some people don't like that. Some people like that. And I think people who do like that, like they actually probably, they like that product on the other hand much more than if they had just bought it pre-made. Because now they like, they actually invested time, they invested effort in learning how to build it. And, maybe Lego is another good example. Lego might be a little easier–
Michael Eisenberg:
For me thank you, yeah.
Ben Lang:
And taking the time to actually build something, it can be rewarding. So if you could like, I think Notion took that and brought that concept into software.
Michael Eisenberg:
And why is it different? Why are Notion and Excel so different in that way? There's no community around Excel really.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, there are like, Excel influencers. I've seen people on TikTok and other places making, who have pretty large audiences doing that. I think–
Michael Eisenberg:
We used to call those people like investment banker trainers.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. Yeah, I think Excel, I guess Excel just doesn't have, I don't know, it's, it also just doesn't have the, the brand, the story, the, it doesn't really have anything that like–right, like who is going to want to create that around like a Microsoft product?
I think it's just kind of missing the–
Michael Eisenberg:
So what's the story? What's the story? Why is Notion different than Microsoft, other than the fact that Microsoft's been around for 50 years? What makes Notion, what is, what's the story?
Ben Lang:
I think beyond the product–Notion's brand, like the playfulness, the aesthetics–I think all of those things come together to create something that people really, it just really resonates. Like when I meet people, either they, they don't get Notion, or they love Notion, right? There's no in between.
Michael Eisenberg:
It's good to have haters, too, because–
Ben Lang:
Yeah, it means you built something that people, people actually care about, or they don't.
I think the people have this emotional connection to Notion. That's what I felt when I started using it also early on. I just felt this emotional connection. I felt like I could visualize my brain. The aesthetics just really worked for me. And I think people are just–excited to like, spend, connect around that, whereas in Excel, you're just, you don't really feel that. It's just boring.
Michael Eisenberg:
What does it mean that you can visualize your brain?
Ben Lang:
So for me my use case in Notion early on was just kind of putting all my notes and thoughts into this Notion database. That's how I used it early on, so I felt like I was able to finally visualize my brain inside of Notion. So I think for–people use it for whatever they want.
It was just, that was the specific use case that got me really excited about it.
Michael Eisenberg:
What would you have used if you didn't have Notion?
Ben Lang:
I had been using Wunderlist before that. They were acquired by Microsoft and shut down. And I think I tried Evernote a few times and it never worked for me.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, for me neither. I tried Evernote also, bought the subscription. Never worked for me.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, so Notion was like the first time, like, a productivity app really really worked well for me.
Michael Eisenberg:
I used Google Docs and Microsoft, and Mac Notes. That's it. That's my–
Ben Lang:
Simple.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. I think it's whatever works for you. I know a lot of people that, that, that's what works for them.
Michael Eisenberg:
Should I try Notion again? Should I go back to that? My partner, everyone here uses it. Like, at Aleph, everyone uses it. I'm the Luddite.
Ben Lang:
I don't think you can force yourself to use something if it doesn't work for you.
Michael Eisenberg:
I appreciate that.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I definitely think if Apple Notes works for you, then just stick with that. It's totally fine.
Michael Eisenberg:
At my age we need to remember things, so I'm trying to figure out what I should, what–
Ben Lang:
How do you use, how do you keep your Apple Notes organized? Do you have any way to do that?
Michael Eisenberg:
No, I'm very disorganized. Have you ever seen my desk? I organize it in my head. I don't use digital tools to organize.
Ben Lang:
That's impressive.
Michael Eisenberg:
You know, until I forget things. But, my brain doesn't work in an organized fashion, I don't think.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
So Notion is not for me because I'm too disorganized.
Ben Lang:
It might be hard. It could, if you, if it, like, clicked for you, it might potentially change your life and you might look back and be like, how did I live this way before, but if it doesn't, you might not be able to force it. So there's definitely a learning curve though.
So if you haven't spent a few hours really trying to learn it, which I know is a lot of time, you might, you just might not get it. It, there's a learning curve.
Michael Eisenberg:
Huh. All right. Not going to happen. I don't know. I don't know. So–a founder comes to you today and says, “I got this cool product. I want to build a community around it.” You say? You ask?
Ben Lang:
What do I ask? I usually like to understand like what people's, what the people using it think about it. What is it doing for people? What is it? Meaning like, I don't like the idea of just creating community for the sake of creating community. I think it's very hard to force it. I think if you do it in an inauthentic way, it's just not–
Michael Eisenberg:
So it needs to bubble up. You need to see signs of it first around the product.
Ben Lang:
Exactly. I think that's the most important thing. So I would rather lean into understanding, you know, from people already using the product - what excites them? Are there any signs? Are there any signals showing that people like, want to actually talk about this? They want to spend their time. They want to teach people. They want to connect around it. Are there like, shared interests and values between the people using the product? That to me is what I would look for. I think it's also, like, totally on a company by company basis. Like there's no–
Michael Eisenberg:
So before you have a product in the wild, you probably can't start thinking about a community strategy. Because you need to see if it bubbles up organically.
Ben Lang:
I think if it's based on a product, I think that's probably what you need to do. Again I think there are ways to just create community around things that aren't necessarily product based. Like I worked with a company a few years back that was pre-product that was selling to IT leaders, and we were just trying to get to as many IT leaders as possible to get their feedback on this upcoming product. And I had the same challenge. There was no product yet. So what are we gonna connect around?
And I just, what I did was I spent a bunch of time talking to different IT leaders asking them like, “Hey, what excites you? Like, where do you spend your time? Where do you connect with other IT leaders?” And something I hit on then was that ITleaders really liked talking about products they were using. They liked the, like, similar to Product Hunt, they liked discovering new things, new tools, they were into that.
So what I did was I hired a contractor and we built a Product Hunt but just for IT people. And we called it IT Kit. And I curated like this initial list of products from these IT leaders I had spoken to, and I added them on the website, and we added like a little upvote function. And through that, because it went viral in a bunch of like IT communities, we were able to capture, like, a couple thousand email addresses from IT people.
And this is, again, this is like pre-product. But at the end of the day, it was the same idea. It was just like talking to these IT leaders and understanding like what, what are these like shared interests, shared values, things that connect them, and building something for them, and providing a service to them.
Michael Eisenberg:
And just to be clear when you say talk to them, you mean actually talk to them, not text message or email.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. No, like just hanging out on Zoom, grabbing coffee Like that's what I mean.
Michael Eisenberg:
Is hanging out on Zoom the same as grabbing coffee?
Ben Lang:
It's just, it's easier. It's not, it's definitely not, but if you don't, if you don't have a choice–
Michael Eisenberg:
Other than Notion, who are the other great, kind of, community companies that you've seen out there?
Ben Lang:
I think figma is definitely one of the top ones. I've always been super impressed with them. I think they've done an incredible job. Other than them, who else? I need to think about other ones.
Michael Eisenberg:
Interesting. Nothing comes to mind quickly. That's interesting.
Ben Lang:
I'm trying to think of like, really like top, top tier ones. I always look at Figma as like, an incredible example for that. I haven't seen as much in Israel, that's like, kind of at that level. There were definitely, I think, companies doing interesting stuff in the crypto space at a certain point. I think, because I'd always felt very, community-oriented.
Michael Eisenberg:
I find it interesting you mentioned Product Hunt a bunch of times in this conversation. What is it about Product Hunt that works? You like Product Hunt, right?
Ben Lang:
I, yeah, I just, for me, it's just a, that's a community that I feel really connected to, because it's a community for early adopters, and people building stuff, and that's just what–that's partially what I like to do. So it's just this place I end up going to and spend a lot of time.
Michael Eisenberg:
Alright, so you made this kind of transition from being an underage drinker, to a soldier, to a community guy at Notion, and now you're an angel investor full time. Why?
Ben Lang:
Why? I guess I realized over the past few years, like I really enjoyed the early days of building startups.That's–to me was like, it's just the most exciting part. And I felt like a lot of things I had been doing could add value to early stage companies. So I also, at the same time, outside of angel investing, I had been working on some of my own stuff. For a while now, I've been organizing these gatherings for people who are exploring what's next.
This originally started as On Deck, which was this thing that Erik Torenberg in the US was organizing.
Michael Eisenberg:
Founder of Product Hunt, right?
Ben Lang:
I think, I don't know if he was the founder. I think he was like an early employee at the time. So he had been organizing these dinners in San Francisco, and I started doing them in Tel Aviv with a friend, Rafael Uzan, on Achad Ha’am, not too far from here, and it was the same concept, which was bringing people together who were exploring what they wanted to do next. People who were maybe like founders who had sold their companies and weren't sure what they wanted to do, or operators who wanted to start things and weren't sure, or wanted to join their next thing.
So I'd actually been building this out for a while now, and I renamed it to Next Play. So now it's at nextplay.so. And so, what’s been really cool about that is just people–we have this really incredible database that's been growing of people who are like, at this phase of exploring what they want to do next.
And so I think it's just been a really incredible community that has a lot of potential and hopefully can support the companies I'm investing in as well.
Michael Eisenberg:
How hard was it to write your first angel check?
Ben Lang:
How hard was it? I–the way I did it, I guess the way I broke into it was that I was helping out a founder with his angel investing.
And so I guess, I didn't really have to, I didn't have to take the risk early on. I think, when people ask me about breaking into angel investing, I usually tell them I think that's a great route. Like trying to become an apprentice for someone and just, avoid the risk of losing too much money early on. So I did that for a few years, and so he was making the decisions on his end, and I was just just observing and learning what he was doing. At a certain point, I started to invest in some of those companies as well. So I think if I had just gone straight into it without doing that, it would have been a lot harder because I really just wouldn't have had any idea what I was doing.
So I found that to be pretty helpful in terms of breaking in.
Michael Eisenberg:
What was your first investment?
Ben Lang:
First investment was–
Michael Eisenberg:
Do you remember your first girlfriend? No, I'm just kidding. What was your first investment?
Ben Lang:
Ben Lang:
Umm…
Michael Eisenberg:
Do you remember your wife's name?
Ben Lang:
It might've been, I'm trying to remember exactly. I remember like some of the–I'm not sure if it was like the first one or after a few, but it was one in Israel called Landa. They were doing fractional real estate investing.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, I remember them.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, so I think that was maybe one of the first ones that I did.
Michael Eisenberg:
Where'd that go?
Ben Lang:
Where'd that go? They're, they've bought, I think, a few hundred buildings now. And they've built this app where you, where they're now taking care of like the rent and the whole rent process. And then you as a, you as like an investor can can buy shares in houses–
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah.
Ben Lang:
–which is, it's pretty cool. They're pretty cool. I think it's been an interesting environment for them as, like, interest rates have changed.
Michael Eisenberg:
You think?
Ben Lang:
But I think also, what I really liked about them early on was seeing people in their Facebook group were just getting super excited about what they were doing. And there was just a lot of that kind of early, these early signs of excitement or, you know, around having a community.
Michael Eisenberg:
If that would come to you again today, now that you've done this for a few years, would you make the investment?
Ben Lang:
I also really, I was a huge fan of Ishai, the founder.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, I also liked him.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, so I think just based on that I would have done it for sure. Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. How many investments have you made to date?
Ben Lang:
I've probably made around 50 or 60.
Michael Eisenberg:
50?
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
What's the best company in the portfolio?
Ben Lang:
Probably Deel.
Michael Eisenberg:
Were you an angel there way at the beginning?
Ben Lang:
Not at the beginning, but I think two rounds in.
Michael Eisenberg:
Why should somebody come to Ben Lang for money today? How big is your angel fund?
Ben Lang:
Six million.
Michael Eisenberg:
Six million?
Ben Lang:
Pretty small.
Michael Eisenberg: Yeah. First one I was involved in was seven. Yeah.
Ben Lang:
Great.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. Why should someone come to Ben for money today?
Ben Lang:
I think I'm just like a builder at heart and so I, I really kind of, I have a lot of empathy for people who are starting companies. And I think a lot of the things that I'm working on on my own can, are things that can be pretty helpful–whether it's finding co-founders, recruiting talent, getting early users, thinking about how to build your community. Those are just things that I spend a lot of time on personally. And, I just hope to be like a good service provider on my end as an investor.
Michael Eisenberg:
You said you're a builder. I always say that I'm unimpeded by any management experience. I've never really built anything other than a fund. I couldn't start a tech startup if I was the last guy to do it. Is it hard to go from being the builder to being the coach, or advisor, or an investor?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I think so. I'm still trying to understand what that exactly looks like. For me at least, to see what type, how I feel about that kind of work, I know they're very different. That's partially why I find myself trying to build things on the side that can provide value to the companies I'm investing in and make me a better investor hopefully.
I think I will always have that itch of creating and building. And so I'm trying to merge those two worlds together. I'm not sure exactly what that looks like yet.
Michael Eisenberg:
And what are you building on the side now?
Ben Lang:
I think I mentioned before this thing called Next Play.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah.
Ben Lang:
I'm actually taking a lot of what I did at Notion and applying it here. So we have these, I brought these hosts in other cities now who are hosting Next Play gatherings as well. So we're setting them up now in Berlin, and London, and Paris, and in Austin and Boston. And so it's becoming this larger thing where it's, I think–hopefully it can become the place that people go when they're exploring what they want to do, what they want to do next, whether it's joining something, starting something.
So I'm, that's something I'm really excited about, and I think there's just a lot of value to be unlocked from it. And also something people just don't, people don't know really where to go for that today.
Michael Eisenberg:
It's like founder dating on steroids.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, but not just for founders. Even for people who want to become operators.
They want to discover, like, what the next best thing to do is. But it's really hard. So it's a very, it's a very challenging place to be when you're not sure what you want to do, when you're, when you want to leave, when you want to figure out what's next. It's just, it's hard.
Michael Eisenberg:
And you're not at all these dinners. How do you collect the feedback, the information, etc.?
Ben Lang:
Now I'm trying to build out this host network of people who are, they're all, we're all using the same database and and just getting more people to take this model and apply it there.
Michael Eisenberg:
I love that.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
I love that. What is your advantage as a venture capitalist? Distill me the Ben Lang advantage. I don't think, have we done a deal together yet? We haven't, right?
Ben Lang:
I'm not sure.
Michael Eisenberg:
I’m not either.
Ben Lang:
I might have done some when I was originally investing with Clark. There might have been some that he did with you.
Michael Eisenberg:
I can’t remember. I should buy you another case of wine if you bring me an investment.
Ben Lang:
I would love to.
Michael Eisenberg:
Now you can drink it.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. You can share a nice dinner with a bottle of wine with your wife now.
Ben Lang:
That sounds great.
Michael Eisenberg:
Okay. Distill for me the Ben Lang advantage. I'll say it differently. You and I are competing on a deal. Why are you going to beat me?
Ben Lang:
So I don't think I'm going to compete with people on deals.
Michael Eisenberg:
No, you're going to compete on deals, and you're going to compete with me.
Ben Lang:
Okay. Well I'm, part of my strategy is I'm doing very small checks, so I'm not trying to, I'm not leading any rounds. I'm the kind of person that just joins in.
Michael Eisenberg:
I get it. Don't, don't be deferential. Just, okay, hit it hard.
Ben Lang:
It is part of my strategy. I, ideally I want to be the kind of person that like does–I don't take up too much room and–
Michael Eisenberg:
You don't want to be competitive?
Ben Lang:
I just don't, at least right now with my setup, I don't think I can be, \cause I'm not going to be leading a round. I can, I'm going to be someone who's adding in an extra 100K to a round.
Michael Eisenberg:
All right. There's 25–there’s a hundred thousand dollars left in a round. You and I are competing. Tell me why you’re going to beat me.
Ben Lang:
Why am I going to beat you? I think I'm, I guess because I'm a small shop, I'm doing this alone–
Michael Eisenberg:
I thought you were going to say because you're younger.
Ben Lang:
So I think I can, given kind of the things I'm working on and the areas I can help out, I'm able to be like super, super proactive.
Michael Eisenberg:
That's generic. I can say all those same words. You gotta be, come on, be specific.
Ben Lang:
I will, I would love to–
Michael Eisenberg:
You want the younger generation to beat you. This is good. You need to tell me why you're going to beat me now.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Tell the founder–let's make pretend that Ron or Erica over here is a founder, and you got to pitch to them. Give me the last hundred thousand dollars in the deal.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. I would, my hope is that having done this a few times, like having been a part of building companies and really being on the ground, I can bring that type of insight and really help out with that.
Michael Eisenberg:
So one, you're an entrepreneur and I'm not. Keep going.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. Two, I think this network that I'm building, Next Play, I think I'm, I will hopefully be able to recruit early hires and even find co- founders when needed. And I think, I really think it has the potential to be something really huge and an incredible asset.
Michael Eisenberg:
Okay, two, be a part of my network of people called Next Play.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Eisenberg doesn't have that one. Keep going.
Ben Lang:
Three, I'm just getting started. I'm super hungry.
Michael Eisenberg:
Eisenberg's old, keep going. Yeah?
Ben Lang:
Oh gosh–
Michael Eisenberg:
You lost the deal buddy.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I lost it? Okay.
Michael Eisenberg:
No, no, keep going. I'm just helping you refine your pitch in real time.
Ben Lang:
Yeah I've never really–that's the thing, I haven't been in a position to compete over–
Michael Eisenberg:
How'd you get into Deel? Like, why did the Bouaziz’s take your money? Because you speak French. You speak French, right? Did I remember that right?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I speak French. I had been friends with Alex for a long time before. And at some point, I had sent a bunch of customer intros for him. I spent a Shabbat with his family in Caesarea and just, I could have gotten in much earlier, I just wasn't angel investing at that point. So I think it was just like, I was just there to be helpful, or before even trying to invest.
Michael Eisenberg:
You didn't mention any of that in your pitch, which is, I delivered customers before I invested.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
And I'm good at hanging out at the Shabbat table and drinking wine with people, and speaking French. Those are all advantages!
Ben Lang:
I didn't know that goes into the pitch.
Michael Eisenberg:
Certainly getting customers probably goes into the pitch. You delivered early customers. That works. You might’ve beat me if you just, if you delivered that.
Ben Lang:
What is, what is your pitch? I would love to hear.
Michael Eisenberg:
I'm old. No, I mean, I've been doing this for a long time.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
I have reach, at this point. I think I can persuade executives, not just early employees, but executives to join your company. And if you need an investor network for your follow-on rounds, I have enough of a track record and capability to get there. I'd still go with youth maybe, but I'm just–
Ben Lang:
How often does that work?
Michael Eisenberg:
My French is not good.
Ben Lang:
How often do you lose a deal against anyone?
Michael Eisenberg:
I think I most often lose deals I don't see. Which is okay right now. But I don't know. I think you don't know how many deals you actually lose. Because many of them don't ever get to see you. Which will make this conversation fun, because it's like head to head competition. But I'd have you in my deals. I think you'd add some value.
Ben Lang:
Okay.
Michael Eisenberg:
If I could figure out who needed community help in particular, that would be super valuable. But you told me I can't figure that out until the product's launched.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I think you can, I think ideally there's some hypothesis around that will be like a big part of, a big part of the company's play. It sounds like Sequence doesn't necessarily have that yet, but ideally, that's something, somewhere they want to go. I've spoken to them before.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, I know you have. You like it?
Ben Lang:
Yeah. Yeah, I like it. Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
You’re not sure.
Ben Lang:
I wasn't like super excited about it, and I didn't end up investing, but–
Michael Eisenberg:
Alright, we're gonna tell the Sequence guys that now they have extra motivation to be successful.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Ben was skeptical.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, definitely.
Michael Eisenberg:
And he's not sure he can build a community around this. There's one forming in Discord. A pretty significant one.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I saw that, yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
What do you think about Discord as a community, a place to form community, versus forming it organically? Or, Facebook Groups as a place to form community–how do you think about that?
Ben Lang:
I don't really think about the platform too much. I think, I always think if it's happening organically and people are building it on their own, I think that's definitely the most exciting thing to see. So if people, if you have a company, if you have a startup and people have launched a Facebook group or something without you even doing that, like that, like by all means, just put as much you can behind that, I think, instead of forcing people to come somewhere.
Michael Eisenberg:
You mentioned earlier that you were in the army. You mentioned Shabbat. Clearly, you wanted to live in Israel, so you have to make a decision about leaving Notion. This is clearly important too. You've also posted pictures online of yourself in uniform and fill in tefillin, phylacteries. You got any pushback on that? Like you're a pretty public persona at this point, as Head of Community in Notion?
Ben Lang:
I didn't get too much pushback on that. I've definitely blocked people on Twitter, and–
Michael Eisenberg:
Who hasn't at this point?
Ben Lang:
Yeah. It's like a normal, I think it's like a, just a normal thing. I wasn't like, so public about it, I think, before October 7th. I think now I try to, I just, I want people to know where I stand. Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
I guess if you get lucky, you get blocked by Paul Graham.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Have you been blocked by Paul?
Ben Lang:
I've never responded to him. I just, I actually just blocked him instead.
Michael Eisenberg:
Oh.
Ben Lang:
I don't want to see his stuff.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. You could get blocked by Paul Graham. I don't think I've been yet, but maybe after this podcast that will be, I don't know.
Ben Lang:
I just tell people just, I think just block him first, I don't know. Yeah. Maybe that's better.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, I think, between your Next Play, TLV Collective, or whatever it is, you'll have your own community that's just as powerful as YC, and Gary Tan is doing a great job over there.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, he's incredible.
Michael Eisenberg:
Gary Tan is incredible. We definitely agree on that. Yeah. I think he's been ahead of a lot of things and what he's doing in San Francisco is also incredibly inspiring.
Ben Lang: Yeah. Do you think it's going to work?
Michael Eisenberg:
I hope it's going to work. That's actually a good question. So you've been like, in San Francisco and New York and Tel Aviv–what's the best place to build a startup today?
Ben Lang:
What's the best place to build a startup? I think they're, they're very different. I'm obviously biased and I will–if you can live in Israel, in Tel Aviv, wherever, I will obviously say that.
I think if you don't have the opportunity to live in Israel, I would probably still say San Francisco, just 'cause I think the, I still think like the talent network there is pretty unmatched.
Michael Eisenberg:
Agreed.
I think people like to say New York has it, but honestly, it doesn't feel like from the startups that I've met, it doesn't feel like they're able to recruit the same caliber of people.
Michael Eisenberg:
Which is interesting, right? Although, you know when I started this business, there was nothing in New York. It was like a desert. Now, it's hopping.
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Especially if you're Israeli and you have to, you know, being located–New York is better because you save six hours of travel and three hours of time difference. You find that also?
Ben Lang:
Yeah. For sure. Yeah. For Israelis, for sure. I think, I mean it seemed also like during COVID, a lot of people moved to New York and wanted to stay there from–I'm saying folks from like the Bay area. But I feel like recently now it seems, at least in my circles, a lot of people have actually moved back to San Francisco–
Michael Eisenberg:
Post COVID.
Ben Lang:
Yeah post-COVID, and also it just seems, it still seems like with the whole AI hype, there's just a lot more going on in San Francisco than there is in New York.
Michael Eisenberg:
San Francisco, New York, Tel Aviv–what about your perspective has changed since October 7th?
Ben Lang:
I mean, I think I feel more conviction about living in Israel. I think it's more important than ever.
I'm also passionate about getting people to move to Israel. I actually just a few weeks ago met up with Nevo Network, which I think you started. And I was just so impressed by, like, all these talented people who moved here from all over the world. I'd never met people who moved here from so many of the countries that were represented. So I was super inspired.
Michael Eisenberg:
Mexico, Chile, Argentina.
Ben Lang:
There was someone from New Zealand.
Michael Eisenberg:
New Zealand, yeah.
Ben Lang:
I didn't even know there were Jews in New Zealand.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah.
Ben Lang:
Yeah, I would, whatever I can do to help get more talented people to move here, I think it's the most important thing.
Michael Eisenberg:
So make the pitch right now live. If you are listening to this podcast, here's why you should move to Israel to join the tech community or start a company. Ben Lang.
Ben Lang:
There's just, I think the vibrancy in the tech community here is pretty incredible. There's just, there's so much opportunity. I think the salaries are pretty much on par now with a lot of other companies, places in the U.S. And you're not really, there's no downgrade to your lifestyle, and that the talent here is incredible. You can still learn from people in a lot of different ways. I just, I feel like if you have the ability to live here and work in tech, like there's just, there's no reason not to. All the infrastructure here is available here that you'll need.
Michael Eisenberg:
No reason not to is like, here.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Here's why you should. Go ahead, try again.
Ben Lang:
Why you should. I think being around people who you're able to be open with, people, you don't have to be afraid to share your opinions, being around like-minded people with similar values. Also just incredible talent. Unmatched Israeli tenacity. Having, being able to have an incredible lifestyle here, good weather, good food, being able to be a Jew here openly it's, there's just, I think it's, I think it's the best place in the world to live, and you have everything there's just, there's nothing like it.
Michael Eisenberg:
I teed up a softball question for you to say hummus.
Ben Lang:
I said food.
Michael Eisenberg:
The hummus in San Francisco is not good, no disrespect to Orange Hummus. But it's like, the best hummus! No?
Ben Lang:
That's true, for sure.
Michael Eisenberg:
You can celebrate Hummus Day from its, kind of, origin hub.
Ben Lang:
Look, I think generally speaking, the food here is just so much better. The quality of food here is so much better than in–
Michael Eisenberg:
Are you a foodie?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, for sure.
Michael Eisenberg:
Now, you did Hummus Day, and Mapped in Israel, and Corona Crush. Is that the beer or the virus?
Ben Lang:
That is the Facebook group.
Michael Eisenberg:
Corona Crush.
Ben Lang:
Oh, like what did we name it after?
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. What’s it for?
Ben Lang:
Yeah, the virus.
Michael Eisenberg:
And what was it about? Because there’s another reason to move, so keep going.
Ben Lang:
I still want to hear your pitch. Oh, to meet someone.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, exactly. So what is Corona Crush?
Ben Lang:
I want to hear your pitch after that.
Michael Eisenberg:
In a second. But first tell us what Corona Crush is.
Ben Lang:
During COVID, a few friends and I, we started a Facebook group for people to post about their friends that were single Jewish people.
And it, it went pretty viral. It now has about 25,000 people in it, and as far as we know, at least a hundred people have gotten married through it. But we think a lot more than that at this point.
Michael Eisenberg:
Were they social distancing as part of this, or this was how you broke the social distancing without people telling you–?
Ben Lang:
People were dating on zoom at that point. That was the normal thing. You weren't meeting in person, for you know, a few months. This is when there was lockdown.
Michael Eisenberg:
I think though in Israel, people were actually meeting in person.
Ben Lang:
You think? There was like, there were like a few weeks where like, you couldn't leave your house. That was when we started it, because we felt like this is you know, we need to help people, right. And people were looking for entertainment. People were spending a lot more time online. It just, it was, I think it's good timing for that.
Michael Eisenberg:
Speaking of the difference between San Francisco and Israel, do you have any couples in San Francisco from Corona Crush?
Ben Lang:
Unlikely.
Michael Eisenberg:
Because they were social distancing for much longer probably, right? Israel was, I got, I met on Corona Crush online, whatever you're down the block, it's Tel Aviv. Nobody's watching or I don't care if anyone's watching.
Ben Lang:
Yeah. That's–
Michael Eisenberg:
How many of those hundred couples were in Israel?
Ben Lang:
I don't know. I don't know the breakdown, but–
Michael Eisenberg:
Majority you'd say?
Ben Lang:
Probably majority. Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah. Because you need a place where you want to break the rules. So that's my pitch. Ready?
Ben Lang:
Yeah. Let's hear your pitch.
Michael Eisenberg:
That's my pitch. If you want to innovate, you need to be able to break the rules. Israelis are very good at breaking the rules. In fact, nobody's even sure there are any rules in this country. The laws and the rules are kind of suggestions, not enforcement. And with all these new models coming around AI, et cetera, the kinda cross-pollination to build applicable AI in places that no one's thought about before, because there are no rules, is going to be unique to Israel.
And I think this is a unique time in history to be able to disrupt many traditional industries. Using AI here in Israel and to do multidisciplinary science out of Israel that will create foundational innovation because again, nobody believes that any rules exist. We're looking at something now in the bio area. The guy who invented it is not a biologist. He's a software engineer who was at Wix. But he said, “I can do this.” And they said, “You don't know anything about biology.” He says, “Aha, that's a feature, not a bug.” And that's, I think part of, what happens here in the same way people got married during Corona Crush when people were supposedly social distancing. You'll also break through some of the–
Ben Lang:
This is the pitch for founders to move to Israel.
Michael Eisenberg:
Yeah, and you know, why it's a great place to join a tech company. It's exciting, it's different. And I think post October 7th what Israel's proved is that civic responsibility and resilience are the hallmarks of this society.
And I think in the 21st century where we have big leadership problems, political leadership problems, globally, the societies that have the most civilian responsibility and civilian resilience will be winners. And I think Israel is going to be a winner.
Ben Lang:
Yeah.
Michael Eisenberg:
To finish up with a couple of questions, since we got through Corona Crush now. It's amazing, by the way, you've got like the whole thing. You can meet your spouse in Corona Crush. You can then have a hummus wedding. And then you can start a startup and be mapped in Israel.
Ben Lang:
That's my pitch now for why let me in the deal.
Michael Eisenberg:
So I finally gave you your–I mean, come on, man. And so given those three accomplishments already, plus Head of Community at Notion–in 90 years when you're 120, how do you want to be remembered?
Ben Lang:
How do I want to be remembered? I don't think that far ahead. I would love to continue to back incredible founders and just be a great service provider in whatever I can, in whatever ways I can and, really add value. And, hopefully continue to scale that over time. I would love to, to help bring more people to Israel and, make this an incredible place for Jews to live.
Michael Eisenberg:
Alright, at the ripe old age of 30, what is the most valuable lesson that you've learned that you want to impart to the listeners?
Ben Lang:
Most valuable lesson? I think just like, taking a shot. I think I've done that like enough times to realize, a lot of these times it didn't work, but a few of the times it did work. And I think people are like oftentimes just afraid of taking a shot and whatever it might be, if it's like starting something, if it's sending a cold email, just reaching out, like I think really like, that's the difference between people who like, I think do something interesting and people just aren't able to break out, like just being able to take a shot somewhere.
Michael Eisenberg:
I think by the way, that is a great place to end the conversation, because I think that's true about you. You just keep taking shots, and some of them work, and some of them don't. And it's reminiscent of the big song from the play Hamilton. And I think there's a lot of batches, I bet you were 17 or something like that, where you were like hey, I’ll try this, I'll try that, and something sticks, and let me be bold enough and reach out to the guys at Notion because I'm just interested in this.
I think that's great advice to anyone. So Ben, thanks for coming on. If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate us five stars on Spotify, Apple podcasts, or wherever else you listen. And if you want to learn more about Ben Lang, you can find him on LinkedIn, Ben Lang, and on X at B E N L N. Ben, thanks for coming on.
Ben Lang:
Thanks for having me.
Michael Eisenberg:
Next drink is on me.
Ben Lang:
Sounds great.
Executive Producer: Erica Marom
Producer: Sofi Levak
Video and Editing: Ron Baranov
Music and Art: Uri Ar
Design: Rony Karadi
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