Entrepreneur Recruitment with Jonathan Kay

Jonathan Kay is the Ambassador of Buzz for Grasshopper. What the hell is an Ambassador of Buzz? It’s pretty much a fancy and creative way of saying: spreading entrepreneurship and Grasshopper love to the world.

Jonathan Kay joined Grasshopper after working as a salesman. He never really liked being a salesman, but he does not regret doing it. He said that he learned a lot while he was one and it has actually helped him in his current position at Grasshopper. Being at Grasshopper, Jonathan gets to work with entrepreneurs on a daily basis. He may not have been entrepreneurial when he got to Grasshopper, but he definitely has some now.

What’s Grasshopper?

Grasshopper is a virtual phone system for you and your business.  For $9.95 a month you can make your business more legitimate. You also get a toll free or local number, unlimited extensions for departments & employees, call forwarding, and voicemails via email. All that and you don’t have to purchase any hardware.

Jonathan gives an example, “Let’s say you and I decide to start a business. We get our website, but we don’t want to put our cell phones up on our website because that’s really not professional. What we want to do is get an 800, local, or toll free number through Grasshopper. Essentially, I’m working out of my basement in my boxers and you’re working out of a co-working space in Boston, but the calls are getting forwarded out to us. It allows us to sound a lot bigger and more professional. And more than that, it really allows to stay connected with our business.”

Grasshopper has created a product that really empowers entrepreneurs to take themselves to the next level.

Grasshopper knows viral
Jonathan tells us about the Chocolate Grasshopper campaign.

“We fedex’d 25,000 chocolate covered grasshoppers to who we considered to be the 5,000 most influential people in America. Each person got a package of grasshoppers with 5 grasshoppers in it and there was a tag on it. It said, ‘Entrepreneurs can change the world – Grasshopper.com/idea’. On the back of the tag was a number – 1 out of 5,000, so they knew it was unique.”

We’re still waiting for our Grasshoppers at GetYourBizSavvy
Pretty amazing idea by Grasshopper. If that doesn’t get people talking, I really wouldn’t know what does. I’d like to see a percentage of the people that actually ate their chocolate covered grasshoppers.

What’s next for Grasshopper?
Jonathan also gave me the inside scoop of what Grasshopper is working on. As a result of Grasshopper’s success, Grasshopper Group was formed. Within Grasshopper Group is Chargify, Spreadable, and of course Grasshopper.

Jonathan explains Chargify and Spreadable: “Chargify is a recurring billing system that is essentially designed for anyone who is selling a product or service on a recurring or subscription basis. Spreadable is a word of mouth tool that will essentially empower your customers to have the tools they need to refer people to your website.”

What next for Jonathan?
“I’m hoping that one day instead of having to start my own venture and leaving Grasshopper, I will make enough of a splash here that they will want me to run one of these product lines. So, be an entrepreneur just without my own idea

Follow Jonathan Kay on Twitter