Eneya Georgieva, editor at Forbes, reflects the successes of Bulgarian entrepreneurs with a focus on the startup ecosystem, technology and social entrepreneurship at https://forbesbulgaria.com.
When, two years after its inception, a company is still unable to support itself and loans are growing, its founders must either quickly find a profitable strategy or leave the market. In the summer of 2016, Dimitar Vuldzhev and Volen Valkov, co-founders of the Bulgarian startup for building online resumes Enhancv, are in this situation.
“We were going to close for a few months, but we didn’t give up, we kept working and watching what was happening in the world. Back then, people were excited about acquiring Yahoo. They argued over whether Marissa Meyer had done a good job and whether she deserved to keep her job. We didn’t know what would happen next and we decided to do her CV in Enhancv “, says Volen Valkov, who was 24 at the time. The idea to describe Mayer’s career became a PR sensation. The autobiography published on LinkedIn collected over 50 thousand likes and 10 thousand comments. “We usually made sales for about $ 2,000 a month. After the CV in question, they surprisingly jumped to 6 thousand dollars in a day “, says Dimitar Vuldzhev (then 21). The “Meyer” effect turned out to be sustainable and the company reached BGN 4.75 million in revenues in 2020. The team today consists of 13 people, and the clients are mainly from the USA with an IT, finance or marketing profile and are at a more advanced stage. his career development. Students are about 15% of consumers mainly because of partnerships with career and educational centers. In 2013, Volen Valkov and Georgi Ivanov were part of the entrepreneurial organization Start It Smart. Valkov knows first hand that applying for a job is one of the most stressful events in a person’s life. He decided it would be great if he could help people in some way, at least make it easier to get a resume. He shares with Ivanov and they start thinking about how this could happen. However, they soon realize that they will need a programmer. At that time Dimitar Vuldzhev was part of the Obecto team and they worked with Start It Smart from one office. The three boys were spotted in the common areas and this makes Georgi Ivanov and Volen Valkov instinctively think of Dimitar Vuldzhev.
He liked the idea and in April 2014 the three participated with an initial version of Enhancv in the accelerator program of the venture capital fund Eleven. There they developed their idea and even made their first sale, with the transaction coming from Amsterdam. “The platform worked and we presented it at the end of the accelerator. However, we were all ashamed of the way it looked and worked, ”says Volen Valkov. Enhancv stays with other Eleven companies in the co-working The Roof for a few more months. Meanwhile, Dimitar Vuldzhev left for the United States to study computer science at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. While there, it combines education with the development of the startup. To start over There are about 10 more subscriptions sold, but the Enhancv team feels that it is still far from the quality it is looking for. The boys tell themselves that this should not continue, and in the summer of 2015 they started again with both the code and the strategy. Add a new payment model with more options. None of the founders has an idea of marketing. They decide that they will find out for themselves how it works. However, this is expensive for them.
“WE HAD MONTHS IN WHICH WE INVESTED 30-40 THOUSAND. DOLLARS IN DIGITAL MARKETING, AND THE RESULT WAS NULL, ”says DIMITAR VULDZHEV.
However, the platform is far better than the first – it has much more functionality, a free and paid package is introduced, and the second gives access to a longer CV, more elements and sections. It also provides an opportunity for users to check their CVs for stylistic errors.
After these changes, Forbes noticed the potential of the founders and in 2016 they became part of our selection “30 under 30”. A year later, however, Georgi Ivanov decided to leave the team because the views of the three began to diverge. With his retirement, he founded the IT recruitment company Noble Hire.
Separation from a partner is not easy, so Vuldzhev and Valkov do everything possible to help the team continue. After a few months, they have the feeling that they have “reached the ceiling” of what they can achieve with their current knowledge. That’s why they are looking for people from different parts of the world with different experiences. Thus, nine people from countries such as the United States, Canada, Great Britain and India join Enhancv.
With them, Enhancv is optimized, and at the end of 2018 it experiences its second big peak.
THEN THE BILLIONAIRE MARK KUBIN FOUND MEYER’S CV FROM 2016 AND DISTRIBUTED IT TO LINKEDIN.
There is a lot of publicity and many people learn about the Bulgarian startup. This further irritates Dimitar Vuldzhev and Volen Valkov.
They decided it was time to gain experience from companies in their sector in America. They are making a tight program and in 2019 they will spend the whole of October in Canada and the USA.
The challenges of distance
Soon, hiring people from other countries began to create problems for Enhancv. Beyond the familiar challenges of different time zones, culture and the current situation in their country, one of the foreigners simply stops joining chats and meetings. “He left from today to tomorrow. We didn’t know what had happened, and we couldn’t ask anyone. At the same time we had a lot of work “, says Dimitar Vuldzhev.
Due to the pandemic of COVID-19 in 2020, Enhancv makes its professional version free for all within one week of their registration. According to them, this time would be enough to create a CV. The decision does not have a negative financial effect on the company.
Even in the same year, Dimitar Vuldzhev and Volen Valkov reconsidered their concept and decided to open an office in another country. They wonder between London, Paris or Berlin. In the end, they choose Berlin. Over time, their team there grew to five experts. Interestingly, none of these people speak pure German and only one has citizenship, more recently. Their nationality is different. Thus, in the end, the goal of Vuldzhev and Valkov to have a diverse team, gathered their experience from different parts of the world, has been fulfilled.
Despite all the participants in the online resume market, there is no data on its size. However, we know that sooner or later we all describe our professional experience in order to start working. From this simple fact it is clear how the website for CV in Europe Europass created 100 million CVs from 2005 to 2017. Interestingly, the samples in the platform are mainly used to apply to EU structures. On the world stage, the company Bold is among the leaders in the sector. Her portfolio includes some of the most used resume sites such as Zety and My Perfect Resume, and her team is over 700 people.
Enhancv has a significantly lower market share than Bold, but is far from a days of financial stalemate. However, one thing has survived from these difficult years. Dimitar Vuldzhev and Volen Valkov still want to make biographies of celebrities. In this way, they engage more people, and may one day repeat the success of 2016 with the presentation of Marissa Meyer.
Photo for Forbes Bulgaria by Elena Nenkova: Enhancv founders Dimitar Vuldzhev (left) and Volen Valkov set up their own businesses to facilitate the job application process.
