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Luis von Ahn
Lessons on creating a $17 billion learning company, going viral with an owl, and ditching short-term thinking
In today’s episode of The Eric Ries Show, I am joined by Luis von Ahn, CEO and co-founder of Duolingo. With Duolingo, his mission was simple: make language learning accessible to everyone—not to build a for-profit company. Fast forward to today, and Duolingo has grown into a 17 billion-dollar business with a reported 90% of the online daily active users in the language learning market. In our conversation today, we discuss the following topics:
• How hiring an intern led to Duolingo’s viral mascot
• Duolingo’s revenue strategy that helped their stock be up over 100% in the past year
• How only 10% of users pay but make about 30% of the revenue in the education app category
• The newly published Duolingo Handbook and its critical role within the company
• How turning learning into a game changed everything
• Why Duolingo spent the first five years focusing on improving retention
• Duolingo’s unique approach to experimentation and how to apply it
• Why Duolingo isn’t focused on market investors but on building a 100-year company
• And much more!
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Brought to you by:• Wilson Sonsini – Wilson Sonsini is the innovation economy’s law firm. Learn more.
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Where to find Luis von Ahn:
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In This Episode We Cover:
(00:00) Intro
(03:10) How Duolingo’s passive-aggressive mascot, Duo, became an internet sensation
(09:21) Why Luis took a chance on the Duo campaign—despite his doubts
(11:30) Take the long view: Duolingo’s principle to build a lasting brand
(12:52) Duolingo’s commitment to excellence
(14:54) Luis’s journey to entrepreneurship
(18:28) Luis’s MacArthur Fellowship “genius” award
(20:13) The inspiration behind Duolingo’s mission and how they stay in alignment with it
(26:16) Early learnings that shaped Duolingo into a fun product
(29:14) How Duolingo gained an edge over Rosetta Stone
(32:45) How a company with no revenue can be worth a billion dollars
(33:10) The VC who pushed Luis and Severin to monetize
(36:05) How Duolingo stays focused on long-term sustainability
(40:12) A mistake Duolingo made by focusing on the quarter rather than long term
(42:15) The importance of trust and “the cultural bank”
(44:11) Duo class shares and ways Duolingo resists hyper-monetization
(46:30) A case for staying under-monetized
(48:23) Why Duolingo wrote a handbook, and the process of creating it
(54:00) The cadence of evaluating the relevance of the handbook
(55:01) Eric’s “two-way reviews”
(58:34) An explanation of Duolingo’s “green machine”
(1:01:42) Product reviews and a/b testing at Duolingo
(1:06:32) Why Duolingo takes a stance against MVPs in their handbook
(1:10:07) How Duolingo’s v1 meets Eric’s definition of MVP
(1:11:45) Duolingo’s early strategy focused on retention
(1:16:22) Duolingo’s testing philosophy
(1:18:13) Lightning round
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Eric may be an investor in the companies discussed.