Episode Details

Roger Dickey is a serial entrepreneur and prolific angel investor with over 130 startup investments under his belt. From humble beginnings coding games as a kid to building Mafia Wars at Zynga—a game that reached a $300 million annual run rate—Roger has scaled multiple companies and exited to giants like Zynga, Home Depot, and private equity. He's also pioneered the "search lab" approach to company building, a structured yet high-velocity process for launching and validating startup ideas. In this episode, we cover:

• Roger’s early obsession with coding and games
• How Dope Wars turned into a breakout Facebook game success
• The origin and explosive growth of Mafia Wars at Zynga
• Building a startup that scaled to $100K/day in revenue
• The matrix method for startup idea generation
• Why distribution, not code, is today’s biggest moat
• Why he believes in going deep on one growth channel
• Lessons learned from two successful search labs
• The importance of knowing when a product isn't working
• What he's exploring now across SaaS, games, and social
• Much more

Brought to you by:

• Fondo – Accounting for startups: https://www.tryfondo.com

Find the transcript at: https://www.tryfondo.com/podcast (or wherever you're hosting it)

Where to Find Roger Dickey

• X: https://x.com/rogerdickey
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rogerdickey/
• Essay – Lessons from 2 Search Labs: https://medium.com/@rogerdickey/lessons-from-2-search-labs-fe07d0bc0fb4

Where to Find David Phillips

• X: https://x.com/davj
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davjphillips/

In This Episode, We Cover

• (00:00) Intro and Roger's startup credentials
• (01:04) Roger’s coding origin story and first “viral” product
• (05:01) How Dope Wars exploded on Facebook
• (10:45) Building and scaling Mafia Wars at Zynga
• (16:00) Product-led growth mechanics and viral loops
• (21:00) Inventing and reinventing distribution
• (25:35) How Roger structured his “search lab” process
• (31:00) Metrics and mindset for early-stage validation
• (34:55) CAC, LTV, and cracking the S-curve of growth
• (38:47) Scaling a $100K/day construction tech startup
• (44:10) The role of deep focus vs. testing across channels
• (48:05) What Roger’s building next and how he’s thinking about it

Referenced

• Lessons from 2 Search Labs (Roger Dickey on Medium): https://medium.com/@rogerdickey/lessons-from-2-search-labs-fe07d0bc0fb4
• Mafia Wars: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mafia_Wars
• Dope Wars (original inspiration): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_Wars_(video_game)
• Y Combinator Demo Day: https://www.ycombinator.com
• Dropbox Growth Story: https://www.dropbox.com/business/resources/growth-story
• Stripe Founder Story:

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