We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Madison Valdez a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Madison, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?
It was a late September morning. I made my way to the couch with my notebook and pencil. This act wasn’t out of the ordinary; writing was my lifeline. At the time, I wasn’t thinking about having a breakthrough moment or “starting” anything in particular. I was doing what I always did; the rest really just happened on its own.
As I put lead to the paper, a few special words came to mind: library, archive. I followed this thread and began to think of other phrases and concepts associated with these two. As I circled the word bank I developed, I wondered if what I was building in my head already existed. I deliberated and looked up to see if a free, all-in-one, open-access database was already out there, and to my surprise, error, not to be found. There were links here and there, spread out online, but nothing concrete/comprehensive/easy to get to, or user-friendly.
All sorts of things came to mind the more I imagined building my own database. In educational and professional environments, research had been the steady foundation of my work. I got to see how, over time, it enriched my processes when it came to talking about what I was looking to make, up until completion. I was already in spaces where research tools were readily available; this is where my familiarity grew. I knew this wasn’t the case for everyone, though. Even if you are in school or have a job that has what you anticipate you will one day use, eventually you fade out of these places and move on to the next thing. This also included your access to their (and once your) resources. I wanted to address this exact loss. To me, everyone should be able to participate in the world of research: reaching answers, with as few limitations as possible. This was where I began to bridge a relationship between accessibility, learning, and ownership.
Something many may also not know is that it was that day that I gave this planted seed a name: Logo (the URL part came shortly after). Because I’m a polyglot, it was always at the top of my list (whenever I was to call something my own) to choose a word that accurately translated to multiple languages. In life, comprehension is essential, and I wanted this to be simple; I knew that when Logo was discussed in/out of this continent, it wouldn’t be far off from the original.
If you ask me how I knew it was going to work, I would just tell you I followed my heart, just like now. I knew how I felt when it came to incorporating research into my practice, whether that was my aversion or acceptance, I got to understand from the beginning how this discipline guided me to deepen my reason(s) with a frame of reference called evidence, allowing me to innovate beyond doing things just because.
Logo has seen many versions of me, but the foundation has always been the same: providing a live, human-to-human platform for inventors (founders, investors, designers, thinkers…) to solidify their foundations, build with certainty, and maintain their truth. When provided context, a background, especially historical, we are faced with deciding to alter how we are to (de)assemble our today’s.
As the database grew, so did user feedback. This prompted me to open my framework and give more attention to my audience’s needs. The database gave insight, yet, for a new user, they often commented that there was something missing when it came to the application part, doing something with what they had worked so long to acquire. This communicated a desire for instructed integration. From this, I decided to expand my services to meet my users where they were, providing them with tailored research partnerships. Here, we would work together, address their plans, questions, and doubts. From there, we would ideate *live* what was about to be brought to life.
Research is a full, hands-on process, from energy, time, to thought; its cycle is far from a touch-and-go. Prioritizing one-on-one partnerships is essential for me to be able to listen, understand, collaborate, and guide in real-time. Being able to ask questions and read what people need from their expressions, apart from their words, is where the unfolding happens.
I knew I was solving these problems because of the conversations I initiated and maintained. Till this day, I spend a lot of time concentrating and inquiring about what my audience needs. I watch for where they’re stuck, what they’re trying to/can’t figure out yet. I build for them. Every conversation I have resolves into an eternal beginning.
Logo addresses the one-sidedness of regular search engines, providing instead: a dialogue, an invitation to revelation.
Madison, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Being born in Brooklyn, New York, has been one of the main directors of my life after God. Coming from what is in my eyes, the world’s capital, I have been blessed to know heart, hustle, and humility. As a young girl, my environment taught me that dreaming was never an option, but a cultural promise to fulfilling my destiny. Where I am now, doing archival work, building out global research partnerships, writing, publishing, all are a product, a culmination of devoting myself to the practices I held and rehearsed as a child without much thought or worry: gathering all I could find to be directed to the answers my questions posed. I studied several things, went to school, made work, and am grateful to have been led to understand the value of process and delivery. For those seeking accessible research support for their projects and ideas, here is a peek into the type of top-to-bottom options I provide:
• Identity Conservation
• Archival Simplification
• Trend-To-Cycle Observation
• Language Rendition and Translation
• Insight Verification, Organization, and Maintenance
• Content Visualization, Generation, and Prescriptive Analysis
• Project Specification, Facilitation, Materialization, and Outcome Evaluation
At Logo, we center ourselves in transforming belief into knowing. Whenever I put something new out, I know that whether it sinks or floats, I can be sure that beyond whatever my attempt looked like, it was rooted in truth. Being someone in the research realm, I am also aware of how much work there is to be done on the entry-point level, getting people to be open to building alongside the already documented. For some, when you say the word “research”, their minds shut off; they think academia, science. I get it, that’s the reputation. For me, research is the ability to strengthen the “I know”. This is the rhythm I coordinate my work to.
How did you build your audience on social media?
I think in my age group, I was definitely a part of the first wave of Instagram users. I can still remember the “beginner’s mind” I once had, posting 5 pictures individually of almost the same thing because collages and carousels were yet to be a thing of the present. This was one of the platforms I got to know well, if we’re talking about social media. I did know about Twitter and used it, but it wasn’t where I decided to spend a lot of my time. I was introduced to YouTube at a young age as well, and spent a long time learning about music, watching interviews over and over again, listening carefully to how people formulated their words, which ones they repeated, forgot, and let go of.
Personality-wise, I was never that outwardly outspoken; I preferred from young to always observe and remember. When I started to build Logo, I was mostly on TikTok. I had a personal account prior, but deleted it because I wanted to start from zero. This led me to meeting people from everywhere. I gained traction from multiple directions since I didn’t have just family and old friends on my feed watching me. I got access to doing TikTok lives fairly quickly without having the minimum amount of followers. I think I had to have at least 1k, but I guess since I posted so often, they gave me the green light. After this was where more of my current audience found me. I was and still go live one to two times a day. For me, there is no moment like the now, and when people see you in action, speaking, they have an energy to put to a face. Going live is the closest thing to having a conversation in real life. It’s a space where my audience or anyone new to me can ask about research/business/life, and it’s also just a space to talk and connect.
Just recently, we were speaking about the most memorable books we read this year. It was interesting to see what everyone was drawn to. In a following live, I revisited the topic. After some exchanges, they brainstormed and came up with the idea to start our own book club. This is the kind of thing that happens when you allow your audience to speak and tell you what they need from you. We landed on reading The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. It’ll be a reread for me, so I’m eager to dissect the text as a group and see what I pick up the second time around. If this sounds like your thing and you want to join us, send me an email, and I’ll send you the book.
For those starting or thinking about building their empire online, I would suggest finding a platform that gives back to you. Try not to blindly use or remain in spaces that don’t facilitate feedback. If you want to know where you should go next, connecting with an audience in the beginning helps. Also, whichever medium you decide to use the most, don’t forget to stay grounded and, above all, real.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
This is what I have learned: life is a cyclical surrender. When you want to do something you’ve never experienced, you can’t hold onto expectation. Everything flows when you lean on your soul’s approach. If your purpose and your efforts find themselves in the discipline category, your story won’t be so fleeting. When I think about what I do, I always return to keeping in line with what I started with, never wavering from the first truth. Those who stay the course, those who don’t all of a sudden decide to become someone else, those are the ones who don’t move according to what the world announces as wind. The more I walk in line with my destiny, the more I get to teach what it takes to be someone who keeps their word, from the jump and all the way through.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://logourl.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/logourl
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/madison-valdez-0729a020a
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LOGOURL
Image Credits
Madison Valdez