Building a 400K community
How Roxanne Taku and Joana Rochard built TechTalk and Reslink
Roxanne Taku and Joana Rocha became co-founders before either of them knew the word for it. They met in a Mandarin class at university in London, moved to China together, and have been building things side by side ever since — first an air-purifying business with a college friend, and now two companies changing how people find jobs in tech: TechTalk and ResLink.
What They’re Building
Tech Talk started as a career community helping people land jobs in tech. Along the way, Roxanne and Joana noticed the traditional CV wasn’t working the way it used to. “The power of the CV isn’t as powerful as it used to be a couple of years ago,” Roxanne says. So they built ResLink, a video CV platform for UK job seekers — keep the CV, add a video, share it as one link, and let recruiters meet a real person. It’s a bet backed by a wider shift in hiring: 67% of hiring managers now say video resumes help them assess candidates more effectively than text alone (source: blog.spoteleven.com).
The Numbers
Tech Talk began as a side project alongside full-time jobs. Two and a half years on, it has grown to more than 400,000 followers, with over 7,000 people inside a gated community — and both founders only went full-time in the past year. “We’ve been growing a lot very quickly, which is great,” Joana says, “but it comes with its challenges as well.”
A Decade of Firsts
The founder story runs deeper than either business. Roxanne and Joana met at university roughly a decade ago and bonded in a Mandarin class before living in China together — navigating first jobs, first raises, and an air-purifying business with a third friend, long before Tech Talk or ResLink existed.
“The fact that we’ve known each other for so long means we know each other as people,” Roxanne says. Their skills split cleanly too: Joana is the marketing strategist and operator; Roxanne is the long-term thinker handling sales and partnerships. “Joana is more like, okay, now let’s take that vision and figure out what we need to do this week, this month, this quarter to make it happen,” Roxanne says.
“Everything you build, you’re building to solve a problem for someone. If you don’t really understand your customer, it’s going to be really hard for you to build something on your own assumptions.” — Joana Rocha
What Canopy Added
Roxanne and Joana met Stewart at Web Summit, joined a Canopy Community demo night, and later pitched ResLink at a London event — winning the audience’s People’s Choice award. “They looked at it from an angle we just never really thought of,” Roxanne says of the judges’ feedback, while Joana points to a fellow pitcher that night who has since been named to a Forbes 30 Under 30 list.
Advice for First-Time Founders
- Talk to customers before they’re customers — don’t build on assumptions.
- Pick a co-founder for complementary skills, not matching ones.
- Choose people you trust before people who are impressive.
- Build systems, not motivation.
Why It Matters
Tech Talk and ResLink are proof that traction doesn’t always need a fundraise — sometimes it’s built for free, over years, inside a community — and that the strongest co-founder relationships are built long before the business idea shows up.
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Canopy Community is a global entrepreneurship platform supporting first-time founders through virtual incubation, investor circles, and Demo Nights across the UK, Portugal, India, and Turkey. We believe entrepreneurship is a route to social mobility. Learn more at canopy.community.
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