Listen to Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes interviewed at Vancouver’s Traction Conference

Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes in Vancouver, June 18, 2015.

If you are a software company, this is the best time ever to raise money.

That’s according to Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes, who spoke today at the Traction Conference in Vancouver.

The forty-year old Holmes, whose tidy beard now sports flecks of grey, referred to himself as “Grandpa Holmes” when he talked about the differences between when he was raising money for Hootsuite and today’s environment.

Holmes says would-be Hootsuites should use the favourable environment to think big.

“One of the pieces of advice I have for anybody is just look for the big waves, If you can find a big, economic seismic shift in the market and get in front of that, you are going to be in a way better place than trying to change something that is not as progressive,” he said.

One subject on everyone’s mind is the possibility of a Hootsuite IPO. Holmes says the hugely successful IPO of Shopify was a definite enticement, but says he sees an IPO as another step in the company’s long evolution, “not a finish line”.

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Listen to Ryan Holmes speak with Bloomberg’s Gerrit De Vynck at the Traction Conference in Vancouver .