Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 28, 2012

If your first startup fails, you are about average. Most entrepreneurs fail on at least one attempt. Investors agree that an entrepreneur who has never failed probably hasn’t pushed the limits. What investors look for is not that you never fail, but that you learn from the failure, maintain a positive attitude, and work with integrity on the next one.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 15, 2012

Potential startup founders are always looking for ideas to implement, when they should be looking for problems to solve. Customers pay for solutions, but there is no market for ideas. I’m often approached by people with a “million dollar idea,” but I haven’t seen anyone pay that for one yet. Equally often, I see startups who are on the road to implementing an idea, but haven’t figured out what problem it solves – the business plan waxes on eloquently for 20 pages about how great this product and

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 16, 2012

If you are new to the entrepreneurial world of startups, you are likely confused by the terminology of seed-stage, lean startups, micro-VCs, and Super Angels. Don’t be embarrassed, since even professional investors are often confused these days by the new terms, as well as old terms used with new meanings. In any case, it’s time to look again at the options you really have.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 8, 2012

People who can’t manage their own lives don’t make good entrepreneurs. Small businesses require multi-tasking, work prioritization, and decision-making, with no entourage of assistants and specialists. That’s why Fortune 500 executives usually don’t survive as startup CEOs. First you have to learn to accept total responsibility for things that happen to your business, just like you are responsible for everything in your personal life.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 14, 2012

Within the startup realm, there is a big difference between having an innovative product versus an innovative business. Some startups have a new technology, but stick to a tried-and-true business model. Others take an existing product, and give it new life with a creative business model. The most competitive startups do both, all the time and every time.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 20, 2012

The ultimate compliment that any entrepreneur can get is that they can “see around corners.” This is a statement that they are willing and able (and successful) at projecting market and technology turns, not just straight-line innovations. They have the courage to make bold decisions, often contrary to conventional market research. Steve Jobs of Apple has been maybe the most visible example of this phenomenon, but others often mentioned include Richard Branson (Virgin Group), Joe Costello (Caden

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 10, 2012

Although every startup is unique, there are certain common avoidable mistakes that can lead to legal complications which jeopardize the long-term success of the business. I’m not suggesting that every startup needs a lawyer, but you should definitely pay attention, and not be afraid to consult legal counsel if any of these raise qualms for you. Like other environments, most legal issues don’t result from fraud, but from ignorance on specific requirements, or simply never getting around to doing

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 2, 2012

Face reality. As an entrepreneur, you should assume none of your customers is like you, yet I find that most entrepreneurs assume just the opposite. Customers don’t have your technical base, the passion, and interest in your solution. In fact, even if they did, they couldn’t find you in the clutter. An underrated portion of every startup effort must be about communication and marketing.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 26, 2012

Every entrepreneur wants to know how they can improve their odds on the road to success, and why some entrepreneurs seem to be able to squeeze success out of even a marginal business case. Most experts agree that is has lot to do with your level of passion, determination, and innovation, modulated by a strong focus on reality, common sense, and street smarts.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 25, 2012

Did you ever wonder how a new entrepreneur knows how to “do the right thing” for his business? Most experts believe that the essence of doing the right thing is ethics. Translating that into business value, a study by Wirthlin Worldwide concluded that 80% of customers still base a good portion of their buy decision on their perception of that firm’s ethics.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 1, 2012

Every entrepreneur wishes that he could predict whether his idea could be the “next big thing,” before he spent his life savings and years of energy on it. Investors, on the other hand, typically don’t even look very hard at the product or service, but prefer to evaluate first the entrepreneur, and secondly the business plan. I define these products and services as “solutions” (customers buy solutions to a problem), but Guy Kawasaki more generically calls them causes, meaning any new idea, compa

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 19, 2012

Most startup founders know exactly what they want to design and sell, and they are personally convinced that everyone will buy one. Yet they often fail to realize that their view is likely biased, and will be instantly discounted by potential investors. Business plans with no “industry expert” data on your target opportunity size and growth are routinely rejected.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2012

As an entrepreneur, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your idea. I hear lots of excuses from startup founders, like “I’m too busy,” concern over IP security, can’t afford an agency, and it’s too early. The result is they get no feedback, no credibility, no visibility, and no investors until months later than they expect. I’m definitely not lobbying here for promising things you can’t deliver, or hiring a publicist before your first programmer.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 21, 2012

Too many entrepreneurs still believe the urban myth that you can sketch your idea on a napkin, and investors will throw money at you. Every investor I know is frustrated with the poor quality of the business plans they get. This is sad, since “how to write a business plan” is a frequent topic found in every business journal, and a common title in the business section of every book store.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 29, 2012

In business and startups, a “sense of urgency” is a good thing. Yet many entrepreneurs confuse this with a “sense of emergency,” which insidiously saps the life from their business. Urgency comes from a greater purpose focused outward, to make good things happen, while handling emergencies is a reactionary inward approach to saving ourselves from the daily crisis.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 17, 2012

Entrepreneurs often have formidable technical expertise, key to developing a new product or service, but a great naïveté in management skills. They run into difficulty when their business reaches the $1-2 million annual sales range, or their employee count exceeds 5-10. It’s here that entrepreneurs must shift their thinking from tactical and operational, to strategic and managerial.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 6, 2012

A good many startups I know have been “successful” over a couple of years in overcoming the challenges of starting the business, including incorporation, services development, funding, and setting up operations. Yet they still haven’t achieved a healthy growing profit, even though this was one of the main reasons they went into business for themselves in the first place.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 24, 2012

Every entrepreneur’s first priority should be the alignment of interests across the range of constituents required for success – partners, investors, customers, vendors, and employees. The best are ones quickest and most willing to do the realignment on a continuous basis these days, as the market changes, customer interests change, and you learn from experience.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 27, 2012

Most startups, and many big businesses, still don’t have a clue on how to use social media productively for marketing their business. They randomly churn for hours a day on a couple of their favorite social media platforms, with little though given to goals, objectives, or metrics; and ultimately give up and fall back to traditional marketing approaches.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 4, 2012

I know some entrepreneurs with successful businesses, and others who seem to have a great relationship with their family, but I can’t think of many who have both. Some people would argue that these two successes are mutually exclusive, but I’m not convinced. Individually, they both take focus, commitment, and a variety of skills, all the strengths of a good entrepreneur.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 7, 2012

If you are just plain tired of working so hard, or your startup is not getting the traction you expected, should you shut down cleanly, or just file for bankruptcy and walk away? For those who think that bankruptcy is the easy way out, think again. Bankruptcy should always be the absolutely last resort. The “advantage” of filing for bankruptcy, of course, is that it gets creditors permanently off your back, with no continuing lawsuits, based on funds derived from selling all assets.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 18, 2012

An all-too-common question I get from startups and small businesses is “Which is the right social media platform for my business?” Is it Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or one of the other 200 active platforms vying for attention these days? The right answer is that not all of these are worth your attention, but it’s probably more than one. The “Tyranny of the OR” is a concept from the business best-seller “ Built to Last ,” by James C.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 5, 2012

If your startup is looking for an angel investor, does it makes sense to present your plan to flocks of angels, and assume that at least one will swoop down and scoop you up? In reality, hitting large numbers of angels in multiple locations with a generic pitch is one of the least productive approaches. Here are five key things you need to know to quickly find the right angel for your startup: Angels invest in people, more often than they invest in ideas.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 12, 2012

We are talking about angel investors here, meaning people who invest their own money in early-stage startups for a share of the equity. These people are highly focused on investment areas they know, which have a large opportunity for growth, revenue projection of $20M or more in five years, and a high return that can be realized via an exit within five years.

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