Sat.Jul 10, 2010 - Fri.Jul 16, 2010

article thumbnail

What’s Really Going on in the VC Industry? What Does it Mean for Startups?

Both Sides of the Table

Lots of discussion these days about the changes in the VC industry. Here’s my take: 1. The VC industry grew dramatically as a result of the Internet bubble - Before the Internet bubble the people who invested in VC funds (called LPs or Limited Partners) put about $50 billion into the industry and by 2001 this had grown precipitously to around $250 billion. 2.

LP 311
article thumbnail

No, that IS NOT a competitive advantage

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

This is part 1 of the series: 5 Lessons from 150 startup pitches. Listening to first-time entrepreneurs talk about their competitive advantages is as predictably invalid as the local weatherman's 10-day forecast. Between this blog and reviewing applications to Capital Factory I see hundreds of pitches a year. Every pitch has a section on competitive advantages, and quite literally 95% of the time the claimed competitive advantages are pathetic, unoriginal, and not really advantages at all.

Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

The New Polymath Wow Candidate Contest

deal architect

Abbie Lundberg, former editor-in-chief at CIO magazine in her review of my book, The New Polymath called it a “veritable firehose of innovation examples”. The book covers wide innovation ground across industries, countries and technologies.

article thumbnail

Take A Chance On Yourself

Feld Thoughts

One of the side benefits of blogging are the various inspiring emails I get from readers about different topics. I got a great one yesterday that I thought addressed the question of “Why am I having so much fun with challenges in my personal life and at the same time am so bored with work. And – more importantly – what can I do about it?

New York 128
article thumbnail

Building Healthy Innovation Ecosystems for Your Projects

Speaker: Nick Noreña, Innovation Coach and Advisor, Kromatic

Every startup and innovation project exists within an ecosystem that either helps or hurts that project. As innovation managers, we need to keep a pulse of that ecosystem and make sure we're helping those innovation projects we're managing every step of the way. In this webinar, Nick Noreña will walk through an Innovation Ecosystem Model that he and his team at Kromatic have developed to help investors, heads of product, teachers, and executives understand how they can best support innovation in

article thumbnail

Doing the Right Things is More Important than Doing Things Right

Both Sides of the Table

Yesterday I wrote a post about top-down versus bottom-up thinking. There is a corollary to that advice, which is “doing the right things is more important than doing things right.&# Sounds simple but in practice I promise you most organization fall into the latter trap. Here’s how it goes: You have a business development group with two people.

article thumbnail

Twitter Link Roundup #47 – Small Business, Social Media, Design, Copywriting, Marketing And More

crowdSPRING Blog

Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about logo design , web design , startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! Here are some of the links that I’ve liked and shared this past week!

More Trending

article thumbnail

You Shouldn’t Have to Pay to Talk To Your Own Customers

Austin Startup

Andy Meadows is the founder and CEO of Bearhug , an Austin-based customer engagement platform launching today. He is focused on delivering real business value by educating clients about the latest proven technologies, strategies that deliver improved profits and operational efficiencies, and using technology to improve life. Customer Care Today. 37signals’ dustup with GetSatisfaction almost 2 years ago now for bullying marketing tactics is still cited as an example of how, especially when it com

article thumbnail

How a Tourist Can Help you with Your Startup

Both Sides of the Table

There’s a famous line about consultants that clients love to repeat, “consultants take your watch and then tell you the time.&#. I suppose there’s some truth to that but of course it’s an over simplification. I used to work for Andersen Consulting (for > 8 years) – mostly building computer systems for large companies in the fixed telecoms, mobile and Internet sectors.

Startup 288
article thumbnail

Twitter Link Roundup #47 – Small Business, Social Media, Design, Copywriting, Marketing And More

crowdSPRING Blog

Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about design, startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! Here are some of the links that I’ve liked and shared this past week! The Legal Risks And Dangers Of $99 Logo Stores – [link].

article thumbnail

‘Tis the season of interviewing (for jobs)

Sophia Perl of Wisdom

I don’t know about you, but it seems that a lot of my employed and non-employed friends are interviewing like crazy. The job economy is definitely picking up. To help you with your season’s greetings, here are some tips from my friends with my two cents. If you’re applying for a technical position, spend some time reviewing relevant topics and coding exercises (e.g., databases, data structures, networking, etc.).

article thumbnail

Austin Tech Happy Hour at The Dogwood (7/22)

Austin Startup

We’re throwing our summer happy hour at The Dogwood (formerly Mother Egan’s) and we’d like to invite you to come out and join us and the rest of the Austin technology community. There has been a lot of things going on around town, including new funding, acquisitions, and new technology leadership all across the community. What better time to come on out, bring your friends, and enjoy a fun and relaxing happy hour, courtesy of our sponsor BountyJobs.

Austin 63
article thumbnail

The Benefits of Top-Down Thinking & Why it is Critical to Entrepreneurs

Both Sides of the Table

For the first 5 years of my career I was a “bottom up&# thinker and worker. I assembled tons of data, grouped things, found results and drew conclusions. It was difficult to make the transition to a “top down&# thinker but as a senior executive – and as an entrepreneur – you’re far less effective without this skill in your arsenal.

article thumbnail

Small business and startup tips: track your own customer service data

crowdSPRING Blog

It’s been over a year since I last updated the community on our efforts to build a world-class customer service organization. We are committed to providing great support and doing it in a timely, polite, and efficient manner. Since we launched in May of 2008 we have provided customer service via our online Help Center, our help desk software via the Contact Us form available anywhere on the site (word to our friends at Zendesk !

article thumbnail

A Micropreneur Blueprint: How to Stay Solo, Bleed Passion, and.

Software By Rob

Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Why You Should Build Your Startup to Sell (But Not to Flip) Lessons Learned Taking Parental Leave as a Solo Entrepreneur → A Micropreneur Blueprint: How to Stay Solo, Bleed Passion, and Build Products that Matter Uncategorized If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.

article thumbnail

Socialware Partners with LiveOffice

Austin Startup

LiveOffice, the number-one provider of software-as-a-service (SaaS) email archiving, email compliance and email continuity solutions and Socialware , the leader in helping companies manage, embrace and leverage public social networks, today announced a partnership. Together the companies will provide LiveOffice users with the ability to pre-review and route social networking activity through their existing compliance workflow within LiveOffice AdvisorMail, while automating social media policy th

Partner 54
article thumbnail

Dublin kickoff to European book tour

deal architect

A stone's throw from historic Trinity College in a place appropriately called the Library Bar we convened. You could feel the ghosts of Joyce and Yeats and Shaw and Goldsmith in the hallways. Dublin's glorious literary history provided a nice.

286
286
article thumbnail

Small business and startup tips: track your own customer service data

crowdSPRING Blog

It’s been over a year since I last updated the community on our efforts to build a world-class customer service organization. We are committed to providing great support and doing it in a timely, polite, and efficient manner. Since we launched in May of 2008 we have provided customer service via our online Help Center, our help desk software via the Contact Us form available anywhere on the site (word to our friends at Zendesk !

article thumbnail

I Want My CIC! … The Benefits for Startups to Be Co-Located

Both Sides of the Table

[if you're not old enough to get the reference between this image and the title you can click on the image for a prompter]. This past December I spent a week in Boston to try to get to know some of the local VC’s and entrepreneurs a bit better. One of the meetings I had (organized by my good friend Jeff Yolen ) was with New Atlantic Ventures held the at the CIC, aka the Cambridge Innovation Center (no prizes for guessing where it’s located).

article thumbnail

Welcome to the Lost Decade (for Entrepreneurs, IPO’s and VC’s)

Steve Blank

If you take funding from a venture capital firm or angel investor and want to build a large, enduring company (rather than sell it to the highest bidder), this isn’t the decade to do it. The collapse of the IPO market and dysfunctional math in the venture capital community has stacked the odds against you. Here’s why. The Golden Age for Entrepreneurs and VC’s.

article thumbnail

Social CRM: The inflexion point

deal architect

In the “social” chapter in my new book, I was honored to have Paul Greenberg talk about the social customer and the fact that he/she increasingly “controls the conversation”. He succinctly talked about “customer referral value” versus “customer lifetime value”. Tags: Industry Commentary.

article thumbnail

The Ten Commandments of an Entrepreneur

Startup Professionals Musings

If you expect to succeed in the thrill-a-minute, roller coaster ride of a startup, let me assure you it takes more than a good idea, a rich uncle, and luck. In fact, the idea is often the least important part of the equation. Investors tell me that they look at the people first, the business plan second, and only then at the idea. If you want some tips to beat the insurmountable odds, take a look at the following concepts, adapted from Richard C.

article thumbnail

This Week in VC: Michael Montgomery (President, Montgomery & Co.)

Both Sides of the Table

This episode of This Week in Venture Capital featured Michael Montgomery, president of Montgomery & Co. If you don’t know Montgomery & Co it is one of the premier technology & media focused investment banks in the country (and as Michael corrected me they also have a strong Healthcare / Med tech practice). For entrepreneurs who want to learn about how to work with investment banks, how to position yourself to be acquired and what the IPO markets look like this is the episode to

IPO 242
article thumbnail

Nuke’em ‘Till They Glow – Quitting My First Job

Steve Blank

I started working when I was 14 (I lied about my age) and counting four years in the Air Force I’ve worked in 12 jobs. I left each one of them when I was bored, ready to move on, got fired, or learned as much as I can. There was only one job that I quit when I feared for my life. Life Is Good. The Vietnam War had just ended and I was out of the Air Force back in college living in Ann Arbor Michigan.

Michigan 255
article thumbnail

No technology vendor left behind

deal architect

Consumer Reports says it cannot recommend the iPhone 4. No bowing to mighty Apple. And it reminded me how few such emphatic calls we have in tech. We don’t call BS on software quality – the torrent of Microsoft bugs. Tags: Industry Commentary.

article thumbnail

Role Model Entrepreneur: Brad Bergersen Interview

Startup Professionals Musings

A few days ago I met a 26 year-old entrepreneur with an attitude that exemplifies what I believe it takes to succeed in this new economy and new world. After doing well as a teen in the jewelry business, he made his first big jump as an entrepreneur by buying a failing store to begin his entrepreneurial career, but quickly found that the road can be a rocky one.

article thumbnail

This Week in VC with Rick Smith of Crosscut Ventures

Both Sides of the Table

We started this week’s show with a Q&A session where I answered viewer questions about fund raising and the VC industry. If you enjoy this blog I think you’ll enjoy watching the first 14 minutes of this video (just click on the image of me below). Heck, stick around and watch me discuss the seed funding debate that is going on right now and what is happening in the VC industry overall.

article thumbnail

Has Apple Jumped the Shark?

Seeing Both Sides

There's a famous moment in 1970s television sitcom lore when the super-popular "Happy Days" lost its mojo. That moment is when the main character and hero, Arthur Fonzarelli ("The Fonze"), performs the improbable water-ski trick of jumping over a shark. Now, I'm an avid water-skiier, and I've been known to jump a Loon or two, but jumping over a shark is so absurd its laughable.

article thumbnail

Come meet us on the European Book Tour

deal architect

Courtesy of the hospitality of a number of European bloggers I am doing small book events in various cities over the next few days. Please join us in for innovation conversations and raffles for free copies of my book. 16th.

article thumbnail

Why Adversity Makes an Entrepreneur Stronger

Startup Professionals Musings

We all know entrepreneurs who have overcome adversity, like this current business recession or personal setbacks, and achieved success. There are famous people like Walt Disney and Nelson Rockefeller, who overcame learning disabilities, and people like J. C. Penney and J. K Rowling who struggled through personal bad times before finding their true legacy.

article thumbnail

Optimizing your Customer Acquisition Funnel

For Entrepreneurs

Almost every sales and marketing funnel has blockage points where the conversion rates are lower than hoped, or the process cannot be scaled. This blog post talks about how to solve those blockage points using an intense study of the customer's concerns, and brainstorming to see what motivations can be used to over come the friction that comes from these concerns.

article thumbnail

Are You Really Ready for that Press Release?

Rembrandt Communications

You have your business up and running and are ready to announce it to the world. Hold on! Before you send out that press release letting everyone know about your services, there are three things to keep in mind: 1. Is your site ready? If people see your press release and visit your site, what [.].

article thumbnail

Some IPO speculation

Startup Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, July 15, 2010 Some IPO speculation Inspired by Steve Blank’s post today about the “lost decade&# of IPO’s , I’d like to make some predictions. Let me be clear: Steve is the historian. His posts are born of tremendous research into the secret history of Silicon Valley , and if you haven’t read those essays, you should.

IPO 166
article thumbnail

The Internet Has Replaced the Consultant

Startup Professionals Musings

Let’s face it, consultants have a bad image. Businesses want experienced people who get their hands dirty, rather than experts who give presentations, make recommendations, and disappear. Even consultants don’t like their job, since they don’t often get to see results, and too much of their time is spent looking for the next gig. The Internet has changed the world.

Internet 226
article thumbnail

The Discussion About The Lack of Women In Tech

Feld Thoughts

The meme of the lack of women in tech (or software, or entrepreneurship) appeared in several places today. Regular readers of this blog know that I’ve been the chairman of the National Center for Women & Information Technology for a number of years and deeply involved in this issue. It’s very satisfying for me to see a meme like this pick up speed and appear in a bunch of thoughtful articles and discussions.

San Jose 140
article thumbnail

Buyer Beware: Generic Logo Design

crowdSPRING Blog

Finding a great logo design for your business is an important part of creating your brand identity. You want to have a logo design that is simple, memorable, and a good representation of what you do. Many people, in an effort to appear modern, choose a current design trend for their logo. One risk when following trends is that your logo could quickly get lost in a sea of similar logos out there on the web and in print.

Design 133
article thumbnail

Top 30 Startup Posts in June 2010

SoCal CTO

Some great content around the intersection of startups and being a Startup CTO in June this year. This continues my series of posts: Top 29 Startup Posts May 2010 Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April 16 Great Startup Posts from March There was some really great content in June. Here are the top 30 along with a brief snippet from the post. 10 Ways To Be Your Own Boss - A VC : Venture Capital and Technology , June 18, 2010 The folks at Behance and Cool Hunting asked me to talk at their 99% Conferenc

Cofounder 175