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The Cost Equation for a Startup is Better Than Ever

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I come from a high-tech software background, and only a few years ago, it would cost at least a million dollars ($1M) for a team of professionals to produce any commercial software product. Now, with open source software components, and low-cost development tools, the same job can be done by one good hacker for a few thousand dollars.

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How to Relate Your Technology to Business Values

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Executives need more data accessible to their team everywhere, but at what cost? How does your proposition address highly targeted advertising without a privacy backlash? User privacy. Customers are bombarded from all angles today for information to improve their user experience, yet they need to protect highly personal things.

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How Do You Select A Revenue Model For Your Startup?

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The alternatives range from giving it away for free, to pricing based on costs, to charging what the market will bear (premium pricing). This is the most common model touted by Internet startups today, the so-called Facebook model, where the service is free, and the revenue comes from click-through advertising. Cost-based model.

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These 10 Key Elements Make a Business Plan Fundable

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Explain in terms your mother could understand, and quantify the “cost-of-pain” in dollars or time. Many people seem to use the social network advertising model for revenue, but forget it assumes at least 100M users and $50M investment. This is how you will make money, who pays you, and gross margins. Financial forecast and metrics.

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Stealth Mode Entrepreneurs Only Increase the Risk

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This takes time, and is more valuable than any advertising you can buy. Customers are more forgiving of early visible changes in direction, and the cost is much lower for you. Here are seven ways this can actually help your startup efforts, rather than hurt them: Initiate media interest. Get concept feedback early. Tune your website.

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Do It Right The First Time, Part II: Visit the Doctor or House Call?

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For those of us who do it every day or every week, there is also a “ well-worn path ” involving reams of very familiar-looking documents that will take relatively little time (and therefore cost relatively little in legal fees) to prepare for a new startup. The amounts involved typically justify working with a good business law firm.