Gust

AUGUST 12, 2012

A simple differentiation is that a product plan is designed for internal use, to get the product out. The product plan tells your developers what to build, and the marketing team what to market. Development and rollout. It’s definitely positive to have a product plan.

Product 150

Product Business Plan Differentiation Business Model 150

Gust

OCTOBER 31, 2011

Many writers have outlined the critical success factors for product companies, like sell every unit at a profit, patent the design, and continuous product improvement. Their perspective is that these entrepreneurs need only to sell themselves, but shouldn’t need capital up front for product development or manufacturing.

Angel Investor 143

Angel Investor Venture Capital Partner Networking 143

Gust

JANUARY 26, 2014

I have used this approach with high-tech roles, like software design, as well as business development roles. If you are a problem solver by nature, like Richard Branson, this requires you to change your mindset from giving the “answer,” to helping someone else understand the process, and come to an even better solution.

Partner 161

Partner Leadership Software Design 161

Gust

AUGUST 24, 2014

It can be a very competitive approach, but the product must be designed and built to provide good utility at many levels. This is a very costly development, testing, documentation, and support challenge. This approach works if your product can be sold “bare-bones” for a low price, and price increments added for additional features.

Revenue 184

Revenue Startup Retention Internet 184

Gust

NOVEMBER 22, 2011

For instance, if your company is only a few weeks old and you have zero customers and your product offering is still in design, don’t expect someone to hand over $10 million to fund your efforts. Of course, growth and development are really a continuum. Funding sources specialize in certain growth stages.

Venture Capital 171

Venture Capital Investment Bankers Angel Investor Initial Public Offering 171

Gust

JANUARY 26, 2014

I have used this approach with high-tech roles, like software design, as well as business development roles. If you are a problem solver by nature, like Richard Branson, this requires you to change your mindset from giving the “answer,” to helping someone else understand the process, and come to an even better solution.

Partner 116

Partner Leadership Software Design 116

Gust

JULY 3, 2012

When presented with a product or service in development, we often have to admit that there is no clear precedent and look for the best analogous situation to assess legal risk. Is Instapaper like collecting press clippings? (If

Intellectual Property 163

Intellectual Property Social Bookmarking IP Term Sheet 163

Gust

NOVEMBER 18, 2012

Back in the “heyday of the dot.com startups,” it was not uncommon to see a valuation incremented by $1M or every paid full-time professional programmer, engineer, or designer. Assign value to all paid professionals, as their skills, training, and knowledge of your business technology is very valuable. NewCo doesn’t have any of these yet.

Valuation 187

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 187

Gust

AUGUST 8, 2012

I’m no UI/UX designer or product manager, but I do work with entrepreneurs daily. If it were a new service offered by a startup, I would never use it again, chalking it up to failure to do any customer development whatsoever before bringing it to market. All of the above isn’t mere venting.

Customer 143

Customer Southern California San Jose Marketing 143

Gust

NOVEMBER 29, 2011

Recently, entrepreneurs in many countries have been soliciting investment through “crowd funding” websites designed specifically for fundraising purposes. Crowd investors could invest in companies at any stage of development, not just startups. Crowd sourcing, in many cases, can be very fast.

Securities and Exchange Commission 154

Securities and Exchange Commission Accredited Investor Angel Investor Due Diligence 154

Gust

OCTOBER 8, 2014

She designed a software solution that she was planning on selling to enterprises for $100,000 a year. Because I left each investor meeting with a plan for my company’s growth, investors were able to measure my actual metrics developed over time against my initial projections. Have Patience. I predicted that we would build an MVP.

Venture Capital 163

Venture Capital Finance Early Stage .Net 163

Gust

NOVEMBER 25, 2012

Eric espouses designing products with the smallest set of features to please a customer base, and moving products into the marketplace quickly to test reaction, then iterating. Pivots come in many different flavors, each designed to test the viability of a different hypothesis about the product, business model, and engine of growth.

Silicon Valley 187

Silicon Valley Architecture Startup Channel 187

Gust

SEPTEMBER 17, 2014

Coding, design, production, sales, finance, operations, marketing, and the like are all execution skills, and without great execution, success will be very hard to come by. Who do you think got the biggest relative return from the development of Trump Tower? Architect Der Scutt (the IA)? Engineer Irwin Cantor (the coder)?

Coder 147

Coder Web Startup Salary 147