Both Sides of the Table

JULY 22, 2010

You’ll need to hire and retain talen to grow your company. The VC’s $1 million still buys them 25% of your company – it’s you who has diluted to 60% ownership rather than 75%. This states how the proceeds from a sale or dissolution of the company will be distributed. That’s normal.

Valuation 405

Valuation Liquidation Preference Pre-Money Valuation Term Sheet 405

Up and Running

JULY 1, 2020

You may grow to tap new markets or increase sales in your current markets. It starts with a high-level strategy and continues all the way to market analysis, sales plans, operations planning, and financial modeling. Will marketing for the expansion dilute marketing of your brand or other products?

Business Plan 152

Business Plan Forecast Operations Dilution 152

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 1, 2009

I know that people find safety in numbers (and there always seems to be 3 amigos) but imagine this for a moment – you go and raise venture capital and you’re fighting over whether to dilute with a VC by 25% or 30% as a company. Do you understand how to lead a sales process? Resist the temptation to hire clones of you.

Hiring 289

Hiring Cofounder Dilution Startup 289

Hearpreneur

JANUARY 30, 2022

Face-to-face engagement is important, especially at vital points in the sales cycle or while creating relationships. 15- Study supply chains and hiring trends. 21- Make more money from sales. In 2022, every business that adapted and survived the pandemic will realize the importance of increasing revenue through online sales.

Entrepreneur 120

Entrepreneur Green Technical Review Social Media 120

YoungUpstarts

MAY 6, 2019

What market are you targeting and how are you going to get sales? If you are getting funded for the first time, which means that you have not diluted the shares of your company, you will be receiving Series A funding. Hiring more resources. So, hire more people or go for outsourcing to remote workers. More funding rounds.

Startup 113

Startup Technical Cofounder Merger Early Stage 113

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

FEBRUARY 26, 2019

Find and focus on one reliable distribution mechanism before diluting your time diversifying. Or you can start selling to enterprise — nothing wrong with that — but then your high cost-basis of marketing, sales, and service will not scale downward. Sales” is not a dirty word. Your values are defined by what you tolerate.

Restful 202

Restful Founder Revenue Acquisition 202

The Startup Magazine

SEPTEMBER 11, 2023

Rather than dedicating time and resources to an extensive hiring process or training, tapping into this pool of external specialists accelerates progress. By delegating specific tasks—like outsourced sales for startups—to third-party experts, internal teams can focus on core competencies.

Cost 142

Cost Startup Non-Compete Dilution 142

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2017

The most obvious way to explain this is with sales people. If you hire 6 senior sales reps in January at $120,000 / year salary then you’ve taken on an extra $60,000 per month in costs yet these sales people might not close new business 6 months. COGS” represents the amount that each sale costs you.

Stock Options 227

Stock Options Startup Dilution Venture Capital 227

David Teten

AUGUST 19, 2019

Benefits: Non-dilutive, flexible credit offerings that fit SMB or enterprise SaaS. The mode purpose for funding is (in order of frequency) Sales, Marketing, Market Expansion, Product Development, and Hiring Employees. At least 12 months of customer history, generally 20+ enterprise customers or 200+ SMB customers.

Revenue 60

Revenue Technical Review Software Review Equity 60

Duct Tape Marketing

OCTOBER 11, 2023

But what the dilution, if you bring it down to it that even creator entertainers and educators have in common is it's this human element. Christie Horsman (05:43): Yeah, I think the only pitfalls I see when looking for, I think hiring creator influencers to represent your brand is great. Is there a better way?

B2B 79

B2B Marketing B2C Community 79

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 16, 2016

But entrepreneurs face other concerns that compete with this growth focus, including hiring, maintaining current revenue sources and distinguishing themselves from the competition. You’ll be inundated with sales pitches, lame template emails, unsolicited voicemails and more. Know when to say “no.”.

Cofounder 100

Cofounder Balance Sheet Small Business Administration Technical Review 100

www.avc.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

The most common comment in this long and complicated MBA Mondays series on Employee Equity is the question of how much equity should you grant when you make a hire. For your first key hires, three, five, maybe as much as ten, you will probably not be able to use any kind of formula. First, a caveat. x $125k which is equal to $31.25k.

Equity 64

Equity Employee CTO Hire Fractional CTO 64

View from Seed

APRIL 30, 2015

In many instances, you raise an institutional round to either fulfill a product strategy or go-to-market strategy or you’re increasing sales and marketing hires, so you have better visibility into what needs to happen in the next six, 12, 18 months. NVV: Is there any dilution? Any equity the venture debt lender gets?

Term Sheet 120

Term Sheet Equity Startup Seed Stage 120

The Startup Magazine

JULY 1, 2022

The three main components of a company are production or service, marketing and sales, and finance. Marketing and sales are how you reach and sell to your target market. Equity financing can give you a lot of cash upfront, but it can also dilute your ownership stake in your company. How To Manage And Grow Your Company.

Technology 139

Technology Venture Capital Finance Startup 139

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 11, 2009

Many startup companies hire advisory boards. You can go as high as 1% because they’re going to get diluted when you bring in VC. So one of your sales pitches to them to join is the other people you have on board (or are approaching). This is part of my ongoing series Startup Advice. It’s very tempting.

Advisory Board 306

Advisory Board Startup Equity Valuation 306

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

Then you can do a little bit of research and find out that very few companies ever achieve this valuation in a trade sale so you’re clearly gunning for an IPO. They did an inside round, spent a bunch of money and then went through a fire sale of the business less than 2 years later. The risk wouldn’t be appropriate.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 9, 2014

Many startup CEOs hire COOs or launch companies with a co-founder carrying the title. When should founders hire one? So when founders lose focus, they dilute their power and effectiveness, which diffuses the force of their impact. Or will you be fine with a head of marketing or a controller or a sales lead?

Hiring 336

Hiring Cofounder Startup Technical Cofounder 336

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 17, 2011

A year ago I blogged about one of my most common mantras that applies to sales, biz dev & fund raising alike: “ Time is the Enemy of all Deals.&#. If you are able to raise money from credible sources at a reasonable dilution percentage then I personally favor getting the round done now and building your business.

Pre-Money Valuation 303

Pre-Money Valuation Dilution Valuation PR 303

JANUARY 9, 2014

By trying to appeal to everyone and adding features left, right and centre, you will actually dilute your message and could end up with a complex, bloated product. Too much talking, not enough listening Perhaps it’s because funding is so important to early-stage startups that they soon get good at perfecting their sales pitch.

Early Stage 102

Early Stage Startup Cofounder Design 102

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

A-Rounds used to be $3–7 million with the best companies able to skip this smaller amount and raise $10 million on a $40 million pre-money valuation (20% dilution). In fact, we just announced that we hired a new head of our Growth Platform, (follow him on Twitter here ? So in a way it’s self selecting. Seksom Suriyapa ?—?he

Pre-Money Valuation 471

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Venture Capital Early Stage 471

The Startup Magazine

JULY 15, 2023

Most firms hire staff prepared to deal with the challenges of two years ago, but fewer have individuals who can respond to those occurring in real-time, let alone ones coming down the pike. Make it so that they don’t need to combine services – something that could dilute your brand and offering. Security needs are constantly evolving.

Security 138

Security Artificial Inteligence Differentiation Dilution 138

ReadWriteStart

OCTOBER 28, 2010

Common areas to address are decisions around capitalization, executive hiring and firing, share issuance (dilution), and acquisitions. You'll need to decide what kinds of decisions the board makes, and which ones it won't. What happens if one of us leaves the company? Will this be the primary activity for each of us?

Cofounder 128

Cofounder Founder Equity Dilution 128

Austin Startup

NOVEMBER 12, 2017

If you have a sales model that involves relationship selling to high-level decision makers, you can be sure they would prefer a detailed proposal from you with a request to “sign here.” There’s no baby step analogy to the pilots discussed above for a sales situation. Decide to think big and ask big. You’ve taken the baby steps.

Term Sheet 48

Term Sheet Technical Review Due Diligence Merger 48

www.inc.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Sales & Marketing | Wednesdays. SALES & MARKETING. Back in 1997, Randy Parker was staring at a blank whiteboard, wondering where hed find the money to hire the employees and consultants he needed to build his new product. "We The Goods: Your Business Toolbox | Thursdays. Finance | Tuesdays. Innovation | Fridays. Newsletters.

Fractional CTO 40

Fractional CTO Equity Iowa Technical Cofounder 40

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

Early in a services business there is usually no profits as the company reinvests in hiring people to grow, but by $20 million in sales the company should at least be pulling in 10% profits (if not more) depending on how much is reinvested. But it might not. Why Build a Services Business in the First Place? It’s pure irony.

Silicon Valley 332

Silicon Valley IP Dividend Finance 332

Rob Go

JUNE 10, 2013

Write code, talk to users, and build the company (hire the best people you can find, get the culture right, fundraise, close sales, etc.) Hire slow; fire fast. Hiring is the most important thing you do; spend at least a third of your time on it. Hire smart and effective people that are committed to what you’re doing.

Startup 49

Startup Technical Cofounder Hiring Cofounder 49

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 24, 2016

They write something that sounds good or is aspirational at best, but not something that they are prepared to deliberately create, nor something for which they’ve hired properly to achieve. If a leadership team truly values its core values, then it is critical to hire other leaders and team members who share those values.

Atlanta 100

Atlanta Dilution Hiring Global 100

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Would I hire a broker? These are your candidates, because they are companies already absorbing much or all the marketing expense necessary to make sales of your invention. What are the advantages of using royalties instead of raising investor funds, other than no dilution of equity? Investment banker? Do it myself?

IP 54

IP Intellectual Property Investment Bankers Product 54

ReadWriteStart

OCTOBER 7, 2020

Content marketing builds brand, engages new audiences, inspires trust, and respect… but does it increase sales? Create a Robust Sales Pipeline. First, we must distinguish between a sales pipeline and a sales funnel if you truly want to grow your business. Let’s look at the stats.

B2C 78

B2C B2B Architecture Dilution 78

View from Seed

APRIL 16, 2015

The reason why hiring a technical co-founder or someone else in role X seems like a milestone is because investors might actually have questions about whether the team can be successful. But again, it’s not specifically the hiring of people that is the value inflection, it’s answering the question of confidence in the team.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Cofounder Early Stage Startup 120

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 20, 2018

Would I hire a broker? These are your candidates, because they are companies already absorbing much or all the marketing expense necessary to make sales of your invention. What are the advantages of using royalties instead of raising investor funds, other than no dilution of equity? Investment banker? Do it myself?

IP 48

IP Intellectual Property Investment Bankers Product 48

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 17, 2018

But in short-term you know that LTV is based on optimistic future assumptions and payback periods on acquisition are based on flying into a brick wall if you get them wrong  —  @msuster 5/ Unless you're scaling rapidly don't hire staff too quickly. Things happen, people tire, sometimes tragedies.

Founder 242

Founder Dilution Software Review Later Stage 242

Duct Tape Marketing

DECEMBER 17, 2015

But with fast growth, that promise can be diluted. Typically they’ll be working long hours while the company struggles to hire and train enough staff. This pressure often sucks companies into hiring the wrong people, just to get more bodies on staff. Growth also strains employees physically.

Canada 28

Canada Dilution America Employee 28

Austin Startup

JANUARY 11, 2020

It’s now the #1 non-dilutive source of capital for businesses to continue to grow and scale, but it’s highly overlooked. We’re also fundraising so that we can hire a bigger team to serve this large market of accounting professionals. Also, mentors that have insight on sales and marketing strategies— that always helps.

CPA 62

CPA Startup Non-Compete Cofounder 62

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 26, 2010

As the founder, you’re the number one sales person of the company and it is not a function you can outsource right away. Show you’re knowledge and passion when speaking to an investor and don’t say you need money to recruit a sales force. You’re it for the time being. Who to raise from?

Elevator Pitch 102

Elevator Pitch Incubator Technical Review Startup 102

Lightspeed Venture Partners

NOVEMBER 19, 2012

They talked about a referral program, as well as direct sales. The company did $250,000 in sales last year and is profitable. Barbara thought that the company should be further along for $240,000 already invested, and didn’t like that the founder only owned 43% and would be diluted by a further 10% in this round, so she passed.

Pre-Money Valuation 161

Pre-Money Valuation Alabama Valuation Churn Rate 161

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2019

Investors bet that by offering prospective hires a stake in the company’s future growth- with a visible time horizon of a payoff – employees would act more like owners and work harder– and that would align employee interests with the investor interests. That made sense.

Stock Options 333

Stock Options Stock Vesting Common Stock 333