Feld Thoughts

JULY 29, 2014

'I expect most of you know the fable of the scorpion and the frog , but if you don’t, it goes like this (quoted from Wikipedia): “A scorpion asks a frog to carry him over a river. The frog is afraid of being stung during the trip, but the scorpion argues that if it stung the frog, both would sink and the scorpion would drown. The frog agrees and begins carrying the scorpion, but midway across the river the scorpion does indeed sting the frog, dooming them both.

Cloud 176

Cloud Partner Hosting Cost 176

YoungUpstarts

JULY 29, 2014

'by Tom Reddon, Forklift Specialist for National Forklift Exchange and a member of Executive Dialogue team for MHEDA. One of the toughest tasks for any manager is enforcing safety rules. If following those rules is inconvenient, workers are sometimes reluctant to obey, which could necessitate confrontation or even discipline. Although punishing an employee could prevent the incident from happening again, there are a few preventative strategies that managers can use to encourage safe behavior

Employee 160

Employee Operations Management Product 160

The Next Web

JULY 29, 2014

'This post originally appeared on the Crew blog. Have you ever felt like all you do is check your e-mail? Well, you may not spend ALL your time checking your e-mail but you do spend about 28 percent of your time doing it. That translates into about 13-hours a week or 650 hours a year of e-mail checking. For those of us who work in a job where e-mail isn’t our main responsibility, checking and responding to e-mails each day can take us away from our primary work, which results in less productivit

Web 167

Web Entrepreneur Product 167

Up and Running

JULY 29, 2014

'In recent years, socially-minded entrepreneurs have begun testing a new type of business entity: the L3C, or Low Profit Limited Liability Corporation. A low-profit limited liability company, or an L3C, is a legal structure (a variation on a limited liability company or LLC) that is relatively new to the United States. The United Kingdom began using a similar structure in 2005, called a Community Interest Company.

Vermont 106

Vermont Limited Liability Company Rhode Island North Dakota 106

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

Startup

The Next Web

JULY 29, 2014

'Paul Jarvis experiments with words and design. His latest book is called The Good Creative: 18 ways to make better art. The internet isn’t a meritocracy, where we can just do good work, put it on a website and hope others will find it and buy it. Nothing will do this for you — not social media, not Kickstarter, not Medium, not Amazon, and not your blog.

Social Media 159

Social Media Web Internet Hiring 159

Up and Running

JULY 29, 2014

'There are many reasons businesses fail: lack of money, changes in the economy, ineffective management, employee turnover, theft, illness, or death of the owner are just a few. According to SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives), the main reason businesses fail is ineffective management, whether it be poor planning or not understanding all that is required to operate a successful business.

Operations 84

Operations Advertising Reputation Employee 84

Mike Michalowicz

JULY 29, 2014

'You know this… there is no free lunch. Inevitably there is some kind of expense. If it’s not your wallet, it’s your time. Another way to look at FREE is to consider the R in the word. The R stands for “Really?”. It is your built in reminder that the next time something is offered to you for free, you need to question it. Is it REALLY free? The cost may be your time and attention.

Cost 79

Cost 79

Hunter Walker

JULY 29, 2014

'My toddler is the beneficiary of growing up in an upper middle class household with associated gadget trickle-down. For example, she inherited an old iPad back in 2012 during her first year of life (although she now prefers my wife’s mini). Fairly quickly she was able to master turning it on and unlocking the screen (not to mention also firing up Pandora).

Term Sheet 80

Term Sheet Founder Technology Product 80

Austin Startup

JULY 29, 2014

'Every entrepreneurship insight I get is cited and sourced from a specific legendary business mentor. I pay attention at a depth I consider "motivational listening." In board meetings, lectures, and tech conferences, I seek to out note-take the rest of the room. This article is a snippet of my recent notes, and revolved around the theme of Other People''s Money (OPM).

Restful 67

Restful 67

Mucker Lab

JULY 29, 2014

'When building a company, acquiring a user or closing a customer one at a time can seem like competing in a marathon while knee deep in mud — making progress in inches, barely able to catch a breath, all the while unable to comprehend exactly how far you are from the finish line. For entrepreneurs, a partnership with an industry giant can seem like, at the very least, a temporary reprieve from the struggle, and at the very best, a sure fire short-cut to success.

Partner 60

Partner Employee Entrepreneur Startup 60

Rob Go

JULY 29, 2014

'When we make our seed investments, we have a strong preference for preferred equity rounds and forming a board of directors that meets regularly. Even in the rare case when we invest in a convertible note, we only do so if founders are interested and excited about convening with us and perhaps one or two other major investors on a regular basis in a structured way.

Seed Stage 65

Seed Stage Government Founder Finance 65

Spencer Fry

JULY 29, 2014

'Around the time we released the new version of Uncover at the end of April 2014, I knew it was time to refocus our work around sales and increasing customers. We''d been focused on product for months, but now it was time to scratch and claw our way to more customers. There are many effective ways to do that: you can build email lists, hit the phones, and lots more, but before all that, you need something to show these people.

Sales 56

Sales B2B Email Design 56

Early Growth Financial Services

JULY 29, 2014

'This guest post by Robert W. Ditmer was originally published on Justworks. The Internal Revenue Service is truly the best source for reliable payroll information for employers, because of how federal tax law structure works. The IRS: Tax Law Educator Congress passes tax laws that become part of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC), often without any clear idea of how they can be implemented on a practical basis.

Startup 50

Startup Revenue 50

ConversionXL

JULY 29, 2014

'After reading some of our subscriber feedback , we noticed that many ConversionXL readers didn’t have a solid foundation with a proper Google Analytics setup. That’s a problem, because if your analytics isn’t properly configured from the beginning, how could you ever expect to gather any insight? When it comes to gathering visitor information, GA can’t collect or change data on visits that have already happened, which means time spent waiting to add or correct certain settings

Analytics 132

Analytics Software Review eCommerce Search 132

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JULY 29, 2014

'Everyone said this would be the most embarrassing moment in the band’s eight-year career. Depeche Mode had decided to play the Pasadena Rose Bowl — capacity 60,000 — for the 101st show of their 1988 tour. To sell out would make it one of the largest music concerts ever played in America — highly unlikely for an English electronic band.

Startup 299

Startup Metrics IPO America 299

YoungUpstarts

JULY 29, 2014

'by Wes Kussmaul, author of “ Quiet Enjoyment – Authenticity Works Where Information Security Technology Has Failed Us “ Fraud and predation pervade everyday online experience. Identities – and cash – are stolen in batches. As the information security industry assures us “we’re working on it,” people grow ever more wary of their Internet experience even as they come to depend upon it more and more.

Security 160

Security Architecture Internet Restful 160

Up and Running

JULY 29, 2014

'Welcome back to #TrackThis! Today, Matt Rissell, CEO of T Sheets Time Tracking, and I sat down to talk about tracking your ROI of attending conferences and trade shows. It’s an important question: Is it worth attending these events to get your name out there, or to have your people trained? It’s hard to know necessarily, and that’s why it’s so important to track your ROI.

Silicon Valley 75

Silicon Valley Audience Metrics Small Business 75