Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'If your startup is looking for an Angel investor, it makes sense to present your plan to flocks of Angels, and assume that at least one will swoop down and scoop you up. Or does it? Actually numbers and locations are just the beginning. The challenge is to find the right Angel for you, and for your situation. Here are some basic principles: Angels invest in people, more often than they invest in ideas.

North America 289

North America Rhode Island Accredited Investor Angel Investor 289

deal architect

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'There are so many amazingly positive visuals of Apple. Customers leaping for joy after they have lined for hours outside a store for their new device. My kids when we traded their Blackberries for iPhones. My kids and wife when.

Customer 261

Customer 261

Jeff Hilimire

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Business Insider had an interesting article recently entitled, “9 CEO’s Share Their Favorite Interview Questions” I thought it might be fun to try to answer these as if I was interviewing at their company. On a scale of one to 10, how weird are you? – Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos. 3. Maybe 4. I’m not too weird. I’m a pretty straight and narrow guy.

Charlotte 58

Charlotte Georgia Atlanta Leadership 58

deal architect

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'In the analyst/blogger/media world we have periodic flare-ups of “who’s more independent”. Nothing gets resolved but a few weeks later it flares up again. Independence to me represents many shades of grey. When I joined Gartner from Price Waterhouse I.

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Media 207

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

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'We know that big businesses rule the world – and so much more than even governments – but which corporations are those that are so large and control so much market share they pretty much dominate their space? Let’s just take banking, for example. The largest banks hold assets of around a total of $25.1 trillion, with ICBC of China alone controlling $2.95 trillion in assets, over 18,000 outlets, and 108 branches globally.

Germany 161

Germany China Government Global 161

The Next Web

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'This post originally appeared on the Buffer blog. Aren’t shortcuts just the best? While everyone else takes the long way, you and your shortcut get to breeze right through, skipping a few steps and feeling pretty smart doing it. Finding a good marketing shortcut feels especially great, considering all that we marketers have to do in a day. That’s why I went hunting for the top free marketing tools in a variety of marketing categories.

Internet 167

Internet Social Media Marketing Web 167

The Next Web

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Ilya Pozin is the founder of Open Me and Ciplex and a columnist for Inc, Forbes, and LinkedIn. You know how you often wake up without an alarm at about the same time every day? That’s your circadian rhythm, which works as your body’s internal alarm clock. Being aware of your circadian rhythm might just be the key to improving your productivity and even your quality of life.

Product 156

Product Email Restful Founder 156

Up and Running

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Tom Morrell of Swell Media shares his insight in naming a business. When you’re naming a business, you want something creative and catchy. Something that has meaning and is memorable. It sounds easy enough, but once you decide to start a business, coming up with a name can be tough. Even the creators of Google had a hard time naming their soon-t0-be-huge business.

Naming 115

Naming Matching Restful Media 115

The Next Web

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Nick Davidov is the Investment Director at iTech Capital and Managing Director of The Pult Group. For many investors and entrepreneurs in the West, doing business in Russia can seem like a step into the unknown. However, these fears are largely unfounded. Within the Russian tech sector, the differences in business practices between the West and East are growing rapidly smaller.

Russia 140

Russia Europe Vertical Government 140

SiliconHills

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Dropbox plans to expand its office office by 170 employees adding to its existing Austin workforce of 30. Dropbox, based in San Francisco, provides an online storage box that allows people and businesses to exchange files including documents, photos and videos from anywhere. More than 200 million people and 4 million businesses including BCBG, Kayak, […] The post Dropbox to Expand in Austin and Hire 170 Employees appeared first on SiliconHills.

Austin 119

Austin San Francisco Hiring Employee 119

Mike Michalowicz

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'Before the Internet, you didn’t really need to be that good. As long as you got the word out, and your product was acceptable, you would get a continual stream of business. It was too hard for customers to find a replacement. Maybe a friend would mention an alternative, while you were sharing lunch. But otherwise it was pretty hard to find a good alternative, that wasn’t a big cloaked marketing push by yet another big company.

Social Media 94

Social Media Internet Media Search 94

The Equity Kicker

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'I’m excited to let you know that David Norris joined us today as my Partner. Our mission is to generate superior returns by making great investment decisions and by being amazingly helpful to our companies. The reason I’m excited is that David is THE MAN to deliver on the second part of that promise. He’s been COO of some amazing businesses, including HouseTrip and LiveBookings, and will now help our founders succeed just as he helped the founders of those companies.

Partner 91

Partner Early Stage Business Model HTML 91

Start Up Blog

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'This post by Seth Godin got me thinking about how to generate trust when we are a new brand or startup on the block. Here is what I think: Building trust is simple. Create stories by doing things which exceed expectations. One customer at a time. When we do it, they share their good fortune to have done business with us. Trust never comes from the brand owner, but the interactions with the brand recipients.

Startup 79

Startup Entrepreneur Customer Marketing 79

SiliconHills

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'The fun loving startup, SpareFoot that has created the nation’s largest online storage marketplace, has just raised $10 million in venture capital from Insight Venture Partners. Austin-based SpareFoot has raised $26 million since its founding in 2008. New York-based Insight Venture Partners provided $22 million of those funds. Its other major investors include Capital Factory, […] The post SpareFoot Raises $10 Million More in Funding appeared first on SiliconHills.

Venture Capital 77

Venture Capital New York Austin Partner 77

Rob Go

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'This post is a bit of inside baseball, but bear with me. Like everyone else, I was very impressed by Facebook’s $16B+ acquisition of WhatApp. Apart from the founders and employees of the company, Sequoia Capital was the big winner, and that was recognized by everyone. As a VC, I was extremely impressed with Sequoia’s investment, just based on the information provided publicly.

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Cap Table Valuation Finance Institutional Investors 78

Duct Tape Marketing

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'5 Things You Know But Don’t Do Enough written by John Jantsch read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing I travel all around this world and speak to thousands and thousands of small business owners about the challenges of growing a business. photo credit: magro_kr via photopin cc. If I had to sum all the problems and questions I hear into just two common threads I would say it is this – “I don’t make enough money” and “I don’t have enough time.”

Tulsa 75

Tulsa Tampa Social Media Small Business 75

Austin Startup

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'SpareFoot, which operates the country''s largest online marketplace for self-storage, has raised $10 million in venture capital from Insight Venture Partners.

Venture Capital 63

Venture Capital Operations Partner 63

ConversionXL

FEBRUARY 24, 2014

'The checkout flow is where the money is at. Think about it, random strikers leave the site before ever entering the checkout funnel, while motivated buyers come here to finish their order. Any small increase in this step usually has a direct impact on how much more money your site makes. Example: An Ecommerce site that I analyzed recently had a payment page where 84.71% of the traffic proceeded to buy.

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eCommerce Design Software Review Technical Review 133