July, 2014

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10 Entrepreneur Alternatives To Investor Funding

Startup Professionals Musings

'The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. I often get asked about the real alternatives to bridge this valley, and there are some good ones I will outline here.

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A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Our Recent Seed-Stage VC Investments

View from Seed

'Two weeks ago, my partners and I here at NextView Ventures announced our second fund. And since we will continue to look proactively at new seed-stage tech startups over the next few years, the question becomes: What, then, will these companies look like? Rather than merely speculate, a more interesting exercise is to examine what we’ve actually seed funded at NextView recently as a reflection of our current investment interests.

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The Changing Structure of the VC Industry

Both Sides of the Table

'There has been much discussion in the past few years of the changing structure of the venture capital industry. On the surface the narratives have been. The rise of “micro VCs” or seed-stage funds. The rise of alternative sources of capital (crowd funding and the like). The poor performance of the asset class (this analysis has largely been wrong as I pointed out here –> most analyses were clumsy rear-view mirror looks at the data).

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Driving Corporate Innovation: Design Thinking vs. Customer Development

Steve Blank

'Startups are not smaller versions of large companies, but interestingly we see that companies are not larger versions of startups. I’ve been spending some time with large companies that are interested in using Lean methods. One of the conundrums is why does innovation take so long to happen in corporations? Previously Hank Chesbrough and I have written about some of the strategic issues that impede innovation inside large corporations here and here.

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Building Healthy Innovation Ecosystems for Your Projects

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

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Case Study: Resolving Airline Engineering Issues Using Videoconferencing

YoungUpstarts

'Airline engineering issues arise due to lack of oversight; methods used for risk management and the use of temporary employees and outsourced specialists. An annual conference is held each year in London to discuss the latest trends, allow key players to meet, adapt new business strategies, understand challenges and solve issues, build relationships and learn best practices for the airline industry.

Engineer 229
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Do venture capitalists have an ethical duty to startups?

The Next Web

'Janine Yancey is the CEO & President of Emtrain — an organization dedicated to creating user-friendly, memorable and scalable ethics and harassment prevention training for the workplace. Before I get into the “ethical duty” mentioned in the title, allow me to quickly run a few things by you. In the past few months, we’ve seen a number of entrepreneurs at startups make some serious ethical and professional mistakes.

More Trending

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How does someone get a meeting with angel investor David S. Rose?

Gust

'The most useful meetings with an investor are ones where going in everyone understands that there may actually be a rational reason for the investor to be interested. So even if my own mother asked me to meet with you, and you were pitching me a biotech opportunity for a $10 million investment at a $90 million valuation, I might take the meeting, but it wouldn’t be particularly useful for either of us.

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Digital Paralysis

Feld Thoughts

'I heard a great phrase from Jenna Walker at Artifact Uprising yesterday. We had a Blackstone Entrepreneurs Network Colorado meeting with her and her partner and in the middle of the discussion about their business Jenna used the phrase “digital paralysis” to describe one of the things she thinks is driving the incredible engagement of their customers.

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How to Open a Successful Hair Salon

Up and Running

'If your dream is to open a hair salon, now might be one of the best times to do it. According to a report from the Professional Beauty Association, the salon industry is growing. Since the recession, the industry has rebounded and analysts expect continued growth for at least the next five years. While the timing might be right, you’ll still face a lot of competition.

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Apple And IBM Bury The Hatchet In The Collaboration Economy

YoungUpstarts

'By Topher Morrison, author of “ Collaboration Economy: Eliminate the Competition by Creating Partnership Opportunities ”. If you need any further proof that the information age is dead and the collaboration age is now in full swing, bitter rivals Apple Inc., and IBM have announced that they are going to be collaborating to create approximately 100 business apps for the iPhone and iPad.

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Twitter Link Roundup #229 – Small Business, Startups, Innovation, Social Media, Design, Marketing and More

crowdSPRING Blog

'Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about logo design , web design , startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! Here are some of the links that I’ve liked and shared this past week!

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How To Test The Startup Lifestyle Before You Commit

Startup Professionals Musings

'If you think you are the perfect fit for the entrepreneur lifestyle, but you’re not yet sure if you’re ready to start your own, then I recommend that you take a job with an existing startup first to validate the culture realities against your dream. Without risking all your life savings, you may find that corporate desk you have as an alternative is a lot more satisfying.

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Convert More Visitors By Improving Your Internal Site Search

ConversionXL

'According to eConsultancy, up to 30% of eCommerce visitors will use internal site search. Typically speaking, due to the increased level of purchase intent, are also known to convert sometimes up to 5-6X higher than the average non-site search visitor. Natural language processing software Inbenta mentions in this article a client who noticed their site search customers converted 43% higher, and eConsultancy talks about cases where site search visitors are making up as much as 13.8% of the overa

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When Vinod Khosla answered my question with a non-verbal

K9 Ventures

'No, not that kind of non-verbal gesture. I believe this was in April 2010 and if memory serves me correct it was an event hosted at the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos by Sand Hill Angels , where Vinod Khosla gave a talk. I was relatively new to the investing world at the time having started K9 Ventures just a year before in April 2009. In his talk Vinod walked through some examples of different companies he had invested in through Khosla Ventures.

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What Startups Need to Know About Exit Strategies

Up and Running

'The exit strategy isn’t about you, it’s about your investors. Startups looking for angel investors or venture capital (VC) absolutely need an exit strategy because investors require it. The exit is what gives them a return. Exit strategies related to startup funding are quite often misunderstood: The “exit” in exit strategy is for the money, not the startup founders or small business owners.

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How to Miss By a Mile: An Alternative Look at Uber’s Potential Market Size

abovethecrowd.com

'On June 18, Aswath Damodaran , a finance professor at NYU’s Stern School of Business, published an article on FiveThirtyEight titled “ Uber Isn’t Worth $17 Billion. ” This post was a shortened version of a more detailed post he had written for his own blog titled “ A Disruptive Cab Ride to Riches: The Uber Payoff.” Using a combination of market data, math, and financial analysis, Professor Damodaran concluded that his best estimate of the value of Uber is $5.9 billion, far short of the value re

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Sunny Whether: Two Types of Forecasting Models for Running Your Startup

Hunter Walker

'Hey founders, want to hear something incredibly frustrating about seed financing? I don’t believe the forecast you show me. You know the one that inevitably has you at $100 million in revenue by Year Three? Yeah, that one. It’s a great discussion point to understand how you think of your business’ potential but as an operating plan?

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Here’s Why a Booming Tech Market May Fool You into Thinking You’re Successful

Both Sides of the Table

'Since 2009 we’ve been in an unequivocal bull market. Venture capitalists have raised increasing amounts of money from their investors (LPs) every year. An impressive number of new VCs have been created – most of them with new seed funds. We’ve had an explosion of alternate sources of financing from crowd-sourcing, angels, accelerators, incubators, corporates, corporate incubators.

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30 Tips for Great Digital Marketing

Duct Tape Marketing

'30 Tips for Great Digital Marketing written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing. It’s guest post day here at Duct Tape Marketing and today’s guest post is from Tara Banda – Enjoy! A man walks into a bar/restaurant/hotel/car repair shop. Chances are, he found it online. That’s because today’s consumers, 80% according to Google , rely more on the Web to find and choose local businesses.

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Oracle DaaS Data-as-a-Service

deal architect

'Oracle invited me to moderate a panel in their DaaS launch today. Watch the whole hour for some great perspectives on this exciting new market category, and our panel starting around 26.00. Talking to Steve Miranda and Omar Tawakol before.

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How to Forecast Sales

Up and Running

'Sales forecasting is much easier than you think, and much more useful than you imagine. It’s not about guessing the future correctly. We’re human; we don’t do that well. Instead, it’s about assumptions, expectations, drivers, tracking, and management. You review and revise your forecast regularly. Since sales are intimate with costs and expenses, the forecast helps you budget and manage.

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How Investors Make Better Decisions: The Investment Readiness Level

Steve Blank

'Investors sitting through Incubator or Accelerator demo days have three metrics to judge fledgling startups – 1) great looking product demos, 2) compelling PowerPoint slides, and 3) a world-class team. Other than “I’ll know it when I see it”, there’s no formal way for an investor to assess project maturity or quantify risks. Other than measuring engineering progress, there’s no standard language to communicate progress.

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Governance Models That Don’t Scale: The World According to Charles T. Munger and Jean Jacques Rousseau

Pascal's View

'Can you name five benign dictators who have ruled successfully for any meaningful period of time (non-fiction)? Can you name five successful, long serving CEO’s (excluding Warren Buffett ) whose governance histories are free of the “high-beta” associated with outliers such as Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs ? It’s not easy. Why? Because enlightened dictators and their corporate CEO equivalents are very, very rare; maintaining immunity to the intoxicating effects of power challenges basic human nat

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A Great Discussion with @skupor @davemcclure @msuster on Changes in the VC Industry

Both Sides of the Table

'I recently attended and presented at Dave McClure’s PreMoney conference in San Francisco. I go every year because I love events hosted & moderated by insiders involving discussions by insiders because it maximizes the amount of real discussions people have. What you’ll see if you watch the video is an unscripted and unfiltered look into how Scott Kupor & I see some of the changes and challenges of the venture industry. tl;dr version.

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SEO Blended Copy: Dos and Don’ts for Boosting Your Website’s Organic Discoverability

Duct Tape Marketing

'SEO Blended Copy: Dos and Don’ts for Boosting Your Website’s Organic Discoverability written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing. It’s guest post day here at Duct Tape Marketing and today’s guest post is from Maria Orozova – Enjoy! These days, it’s all about organic: organic produce, organic pressed-juice, holistic baby diapers made from all-organic materials – the list goes on.

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Think Hard Before Jumping From Corporate To Startup

Startup Professionals Musings

'I talk to many people who have spent years struggling up the corporate ladder who dream of jumping ship and becoming an entrepreneur. I hasten to tell them that every job move is fraught with risk, but the move from employee to entrepreneur is on the high end of the risk curve. It’s a big jump, especially in today’s economy, so do your homework first on this one.

Startup 271
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How to Pick the Right Attorney For Your Startup

Up and Running

'Picking the right attorney in your startup is as important as picking the right business partner. You can’t underestimate the importance of selecting an attorney who “gets” your business model, your market opportunity, and most importantly, your fundraising and exit strategy. My business partner and I made many mistakes in our first tech startup, and so many of them were the result of choosing a lawyer who was a terrible fit.

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Validation: Be Sure Your Startup Vision Isn’t a Hallucination. 2 Minutes to See Why

Steve Blank

'If you can’t see the video click here Filed under: 2 Minute Lessons , Business Model versus Business Plan , Customer Development , Lean LaunchPad , Teaching.

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13 Negotiating Techniques Taught At The Wharton School Of Business

YoungUpstarts

'by Steven G. Blum, author of “ Negotiating Your Investments: Use Proven Negotiation Methods to Enrich Your Financial Life “ Life is a series of negotiations. While we may realize this in theory, we probably don’t realize how often it applies in practice. Your work schedule, your pay and benefits, prices in big box stores, cell phone contracts, day care arrangements — you name it, it’s negotiable.

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Happy 10th, Deal Architect

deal architect

'Filing quarterly corporate taxes I came across Deal Architect’s incorporation papers. Happy (belated) birthday!

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How to Incorporate Brand Advocates into Your Marketing Strategy

Duct Tape Marketing

'How to Incorporate Brand Advocates into Your Marketing Strategy written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing. It’s guest post day here at Duct Tape Marketing and today’s guest post is from Holly Cordner – Enjoy! photo credit: Intersection Consulting via photopin cc. When asked about how and why they make purchases, most people say that reviews and recommendations play a major role.

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Kickstart Your Startup Credibility With A Prototype

Startup Professionals Musings

'These days, everyone wants to be an entrepreneur, pitching their latest and greatest new idea, and looking for someone to give them money. Angel investors, like me, have long figured out that asking to see the prototype is a quick way to separate the ‘wannabes’ from serious players. Talk is cheap, but entrepreneurs who show you a working model of their idea know how to execute.

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Boston Startup Talent: Leaky Bucket or Everlasting Spring?

Agile VC

'One of our portfolio companies, Plastiq , announced yesterday that they raised a $10M Series B led by Khosla Ventures and are planning to move their headquarters from Boston to San Francisco. We’re thrilled for the company to have a great investment partner joining the syndicate and one with deep payments expertise having backed companies like Square, Stripe, Fundbox, and others.

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Getting Lean in Education – By Getting Out of the Classroom

Steve Blank

'This week the National Science Foundation goes Lean on education by providing $1.2 million to educators who want to bring their classroom innovations to a wider audience. ——– The I-Corps program started when the U.S. National Science Foundation adopted my Lean LaunchPad class. Their goal was to train University scientists and researchers to use Lean Startup methods (business model design, customer development and agile engineering) to commercialize their science.

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Transparency Doesn’t Have To Be Just Another Buzzword

YoungUpstarts

'by Bobby Emamian , co-founder and CEO of Prolific Interactive. Synergy. Scalability. Disruption. It’s amazing how quickly an idea can go from buzzworthy to buzzword. Sometimes buzzwords originate because they’re great ideas. But all too often, they become irrelevant once they’re branded a buzzword. The term “transparency” has struggled with this distinction in the business world for the past few years, but it’s time to clarify the role of transparency and the implications it can have for you

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How Can This Be A Billion Dollar Company?

Feld Thoughts

'I was in the bathroom this morning catching up on all the blogs (via Feedly ) that I hadn’t read this week since my head was in a bunch of other things. I came across one from Nic Brisbourne (Forward Ventures) titled I’m a stock picker. I wish he had called it “This Unicorn Thing Is B t For Early Stage Investing” but I think he’s a little more restrained than I am.