A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MAY 17, 2010

You probably think of "tech support" as the bottom of the food chain. "Shit flows downhill" and all that. After all: Tech support deals with insane customers. Tech support answers the phone; a job even salesmen don't want. Tech support keeps angry customers at bay while having no power to effect change. Yep, that sounds lowly. Dismal too — how would you like to deal with an irate voice screaming at you when you know how to fix the problem but lack the authority to do it?

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Technical Review Sales Turkey Software Review 245

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2010

Our guest this week on #TWiVC was Dana Settle , partner at Greycroft Partners , a venture capital firm with offices in New York and Los Angeles. It’s always fun debating companies with Dana because she’s always so knowledgeable on deals – particularly those in the digital media, ad-tech and eCommerce spaces. When the show has been processed it will be available here (estimated 8pm PDT).

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Partner New York City Cofounder Syndicate 240

Steve Blank

MAY 17, 2010

Last week one of the schools I teach at invited me to judge a business plan contest. I suggested that they first might want to read my post on why business plans are a poor planning and execution tool for startups. They called back laughing and the invitation disappeared. At best I think business plan competitions are a waste of time. But until now I haven’t been able to articulate a framework of why or had a concrete suggestion of what to replace them with.

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Business Plan Business Model Customer Development Deal Flow 312

SoCal CTO

MAY 19, 2010

I’m seeing and hearing that it’s becoming tough finding good developers again, at least here in Los Angeles. On Friday, at the LA CTO Forum , I heard from a couple of CTOs having trouble finding good developers. My company, TechEmpower , recently added a few top notch developers, but it wasn’t easy to find just the right people. And it’s not just me, Ben Kuo just posted - Good news for developers (and jobs) We’ve been talking with a lot (and I mean a LOT) of people who are looking for developers

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Southern California Los Angeles Developer Offshore 175

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

Feld Thoughts

MAY 18, 2010

Wow – I needed that vacation. Sometimes it just catches up with me and I don’t realize how tired I am. Amy and I were going to go to Paris but both of us just needed to chill out so we went to our house in Keystone and just hid out for a week. I only had a few things that I had to pay attention to and the goddess of my schedule Kelly made sure I was available when needed.

Silicon Valley 97

Silicon Valley Software Review Technical Review Mobile 97

Entrepreneurs-Journey.com by Yaro Starak

MAY 16, 2010

I wasn’t going to write this article. I was comfortable with my stance on outsourcing, comfortable enough to recommend it and promote products, and profit from the affiliate commissions, from people who use the catch-call of $2-per-hour labor and the phrase – “ they do the work, you get the money “ I’ve begun the process of outsourcing to the Philippines.

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Philippines Securities and Exchange Commission Hiring Thailand 111

crowdSPRING Blog

MAY 18, 2010

In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.

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Jacksonville West Virginia Design Brunei 71

Software By Rob

MAY 21, 2010

Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← How to Find Your 4-Second Startup Pitch iMemories VHS to DVD Conversions → How to Avoid the Three Startup Danger Points Micropreneurship , Startups If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.

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Software Review Startup RSS Software Developers 55

Up and Running

MAY 21, 2010

A lot went on this week at Google’s developer conference in San Francisco. Google TV, for example. (video below). I’ve got Comcast DVR and Roku these days, plus an iPad, and I’ve gone through ReplayTV and Tivo, but I guess I can’t get enough of this stuff, because now I want Google TV. Consider the video here (and if it doesn’t show, click here for the original on YouTube): That’s only part of it.

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San Francisco Technical Review Marketing Web 61

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 16, 2010

Canceling meetings is part of modern day life. I seem to get so over programmed that if I ever want to have a “break-out&# unplanned trip somewhere I seem to have to reschedule meetings. Not fun, but a reality. And people reschedule meetings with me on a regular basis, too. If done correctly I never have any problem with it at all. Done poorly and it really puts a bad taste in my mouth.

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Las Vegas Warrant Cofounder Email 346

crowdSPRING Blog

MAY 17, 2010

As a Kellogg alum (worlds greatest marketing school, after all, uh huh) I would be remiss not to write occasionally about marketing in the context of our world: online entrepreneurs. At crowdSPRING, we are constantly evaluating our own mix of marketing strategy, tactics, and resources and the “debates&# can get extreme. Like many small companies with limited marketing budgets, we are forced to work with the resources at hand, so creativity, partnering approaches, social media, and viral ef

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Marketing Startup Viral Small Business 84

deal architect

MAY 19, 2010

Ok, as we enter Day 3 of this event, let me lay out the stuff I have been impressed with/need to compliment so far A much more smiling Hasso Plattner than in prior years. We had a chance to spend.

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Steve Blank

MAY 20, 2010

At times VC’s forget who their business is built on. Nice Car. Last week in a car showroom of all places I ran into a VC who I hadn’t seen in ten years. He had sat on the board of my last company and we chatted and made small talk as he was admiring a new car. It was clear that he had no memory of a phone conversation my partner and I have never forgotten.

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Founder Cofounder Salary Naming 275

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 18, 2010

As a startup entrepreneur you’ll have many demands for your time. Especially if you start to have a degree of success or build a high public profile. Everyone will want you to speak at conferences. Service providers will want to get to know you. Potential employees want to “get together.&# VC’s will want to learn about what you’re up to and later stage VCs will have their 23-year-old analysts call you to tell you how interested they are in your company.

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Later Stage Demand Video Email 305

Sophia Perl of Wisdom

MAY 19, 2010

Alright, so you have a business and now you want to app-ify it and get in on the iPhone craze, but you don’t have (or want to hire) iPhone developers in-house. What do you do? You outsource it of course! I just happen to come across a string of messages of a group message board. The topic, the going rate for contracting out iPhone app development, not a developer’s salary.

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Application Development Salary Web Demand 49

deal architect

MAY 20, 2010

My compliments to SAP yesterday for the logistics and the upbeat mood at SapphireNow have been widely reported. The impressive technology and logistics at the event, in particular, deserve a post on my New Florence innovation blog – SAP is. Tags: Enterprise Software (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP).

Software 256

Software Technology 256

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 19, 2010

As a member of the local angel group Selection Committee, I’ve seen a lot of startup presentations to investors, and I’ve never seen one that was too short - maybe short on content, but not short on pages! A perfect round number is ten slides, with the right content, that can be covered in ten minutes. I’ve published these points before, but based on interest, it’s time for an update.

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Elevator Pitch Exit Strategy Burn Rate Merger 235

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 15, 2010

I recently wrote a piece about how Entrepreneurs Should be Respected, Not Loved. The premise was that some leaders are too enamored with the approbation of their peers than making the tough decisions in the business that are bound to upset some people. The corollary to this rule is “decision by indecision.&# This is one of my favorite lines to remind entrepreneurs because it is the sort of garden variety mistake that is so common in everyday life.

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Dilution Hiring Partner Employee 299

SoCal CTO

MAY 19, 2010

I’m planning on going to a Tech Coast Angels mixer tomorrow and the topic for me is whether there is angel funding out there for startups that don’t meet classic VC models. If there are, then who are they, what are the criteria, what does it typically look like? By way of background for the question, there’s a great post by Bob Aholt, a Pasadena Angel: An Angel Investor’s Thoughts on Valuation.

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Hockey Stick NPV IRR Valuation 205

Aymeric Gaurat-Apelli

MAY 16, 2010

Skip to content Follow: RSS Email Twitter Aymeric Gaurat-Apelli On building profitable web applications Home Contact me Creations Blog Books Entrepreneurship & Startups General Online experiments Programming tips and tricks Startup tips and tricks Tags productivity , ruby on rails How an experienced Asp.net developer multiplied his productivity ten fold by Aymeric on May 17th, 2010 I have been on the.Net wagon since the beta 1 (2002?

Ruby 32

Ruby Developer Product Caching 32

deal architect

MAY 19, 2010

I was talking to Marilyn Pratt of SAP last night about women in technology – she is quoted on that topic in my upcoming book (excerpt here I posted on Ada Lovelace Day which celebrates women technology bloggers). She was. Tags: Enterprise Software (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP).

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Software Technology 186

entrepreMusings

MAY 18, 2010

I recently finished reading Outliers: The Story of Success (Amazon link) by Malcolm Gladwell. Gladwell also wrote The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (Amazon link) and Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking (Amazon link). I have not read either of the other two but have heard much about them. They were and continue to be top sellers.

Restful 28

Restful Software Review Jamaica Technical Review 28

SoCal CTO

MAY 18, 2010

Continuing my series of posts that I’ve been collecting that live at the intersection of Startups, Startup Development and being a Startup CTO. Here are a couple of the other collections: 16 Great Startup Posts from March , Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April. Some good ones already from May: "Authentic" is dead - A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks , May 3, 2010 Phrases that should be retired include - “Putting customers first” You Actually Did This?

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Churn Rate Flash Startup Metrics 150

Aymeric Gaurat-Apelli

MAY 16, 2010

Skip to content Follow: RSS Email Twitter Aymeric Gaurat-Apelli On building profitable web applications Home Contact me Creations Blog Books Entrepreneurship & Startups General Online experiments Programming tips and tricks Startup tips and tricks Tags productivity , ruby on rails How an experienced Asp.net developer multiplied his productivity ten fold by Aymeric on May 17th, 2010 I have been on the.Net wagon since the beta 1 (2002?

Ruby 28

Ruby Developer Product Caching 28

deal architect

MAY 18, 2010

Edward Carr, the editorial director of the Economist , is quoted in my book, The New Polymath: “Isaiah Berlin once divided thinkers into two types. Foxes, he wrote, know many things; whereas hedgehogs know one big thing." Several EIs had.

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 15, 2010

We just had our sixth episode of #TWiVC and I felt this one was the best. This week was had Jason Calacanis as our guest. It’s always fun chatting with Jason because he’s knowledgeable about the market, quick on topics and pushes me to talk more about VC / entrepreneur issues. We’re staring to get the hang of how to divide the show up into talking about deals but also talking about issues for entrepreneurs during funding.

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Stealth SEC Advertising Accredited Investor 285

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 21, 2010

One of the hot new approaches I have seen around the country for assisting startups looking for funding has been “crowd-sourcing” tools ( ProFounder ) or “crowd-pitching” events ( Funding Universe ). These are variations on a “crowd-funding” theme to raise money for a startup through social networks and voting at public events. Crowd-sourcing tools, usually Internet applications, use the social media to poll for interest, feedback, and ultimately some funding for the startup.

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Non-disclosure Agreement Intellectual Property Startup Social Media 149

Feld Thoughts

MAY 20, 2010

I just finished up spending the past two days at Google I/O. On one of the panels I participated in yesterday ( VCs Who Code ), the endless discussion about open (e.g. Google) vs. closed (e.g. Apple) came up with Dave McClure stating “ Open is for losers.” We had a short but spirited debate about a topic that could easily consume an entire panel before Dick Costolo (our moderator) quickly moved us on.

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Flash Mobile Web Email 164

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 20, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, May 20, 2010 Philosophy Helps Start-Ups Move Faster (WSJ on the Lean Startup) The Wall Street Journal covers the Lean Startup movement in todays paper. Although the article is a bit me-centric, I think they did a good job capturing the fact that this is more than just the bloggers and writers, but represents a shift in thinking among entrepreneurs all over the world.

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Lean San Francisco Arlington Continuous Deployment 153

Rembrandt Communications

MAY 19, 2010

Several months ago, I met Robert Kiyosaki, and he agreed to offer his advice for my blog and the StartupNation audience at [link] Robert is the author of The New York Times, international bestselling book, “Rich Dad Poor Dad,” with 26 books in the Rich Dad series. As an investor, entrepreneur and educator with unconventional perspectives on [.].

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New York Audience Entrepreneur Public Relations 127

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 17, 2010

If you are a first-time entrepreneur, I often recommend that you team with a co-founder with experiences, connections, and a skill set that complements, but doesn’t duplicate yours. Even experienced entrepreneurs need a partner to strengthen their position. The question is how to find that elusive perfect-fit partner. First, I will admit there is no magic formula here, just like in real life when trying to find a relationship partner.

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Cofounder Founder Silicon Valley Startup 135

Feld Thoughts

MAY 20, 2010

Another TechStars Boulder company – this time DailyBurn from the class of 2008 – has been acquired by IAC. I’m super proud of Andy Smith, Stephen Blankenship, and the whole DailyBurn team. This is now TechStars fifth meaningful acquisition and the first from the 2008 class. The TechStars Boulder 2010 class has begun. I spent Monday afternoon meeting with each of the teams and I’m psyched about this year’s group.

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Affiliate Seattle Boston New York 122

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 17, 2010

“Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light. He was considered an evildoer who had dealt with a demon mankind dreaded. But thereafter men had fire to keep them warm, to cook their food, to light their caves. He had left them a gift they had not conceived and he had lifted dardness off the earth.

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Web Salary Venture Capital Employee 118

Start Up Blog

MAY 19, 2010

We all have to pitch for business, regardless of whether we are in startup land or an established firm. Without new business we die. Pitching can take the form of gaining new retail outlets, signing up memberships, raising capital or even just getting added to preferred supplier list. It’s all selling, and more often than not we focus on the opportunity event, yet this is the exact opposite of what we ought do.

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Stealth Widget Reputation Employee 101

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 20, 2010

A couple of years ago, I saw first hand what can happen to a founder, and the business, when the founder practiced unhealthy habits, such as working 20 hours a day. A typical “Type A” personality, with boundless energy and enthusiasm, she aggravated some previous health limitations until she was bedridden, and the business floundered. Many entrepreneurs are too focused on their dream to take notice of health warning signs, which leads them to ignore business health signs as well.

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Restful Employee Metrics Demand 133

Feld Thoughts

MAY 21, 2010

Trada – one of our investments that is based in Boulder – is absolutely killing it. It was started by Niel Robertson, who we’ve worked with in various forms going back to the mid-1990’s. When Niel first came up with the idea, he and my partner Seth Levine spent a few months really going deep and figuring out how (PPC) pay per click marketing campaigns (e.g.

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