Sat.Jun 20, 2015 - Fri.Jun 26, 2015

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When Should You Allow Exclusivity in Deals?

Both Sides of the Table

I’ve heard many investors and some executives repeat the mantra, “Never offer exclusive deals,” and since this blanket statement is generally bad advice I thought I’d offer the less conventional but I believe more practical version of why exclusive deals can actually be a huge bonus for a startup and why I actively encourage them.

PR 269
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7 Tips On Building Better Connections With Your Team

Startup Professionals Musings

Entrepreneurs need to be effective team leaders, since no one can transform an idea into a product and a business without some help. Unfortunately many founders I work with as a mentor are experts on the technical side, but have no insight into leading a team. But fortunately, team building is a skill that can be learned and practiced, for those willing to put in some effort.

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Lean Innovation Management – Making Corporate Innovation Work

Steve Blank

I’ve been working with large companies and the U.S. government to help them innovate faster– not just kind of fast, but 10x the number of initiatives in 1/5 the time. A 50x speedup kind of fast. Here’s how. —– Lean Innovation Management. In the last five years “ Lean Startup ” methodologies have enabled entrepreneurs to efficiently build a startup by searching for product/market fit rather than blindly trying to execute.

Lean 262
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Why A Big Ego Could Be Your Downfall (And Seven Tips To Help You Hone Your Humility)

YoungUpstarts

by Edward D. Hess, author of “ Learn or Die: Using Science to Build a Leading-Edge Learning Organization “. Not so long ago, our culture really (really) admired people with big egos. We called them rugged individualists, fearless leaders, MVPs, visionaries, and go-getters. We respected these confident and successful folks for (seemingly) having all the answers.

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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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Your 2015 guide to summer reading for startups

The Next Web

Summer has unofficially begun here in the U.S. And I don’t know about you, but there’s nothing I love more than relaxing with a great book on the beach or laying in the grass at a park. And if I can get better at my job in the process? That, my friends, is a win-win. Or double win, as I like to call it. Since our previous reading lists ( here and here ) were so helpful for me personally as a reader, I want to pay it forward.

PR 126
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7 Keys To A Compelling Investor Executive Summary

Startup Professionals Musings

Few investors these days have the time or patience to read a full business plan, so a better way to catch their eye is with a tightly written and well formatted two-page executive summary. As a model, think high-quality marketing collateral, with text and graphics in columns and sidebars, but focused on the value of your business, rather than selling your product.

More Trending

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Sluggish Summer: 3 Tips To Rejuvenate Employees And Keep Your Business At Top Performance

YoungUpstarts

by Richard Milam , the Founder and CEO of EnableSoft Incorporated. The summer brings humidity, heat, vacations and the well-known fact that employee productivity decreases this time of year. Workers become distracted and sluggish when wanting to be out-of-the-office. A Captive Network study of 600 white collar North American workers says that workplace productivity drops 20 percent during the summer months, worker attendance decreases by 19 percent, projects take 13 percent more time to complet

Employee 156
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Maternova and the Business of Saving Lives: A Secret to Success Story

Up and Running

Meg Wirth and Allyson Cote, founders of Maternova. Maternal health is a concern the world over, especially in developing nations. Childbirth can be a precarious process; for some women and their infants it can be life-threatening. According to the World Health Organization, 800 women die every day during childbirth, with 99 percent of those deaths taking place in the developing world.

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5 Ways Writing A Book Will Supercharge Your Online Presence

Duct Tape Marketing

5 Ways Writing A Book Will Supercharge Your Online Presence written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing. Let me tell you right off the bat, writing and publishing a book is a lot easier than you think. In September of 2014, when I became a Duct Tape Marketing Certified Consultant, I provided a list of ten reasons why joining the Duct Tape Marketing Consultant network is a no-brainer for digital agencies.

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How To Find, Vet And Hire A Software Consultant

YFS Magazine

If you are running a business, chances are you will need the services of a software consultant at some point.

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Tips For Improving Your Customer Service

YoungUpstarts

Providing great customer service is one of the most important parts of the business equation. If you want to ensure that your customers keep coming back to you with their business, you need to make sure that they can find help when they need it, that they are left alone when they want to be, and that your sales team is able to anticipate their needs so that they will feel exceedingly well attended to.

Customer 179
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Diligence

Rob Go

When an investor “does work” on a potential investment, it usually means engaging in some form of due diligence. One of my favorite VC sayings is from an investor that has said that “due diligence is something VC’s do very studiously when they want to kill a deal” I’ve often quoted this, half joking, half in truth.

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Small Business and Startups: Teams and Transparency

crowdSPRING Blog

How transparent is too transparent? At crowdSPRING we have worked hard since we first launched to share information openly and honestly with our users, our investors, and our team. We communicate regularly with customers about site issues, new features, and our policies and procedures. We ask for feedback and suggestions and, when users choose to share their ideas with us, we consider these carefully and seriously.

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How Do You Know if You Have the Right CEO to Run Your Business Until the End?

Both Sides of the Table

Many people don’t know that I actually became Chairman of my first company and relinquishing the CEO role before the company was sold. It’s a topic I’m well versed in personally and I understand the difficult emotional decision of whether to hand the reigns to someone else of the baby you’ve struggled so hard to launch into the world.

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[Infographic] Mobile App Backlog Affecting The Enterprise: Outsystems

YoungUpstarts

Here’s a shocking statistic – according to a survey by London-based insights agency Opinion Matters last year revealed that a shocking 85% of enterprises have a backlog of between one and 20 mobile applications. That’s right, mobile app development is lagging far behind the operational needs and burgeoning mobile use in the enterprise, highlighting the dire challenges faced by enterprises when it comes to mobile application development.

Mobile 145
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An epic time for enterprise technology

deal architect

Like most, I have watched many a “One more thing” announcement by Steve Jobs. While it made many run out and line up for blocks when Apple introduced that shiny new thing, it inspired the author in me to write.

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10 Recommendations For Entrepreneurs Who Hate Norms

Startup Professionals Musings

Every culture and community puts pressure on its members to follow the norms. Even young people who start out wanting to be different are called “freaks,” and most are slowly bent back into the norm by the time they “grow up.” Maybe that’s why so many entrepreneurs struggle with building a disruptive new business, where breaks from the norm are the key to success.

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10 Things You Should Never Ever Do On Twitter

Brandanew

One of the best things about social media is that there are no hard and fast rules set by the snooty experts of the field. But just like every other thing that comes with no restrictions, the platform is often misused for purposes that leave us at our wit’s end. Whether it is a business account or a personal one, it isn’t everyone’s cup of tea to stick to keeping tweets attractive and followable – it requires a little attention to detail.

Warrant 196
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[Review] Jabra Evolve 80

YoungUpstarts

The modern workplace – and especially those incorporating the open concept office design that’s supposed to combat the evils of cubicles – can be an exceedingly bustling and noisy environment. Between team conversations, people movement and that annoying colleague who keeps stopping by for a chat, there is a decidedly lack of privacy that can keep you from concentrating on your work.

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Traction #5: How One Journalist Broke into Tech & Rocketed to the Top in Just 18 Months

View from Seed

Traction is NextView’s twice-monthly podcast sharing the stories of creative and unusual ways entrepreneurs gain initial results. Everyone likes to say that startups should do things that don’t scale, so we wondered … what ARE those things? Available on iTunes , Stitcher , and SoundCloud. In this episode of Traction, Pando Daily tech writer Dennis Keohane joins me to discuss his insanely fast rise from teacher to local reporter to national reporter in our industry.

Boston 178
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5 Principles That Lead To More CleanTech Startups

Startup Professionals Musings

The cost of entry for an aspiring entrepreneur has never been lower, and the total wealth of opportunities has never been larger. You can start a new web site business on the Internet for as little as $100, with cheap smart phone apps, new technology innovations, or tapping the multitude of opportunities brought by capitalizing on our concern for dwindling natural resources.

Startup 207
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How to Choose Content Marketing Tools

Brandanew

There are tons of social media and content marketing tools available in the market. And routine tasks in the marketing/ branding departments are being replaced by intelligent systems. These could include, automatic curation, scheduling, image edits or any such functions. Tools can be a big addition to your Content Marketing costs. Thus it’s important to know how to choose Content Marketing tools for your brand.

Marketing 184
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9 Essential Guidelines For Becoming An Entrepreneur

YoungUpstarts

by Robert B. Pamplin Jr., serial entrepreneur and author of 19 books. In a saturated and increasingly competitive market, the first steps toward a prosperous entrepreneurial career begin with a strong imagination, belief in yourself and your abilities, and refusal to quit in the face of adversity. To achieve entrepreneurial success, it is crucial that you believe in yourself and have confidence in your abilities.

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Diligence

Rob Go

When an investor “does work” on a potential investment, it usually means engaging in some form of due diligence. One of my favorite VC sayings is from an investor that has said that “due diligence is something VC’s do very studiously when they want to kill a deal” I’ve often quoted this, half joking, half in truth.

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The Peter Principle Can Paralyze Your Startup Team

Startup Professionals Musings

The good news is that recent big company financial woes and layoffs have generated a flood of candidates with real experience seeking positions at startups. The bad news is that many of these frustrated employees may have already reached their level of incompetence ( The Peter Principle ). They are not the ones you need in the few key team positions to drive your startup.

Startup 205
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Infographic: 5 Social Media Trends For Small Businesses

Brandanew

In a 2015 social media trends report shared by Social Media Examiner , tons of interesting information is available for marketers and brand owners. For those who don’t have the time to go through the 53-pager, here are the 5 social media trends for small businesses summarized for a review! 5 Social Media Trends For Small Businesses in 2015. 1.

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Four Tips For Small Businesses To Increase Brand Awareness Fast

YoungUpstarts

By Pamela Webber, Chief Marketing Officer at 99designs. When it comes to raising brand awareness, small businesses have options. Here are a few of the best ways to accelerate brand awareness for immediate and profound results. 1. Engage in Social Media. Small businesses can use social media to build a brand fast. Done right, you can reach many users quickly with relatively little direct monetary cost.

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Don’t Have a Content Marketing Strategy? You’re Losing Money!

Rembrandt Communications

Writing copy that sells is not a passing trend. While there is a lot of hype now about BtoC and BtoB Content Marketing and Content Strategy, these processes have been around for a long time… just with different names. And there is no need for confusion. Let’s keep it simple… What is content marketing? It’s […]. The post Don’t Have a Content Marketing Strategy?

Marketing 144
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9 questions to ask your software’s beta testers

The Next Web

Launching your software in beta mode is an excellent way to get feedback on your product and make any necessary adjustments before bringing it to market. Your beta testers hold all of the valuable information you need when it comes to improving your product, so it’s worth it to take the time to ask them about any difficulties or pain points they experienced while testing it.

Software 130
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4 Challenges Brands May Face With Twitter Influencers

Brandanew

Live Mint writer Charles Assisi recently posted a fun article on buying “ fake followers ” on Twitter in India. He bumped his Twitter following from two thousand to 47 thousand (and at the time of writing this post it’s over 70K) by spending $20 with a specialized Twitter-fame purchase firm. Would you now consider his profile as influential?

Analytics 158
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6 Ways To Overcome The Fear Of Failure In Business

YoungUpstarts

By Jacqueline Whitmore, author of “ Poised for Success: Mastering the Four Qualities That Distinguish Outstanding Professionals ”. We all know that getting ahead in your career requires many things: industry knowledge and expertise, experience, a proven track record, being liked by your colleagues and customers, having a good reputation and more. But one of the most common things holding back many people from reaching the success they deserve is the fear of failure.

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Who Knew GPS Tracking Could Do This For Small Business?

YFS Magazine

Faced with the burden of a challenging economy, it is increasingly important to do everything you can to boost cost savings by creating a more efficient workforce.

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I launched a startup with my mom

The Next Web

It was August 2013 when my co-founder at SportsManias called to tell me that we had raised $1 million in angel funding. I was a second-year in college on my way to the library at the University of Chicago; she was back in Miami, where our company is based. This moment confirmed that our vision for sports journalism wasn’t crazy after all. The investors believed in our mission to blend social media with the reporting of sports beat writers.

Cofounder 130
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Sales 3.0: evolution of the software sales function

Version One Ventures

It’s widely accepted that SaaS has permanently changed software sales. Enterprise software sales once meant a large “boots on the ground” field sales team who knew how to wine and dine the right individuals and stakeholders. With the emergence of SaaS, the sales process became more transactional and less about relationships. With software products at lower price points, companies need to make up revenue via volume.

Sales 122
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Four Lessons All Companies Can Learn From Baseball’s Astros Hacking Scandal

YoungUpstarts

By James Pooley, author of “ Secrets: Managing Information Assets in the Age of Cyberespionage “ Most of us assume that corporate espionage and digital theft of trade secrets rarely occur outside of technology, retail, and finance. But as the recent hacking of the Houston Astros’ internal computer network — allegedly by St. Louis Cardinals employees — proves, every company in every industry is vulnerable.

St. Louis 152
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Why Isn’t PGP Built Into Gmail?

Feld Thoughts

An increasing number of companies that I work with are using PGP to encrypt certain email. While they are comfortable sending a lot of email unencrypted, there are periodic threads that different people want to have encrypted for a variety of reasons, some rational and some not. Each company is dealing with this a different way. Suddenly I find myself managing a bunch of public keys in different PGP tools on different computers.

Email 118