Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2013

'This article initially appeared on Inc. If you haven’t already followed me on Twitter, that’s the fastest way to get blog updates. Click here. In my first enterprise software company we developed a methodology for sales that we called PUCCKA. This post is about the “P” or pain. The point of PUCCKA was to develop a common methodology to make sure our whole team approaches sales with the same mindset and to give us a language to talk with each other about our prospects, as in, “have y

Sales 367

Sales Software Review Social Media Customer 367

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 19, 2013

'Marketing is everything these days. You can have the best technology, but if customers don’t know you exist, or they don’t know how your technology solves a real problem for them, your startup will fail. Yet I see many entrepreneurs that focus on the basics of marketing too little and too late. They skimp on the design of their website, procrastinate on the rollout to make sure the product is perfect, and get so excited about technology features that they forget about creating value for custome

Marketing 258

Marketing Startup Technical Review Social Media 258

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 21, 2013

'by Chris Garrett. Building a business from the ground up can be a difficult process, and every entrepreneur knows the importance of marketing. There are many different types of marketing, and it isn’t uncommon for one or more of them to be overlooked by busy business owners. This guide is intended to ensure that your small business doesn’t miss out on any of the customers who can be reached by a thorough marketing campaign: Digital.

Marketing 153

Marketing Startup Technical Review Viral 153

Up and Running

JUNE 18, 2013

'Technology today affords us the opportunity to initiate contact with a lot of potential customers online, but many businesses fall short of actually converting these customers because they fail to truly engage them. The days when large companies could just blanket the airwaves with their sales pitches and actually expect a return from such advertising are gone.

Customer 99

Customer Social Network Community Programming 99

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

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2013

'In my first enterprise software company we developed a methodology for sales that we called PUCCKA , which I wrote about previously. Having a good sales methodology can help you ensure your company runs more disciplined campaigns and focuses scarce resources on your best opportunities. The first post covered the topic of “P” or pain. Simply, this is identifying a customer need which has economic value to them if they can solve it.

Campaign 336

Campaign Sales Software Customer 336

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 21, 2013

'Most leaders agree that poor customer service is a business killer today, in terms of lost customers, reduced profits, and low morale. Yet the average perception of customer experience continues to decline. Young entrepreneurs and startups, in particular, often remain naively unfocused, despite their passion, of what it takes to provide the high-quality service expected.

Customer 230

Customer Technical Review Startup Salary 230

Up and Running

JUNE 21, 2013

'Most of the challenges in starting a business relate back to doing the little things right. Like any good coach has said at some point: The fundamentals get you to the top. If you are thinking of starting a small business, make sure you follow these ten important rules for small businesses: 1. You need to manage your cash. The number one reason small businesses go bankrupt is lack of cash , not lack of profits.

Small Business 153

Small Business Software Review Lean Advertising 153

blog.alinelerner.com

JUNE 21, 2013

'Aline Lerner's Blog. making technical recruiting suck less. Home. Posts. About. Press. Lessons from a year’s worth of hiring data. Jun 21, 2013. I ran technical recruiting at TrialPay for a year before going off to start my own agency. Because I used to be an engineer, one part of my job was conducting first-round technical interviews, and between January 2012 and January 2013, I interviewed roughly 300 people for our back-end/full-stack engineer position.

CTO Hire 98

CTO Hire Hiring Software Review Technical Review 98

crowdSPRING Blog

JUNE 21, 2013

'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!

Social Media 93

Social Media Small Business Design Media 93

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 19, 2013

'by Erik Larson, president and founder of NextAdvisor.com. There are myriad challenges in starting a business from your home. Just getting the infrastructure in place to conduct business can seem like a daunting task, much less actually creating a successful operation. Fortunately, the proliferation of cloud services has been a boon to small businesses.

Cloud 168

Cloud Hosting Cofounder Technical Review 168

Growthink Blog

JUNE 17, 2013

'Holding constant for socioeconomic factors, the typical entrepreneur makes less money, works more hours and suffers more work-related stress than their employed counterparts. And when we combine these statistics with those that show a very low percentage of businesses ever attaining meaningful profitability, it is remarkable that people ever even dream to be entrepreneurs and start businesses at all.

Web Development 91

Web Development Web Entrepreneur Developer 91

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 15, 2013

'My mom seems to sneak into my blog from time-to-time. My dad less so. Mom was an entrepreneur and a civic leader. She was (is) a bit of a ball buster. And a negotiator. And a go getter. So she naturally fills my story arcs more easily. But of course we’re all a product of both of our parents – if we were fortunate enough to be raised by two individuals.

San Francisco 407

San Francisco South Carolina South America Colombia 407

tuckermax.me

JUNE 21, 2013

'Home. Menu. About. Reading Lists. Quote Lists. Book Summaries. Archive. Contact. June 21, 2013. Don’t look for talent, find people who do things. I wrote a blog post a while ago about what one of my former assistants did after working for me, and in it I wondered why so many of them have had success. My conclusion was that: I honestly don’t think I have much to do with it.

RSS 78

RSS New York Hiring Software Review 78

A Crowded Space

JUNE 18, 2013

' . It’s not demo days. It’s not AngelList. It’s not lawyers or bankers. It’s the stuff that happens behind the scenes. Due diligence calls. —— I recently led a $2M Series A investment for my firm, Sigma West. It’s in a company that’s building a killer analytics and engagement platform (still private, announcement to come soon).

Deal Flow 60

Deal Flow Technical Review Due Diligence Analytics 60

deal architect

JUNE 18, 2013

'It is embarrassing to see large vendors so desperate to show they are cloud players that they will grab at any straw. First there was SAP''s Bill McDemott''s gushy, mushy claim "We thank Lars so much for bringing the cloud.

Cloud 306

Cloud 306

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

'There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come. Victor Hugo. The Lean LaunchPad entrepreneurship curriculum has caught fire. This week 100 educators from around the world will come to Stanford to learn how to teach it. —– Life is full of unintended consequences. Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies.

Lean 286

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 286

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 17, 2013

'What makes an entrepreneur tick? Perhaps the better question is – what kind of leader makes the best entrepreneur? After all, startups are fast paced, small, and ever-morphing, which means it takes certain type of person to help make things succeed. Here’s a look at what a founder should be able to do: Development. Write Code. Build a server.

Advisory Board 279

Advisory Board Balance Sheet Term Sheet Entrepreneur 279

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 16, 2013

'We’ve all heard the old joke “In a bacon-and-egg breakfast, the chicken is involved, but the pig is committed.” This quote epitomizes the true essence of commitment. We all know at least one self-professed entrepreneur who claims to committed, but seems to treat it like a part-time hobby, won’t put any personal skin in the game, and is quick to give up when things are tough.

Leadership 264

Leadership Entrepreneur Startup 264

deal architect

JUNE 16, 2013

'On the New Florence blog Digital Marketing and Talent Infor-Art The Tesla Mobile app Google Now Big Data and story telling Ideo’s David Kelley Customized Crowdsourcing The future of on-demand marketing.

Demand 259

Demand Mobile Technology Customer 259

Early Growth Financial Services

JUNE 18, 2013

'Originally published in CoFounders Lab. I work with startup CEOs every day—from clean tech to Web 2.0, from SaaS to life science and everything in between—and I’ve seen what it takes to found and grow a successful company. Interestingly, the essential qualities you need to possess to be a founding CEO—or might be looking for in a co-founderVare not always obvious.

Cofounder 41

Cofounder Technical Cofounder Startup Web 41

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 17, 2013

'By Chelsey Lewis. Although business negotiations are an essential part of modern commerce, you may feel that you’re not very good at them. You may leave a meeting with a potential client feeling like you’ve just missed out on a lot of money or that you didn’t receive everything you wanted, or you may think you could have easily got a better deal with improved negotiation skills.

Conversion 211

Conversion Marketing 211

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 15, 2013

'Some entrepreneurs start polling venture capitalists for that multi-million dollar investment before they even have a business plan. That’s like trying to sell part of something to a stranger for big money when you haven’t fully defined it yet. It won’t work, it costs time and money, and hurts your credibility when you need them later. Every entrepreneur needs help and support along the way, from developing the initial idea, to selling off the successful business (exit strategy).

Incubator 256

Incubator Entrepreneur Exit Strategy Institutional Investors 256

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

'There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come. Victor Hugo. The Lean LaunchPad entrepreneurship curriculum has caught fire. This week 100 educators from around the world will come to Stanford to learn how to teach it. —– Life is full of unintended consequences. Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies.

Lean 178

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 178

Rembrandt Communications

JUNE 20, 2013

'Hint – It’s not just about adding search engine optimization keywords to your Website SEO, or search engine optimization, is a big mystery to many people. While many of us in the media and communications business have no trouble understanding it, it can be misunderstood by entrepreneurs and business people worldwide. If you fall into [.].

SEO 157

SEO Public Relations Engineer Web 157

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 20, 2013

'by Bill McBean, author of “ The Facts of Business Life: What Every Successful Business Owner Knows that You Don’t “ Doomed from the start. If you’re an entrepreneur or an entrepreneur-hopeful, it’s probably difficult to keep those four words from causing you to second guess your every move as you plan and run your business. They become especially hard to ignore when you consider the fact that less than 30 percent of businesses last more than 10 years, and most failures happen within

Leadership 203

Leadership .Net Bankruptcy Operations 203

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 18, 2013

'People with a victim mentality should never be entrepreneurs. We all know the role of starting and running a business is unpredictable, and has a high risk of failure. For people with a victim mentality, this fear of failure alone will almost certainly make it a self-fulfilling prophecy. I’m sure you all know someone who is the perennial victim. The problem is that most of these people aren’t likely to accept your assessment, so it’s hard to help them.

Entrepreneur 251

Entrepreneur Cost Startup 251

Early Growth Financial Services

JUNE 18, 2013

'Originally published in CoFounders Lab. I work with startup CEOs every day—from clean tech to Web 2.0, from SaaS to life science and everything in between—and I’ve seen what it takes to found and grow a successful company. Interestingly, the essential qualities you need to possess to be a founding CEO—or might be looking for in a co-founderVare not always obvious.

Cofounder 28

Cofounder Technical Cofounder Startup Web 28

Mike Michalowicz

JUNE 18, 2013

'You are equal to your five closest friends. This is either good news or bad news, depending on the type of people you hang out with. You love your mob, but how would you feel if you were judged solely on the company you keep? The truth is, in many situations, you are. Beyond association, your peer group is the filter through which you see the world.

Naming 155

Naming 155

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 16, 2013

'Both technology giants Google and Facebook almost always top the list of choice employers for job seekers – career community Glassdoor ranks Google #1 for ‘Best Internship’, and Facebook as #1 for ‘Best to Work’ But for interns they get even more attractive – if you land a coveted internship at either company, you’re looking at a yearly salary of almost US$80,000.

Salary 199

Salary Community Hiring Technology 199

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 20, 2013

'When entrepreneurs come to me with that “million dollar idea,” I have to tell them that an idea alone is really worth nothing. It’s all about the execution, and investors invest in the people who can execute, or even better, have a history of successful execution. Execution is making things happen, and for startups it usually means making change happen, which is even more difficult.

Startup 245

Startup Founder Entrepreneur Revenue 245

Lightspeed Venture Partners

JUNE 19, 2013

'Over the years, I’ve had the great honor of supporting some truly inspiring entrepreneurs as they have strived to not only disrupt markets, but also improve the world we live in. Today, I am thrilled to see that one of those leaders, Atul Butte is being recognized for his contributions as a scientist and an entrepreneur. On Thursday of this week, the White House is honoring pediatrician, geneticist and entrepreneur, Atul Butte, as one of thirteen Champions of Change who are promoting and usin

Entrepreneur 151

Entrepreneur Programming Community Founder 151

Genuine VC

JUNE 18, 2013

'Mobile is changing the world. As a startup-tech industry, we’ve been talking about it coming right around the corner for well over a decade. And now, it’s actually happening. Really happening. I am not going to spend time in a blog post detailing figures & charts about this mega-trend which will astound you, despite the fact that intellectually you know it is happening.

Mobile 131

Mobile Web Boston Distribution 131

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 20, 2013

'by Morgan Sims. There are many different challenges that face a person or group of people when diving into the world of entrepreneurialism. This could either be getting the loans or the money to get this project off the ground or even ironing out the final business plan. Too Big Too Fast? Readers of this sentence maybe thinking that getting big fast is a great thing.

Startup 170

Startup Florida Austin Texas 170

Life Beyond Code

JUNE 20, 2013

'In the world of social media, a network can mean a lot of things. Unfortunately, your network is not equivalent to the sum of all the friends, follower and connections across your social networks. That would be a fantasy. If we have to over-simplify, your network comprises of people who will care enough to take some positive action for the things that matter most to you AND to some degree you would do the same to them.

Networking 150

Networking Social Network Social Media Operations 150

Version One Ventures

JUNE 17, 2013

'In an effort to spur on their local economies, many provincial and city officials have been wondering what it takes to create the next Silicon Valley. From cities in Canada, the U.S. and worldwide, we’ve seen the emergence of numerous policies all designed to encourage start-up activity. There have been taxpayer-sponsored VCs, mentoring programs, generous tax credits and direct subsidies, accelerators, incubators, and co-working spaces.

Silicon Valley 149

Silicon Valley Incubator Canada Government 149

Feld Thoughts

JUNE 19, 2013

'At TechStars , we talk often about “mentor whiplash” – the thing that happens when you get seemingly conflicting advice from multiple mentors. Talk to five mentors; get seven different opinions! This is normal, as there is no right or absolute answer in many cases, people have different perspectives and experiences, and they are responding to different inputs (based on their own context), even if the data they are presented with looks the same on the surface.

Early Stage 143

Early Stage Limited Partner Global Finance 143