Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

But often this doesn’t tell the whole story because often companies are also spending money on PR and other marketing activities in order to support the sales process. Generally you should take your full marketing spend including PR divided by your customers acquired to get your “fully loaded CAC.”

Metrics 150

Metrics Cost Acquisition Startup 150

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 19, 2011

o Huge on PR, “Be Everywhere” is his motto – fly to NY, proactively everywhere he could get press. To make PR big you need to find a way to “make news”. To make PR big you need to find a way to “make news”. o CPM model gave him control over the information in the acquisition cycle so he focused on that. -

Acquisition 304

Acquisition Warrant Customer Term Sheet 304

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2011

You hire people too fast, you over build your products, you try to force market adoption and you do PR blitzes before your product is really ready for prime time. And they seem to have been going really slow in building out the team and you certainly don’t see a ton of too-early PR blitzes from them.

Development Team Review 374

Development Team Review Technical Review Bulgaria Lean 374

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2010

We’re here for Greycroft’s CEO Summit – a gathering of the CEO’s of their portfolio companies with guest speakers covering topics including how to build your team, PR, customer development, etc. Key take aways: the CEO has got to be committed to leading PR personally or it won’t be successful.

PR 279

PR Technical Review Portfolio Customer Development 279

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2015

I need to give credit for the topic to PR Malloy who Tweeted me this question. PR Malloy (@diddly_do_indy) June 13, 2015. As a startup this is often the one true source of strong leverage in a negotiation to: Get a better price, get a longer-term commitment, get PR commitments and so forth. ” Here’s what I mean.

PR 150

PR Early Stage Software Naming 150

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 28, 2009

If you don’t address it they’re minds are shaped by competitor PR. Don’t underestimate the impact of good PR on your competitors. Good PR can help slow down your competitors initiatives as they naively try to follow you. Be careful about not over expressing your deepest concerns to your team.

PR 331

PR Software Review Ireland Germany 331

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 6, 2013

My rationale is simple: everything goes wrong and only great teams can respond to competitors, markets, funding environments, staff departures, PR disasters and the like. I am fond of quoting that about 70% of my investment decision of an early-stage company is the team. Final startup grind from msuster. figure out roles. identify gaps.

Cofounder 388

Cofounder Early Stage Startup Silicon Valley 388

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

And while of course the founders & management deserve all the credit for Maker’s success and will no doubt get their accolades in the press, from an investor perspective, Dana & I were hugely active in the company for years behind the scenes in recruiting, PR, product strategy, M&A, etc.

Los Angeles 387

Los Angeles Intellectual Property LP Venture Capital 387

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 1, 2009

My favorite line about using blogging for PR I heard from Brian Solis who said, “PR doesn’t stand for press release, it stands for public relations.&# When you think about your blog, think about which members of the public you most need relations with. We then set out to build these features as quickly as we could.

Customer 280

Customer Technical Review Software Review Mexico 280

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 30, 2016

It is a truism that with more capital you will hire people more quickly and spend more liberally whether it’s on external contractors, PR firms, attending events, doing legal work (trademarks, patents) or whatever. You will spend what you raise in the same timeframes whether you raise $1.5 million or $4 million.

Pre-Money Valuation 292

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Early Stage Startup 292

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 22, 2011

They are great at their respective fields whether they be marketing, sales, programming, PR, whatever. And leaders aren’t always right of when they are they don’t always win. But in every team you need the majority of people who excel at their job functions.

Leadership 418

Leadership Technical Review Software Review PR 418

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2015

” PR. We CEOs like to be heroes and with the power to push through pricing or product we have unfair advantages over the normal process. Your job as CEO is to be “ chief adjudicator ” not “chief dictator.” When companies start the founder & CEO is often the only mouthpiece for the business.

Startup 150

Startup CTO Hire Sales Leadership 150

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 10, 2011

Given how badly the announcement of the splitting went and their inability to control the PR cycle (or their stock price!) But they sure need somebody at the top handling their marketing and PR better. Dumb, da-dumb, dumb, dumb. The decision to back-out of the splitting of the business : 3 out of 5. I pay for them separately.

Customer 287

Customer Technical Review Caching PR 287

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 25, 2014

I’ve been having this PR discussion with three separate portfolio companies at once so I thought I’d just publish my thoughts more broadly. I have written many times about PR so if you want a deep dive on the “how” of PR you may enjoy reading some of these posts. PR pays dividends in Biz Dev.

PR 415

PR Early Stage Dividend Acquisition 415

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 11, 2014

I have seen many teams pour tons of money, time and effort into PR strategies without thinking about how product tweaks could drive more consumption, more retention and more referrals. But I still believe Sean Ellis was right. Growth hacking is a mentality that a company needs to be committed to.

Technical Review 384

Technical Review Hockey Stick SEM Channel 384

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2009

Handling PR with VCs. To update me on your PR? Don’t get me wrong, I’m very pro PR but please see it for what it is and don’t think that smart or experienced people are going to see it as any more than it is either. In your VC pitch your PR page should take no longer than 30 seconds – Wait.

PR 291

PR Bankruptcy Venture Capital Acquisition 291

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 9, 2012

Often they are “soft landings” for PR purposes. So, too, does PR. The median VC exit price for deals is $70 million (FLAG Capital via Bryce.VC). I’m assuming that’s for positive outcome deals. And I’m certain that many of these deals are not great returns for people because too much money went in.

Technology 323

Technology PR Startup IPO 323

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 25, 2016

That marketing can be PR or SEO or influencer distribution or other forms of “unpaid” marketing. PR requires time and effort from your team that isn’t spent elsewhere and thus is a real cost. We need to market to that customer to make them aware of our product or service.

Startup 150

Startup Seed Money DC Software Review 150

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2014

It’s the easiest way to justify losing deals, put pressure on your to build the features they want and they always believe a competitors PR more than the reality they see inside your business. Sales people will always tell you how far ahead the competition is. Always make your own assessment of your competitors.

Sales 382

Sales Startup Technical Review Matching 382

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 20, 2010

new features need to be rolled into PR strategies and competitor analyses. - . - somebody needs to be sure that customer service is alerted to the new features and are trained in how to handle these functions with customers. -

Fractional CTO 400

Fractional CTO CTO Hire Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 400

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2012

I had dinner with my friend Brooke Hammerling , founder of Brew PR recently. She was lamenting that some startups simply see their PR company as merely somebody who corrals the press when you want to get some inches. And they will offer you some of the best business advice you will ever receive if you’re open to it.

Startup 363

Startup PR Venture Capital Angel Investor 363

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Of course it is super helpful if a VC can drop you in to important people for business development, recruiting, PR, sales and eventually M&A. To be clear – I’m not saying huge successes make a VC less likely to be helpful to you – I’m just saying it’s not a guaranteed predictor. Connections?

Portfolio 364

Portfolio Chicago Sales Incubator 364

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2013

Understanding “The Funding Angle” I sit at enough board meetings to hear conflicting advice given to entrepreneurs about how to handle PR and announcements at startups. In stead of doing my typical big long post with 10 PR tips (like I did there), I’m going to break them up into individual (I hope more digestible) chunks.

Startup 355

Startup PR Dividend Merger 355

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2010

One of the large parts of the burn was PR, Marketing and attending conferences. Then I’d cut the burn to a realistic level and build a company.&# (yes, I really said this). They got their round done anyway from a big late-stage VC. As I said, there are VCs who are fooled by all this but it doesn’t equal success.

Entrepreneur 286

Entrepreneur CTO Hire Cofounder Early Stage 286

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2015

There’s too much PR and too many tech blogs and too many newsletters and aggregators and Twitter summarizers to even try to catch everything that’s going on and equally there’s so much noise that it becomes harder to be heard.

Software Review 150

Software Review Turkey Portfolio Syndicate 150

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2014

While traditional methods (PR, advertising, events, seminars) and online methods (SEO, SEM, social, referral marketing) are well understood by most companies there are many methods that are less well publicized. So What is This Underbelly of Which You Speak?

SEM 379

SEM Viral Marketing Widget 379

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 11, 2011

Do we have the wrong PR firm? Let’s think about whether that is hurting us or not. Let’s understand what about our approach isn’t resonating with journalists. Are we off message? Is our product not as pretty? Are we not at enough tech events? But let’s at least understand it.”

Startup 313

Startup Guerilla Silicon Valley Portfolio 313

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 1, 2010

As a CEO you never stop needing to go on sales calls (or to work the phones in telesales or customer support) and ceasing to do this as your company grows because you’re focusing on investors, recruiting, PR or whatever is a mistake.

CTO Hire 308

CTO Hire Management Technical Review Part-Time VPE 308

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 10, 2014

Often it is a good idea to have a junior PR person in your company to interface with whatever PR firms you work with. This finance director now deals with finding office space, managing legal issues, implementing HR policies as well as doing accounting and planning board meetings. Other B-round scaling issues?

Startup 381

Startup PR Finance Hiring 381

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

It’s the easiest way to justify losing deals, put pressure on your to build the features they want and they always believe a competitors PR more than the reality they see inside your business. Sales people will always tell you how far ahead the competition is. Always make your own assessment of your competitors.

Sales 316

Sales Technical Review Matching Hiring 316

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2011

Because market is such a broad topic, I’m restricting these lessons to PR marketing (as opposed SEO, SEM, product marketing, etc.). If I can help you avoid some of my first-time mistakes it would be a victory. The following are some lessons I learned about early-stage startup marketing.

Early Stage 380

Early Stage Stealth Marketing Startup 380

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2013

They want the perfect feature set, the PR company lined up to do the perfect press release, they want maximum coverage, rave reviews, viral adoption and they want to sit back and then wait for the signups to come roaring in. I think this is particularly true because every startup entrepreneur is trying to catch lightning in a bottle.

Viral 371

Viral PR Lean Founder 371

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 19, 2011

Bankers & PR : I think you get the point so I’ll make the last two brief. Bankers & PR firms have multiple clients. PR firms are the same. They’re essential in helping us get our jobs done because they specialize in something we do not. Recruiters. Real Estate professionals. You name it. We need them all.

Term Sheet 319

Term Sheet PR Liquidation Preference Stock Options 319

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 3, 2016

Our top request include: helping with PR announcements, helping with recruiting, helping to connect with other companies with similar issues [acquiring expertise], helping with introductions [biz dev] and of course help with strategy, advice, mentorship, conflict resolution and several other interactions.

Portfolio 150

Portfolio PR Partner Early Stage 150

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 21, 2010

As startup entrepreneurs we all want to work with them because having their name as reference clients makes it so much easier for marketing, PR, selling to other customers, fund raising and even recruiting. ’ &# The PR firm actually didn’t do badly but 4% was a lot of dilution. Large companies can be strange sometimes.

Warrant 298

Warrant Dilution Startup Stock Options 298

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

Or Salesforce.com who rose to prominence in this same period where they were ramping up PR and shouting from mountain tops when everybody else in the market was mute. An obvious example is Google who may have gotten less market attention if there would have been 8 well-financed competitors during the 2001-2005 timeframe.

Saudi Arabia 309

Saudi Arabia Valuation IPO Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 4, 2011

Usually you have a catch-all bucket for “direct” or similar that often came through PR or word-of-mouth. If so, make sure you can track which leads come from this. Measuring viral adoption is obviously important. If you have multiple versions of your product, how many are web vs. mobile? How do the mobile customers break down by device type?

Metrics 346

Metrics Startup Acquisition SEM 346