article thumbnail

Why Entrepreneurs Should Be Respected More Than Loved

Both Sides of the Table

One of the vivid memories I have from being a startup CEO is the feeling that most people in your company have a look in their eyes that like they can do your job as well as you. Eventually you need a VP of Product to handle your product roadmap, a CTO for engineering leadership and VPs of sales, marketing & biz dev. Startup life.

CTO Hire 385
article thumbnail

Lessons Learned: What does a startup CTO actually do?

Startup Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, September 30, 2008 What does a startup CTO actually do? Often times, it seems like people are thinking its synonymous with "that guy who gets paid to sit in the corner and think technical deep thoughts" or "that guy who gets to swoop in a rearrange my project at the last minute on a whim."

CTO 168
Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

Marketing Your Startup: A Billion-Dollar Company’s First Marketer Reflects Back

View from Seed

Ellie Mirman was the first marketer hired by the CMO of HubSpot, the Boston-based marketing software startup that IPOed in 2014. Below, she shares lessons learned from the earliest days of marketing the company and how this has translated to her second startup role as VP of Marketing at Toast. How did you address that?

Marketing 120
article thumbnail

How to Create a Marketing Playbook for Consistent Campaigns

ConversionXL

Consistency is equally critical for startups. For example, if your goal is to generate leads , assets might be webinars, landing pages , and emails. Think about your playbook from the perspective of a new hire. Your primary audience is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) who has the spending power to buy your product.

Campaign 149
article thumbnail

Lessons Learned: The lean startup

Startup Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, September 8, 2008 The lean startup Ive been thinking for some time about a term that could encapsulate trends that are changing the startup landscape. After some trial and error, Ive settled on the Lean Startup. Of course, many startups are capital efficient and generally frugal.

Lean 168
article thumbnail

Lessons Learned: The three drivers of growth for your business.

Startup Lessons Learned

Master of 500 Hats: Startup Metrics for Pirates (SeedCamp 2008, London) This presentation should be required reading for anyone creating a startup with an online service component. In my opinion, every startup needs to "pick a major" among these three drivers of growth. The Lean Startup Intensive is tomorrow at Web 2.0.

article thumbnail

Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot

Startup Lessons Learned

kaChing has been very active in the Lean Startup movement. With case studies like this, we aim to illustrate specific Lean Startup techniques through the stories of current practitioners. Yet there’s a lot of mystery around pivots, and entrepreneurs ask all the time how you know it’s time to commit to a new direction.