November, 2016

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6 Ways Your Business Processes Could Be Hurting Your Business

YoungUpstarts

by Nick Candito, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Progressly. Time and time again, there’s one critical component that hampers productivity and efficiency: We are wired to work within the confines of organizational silos. Your prospects, customers and partners (and employees for that matter) do not see you as a series of disparate organizations.

Cofounder 174
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Don’t go dark

David Cohen

I’ve had a couple of situations lately where a portfolio company founder or CEO went dark on me. They just stopped communicating. Sometimes takes me a while to notice it. When I do, I usually check in with the person and just ask something like “Hey – I haven’t heard from you in a while, how’s it going?” Sometimes the response is benign, and all is more or less ok with the company and people in question.

Portfolio 125
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Transformify Partners with Laboratoria to Empower Young Women and Girls in Latin America

Transformify

London, UK - November, 2016. Transformify, an online platform providing remote work to those who need it the most, announces a new partnership with Laboratoria , a Latin-American social enterprise that gives low-income women the access to education and work in tech, transforming their future and bringing diversity to the tech world. A great number of women in Latin America are unemployed or not employed officially, due to various reasons.

America 68
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3 Simple Ways To Improve Your Website’s Search Engine Rank

YFS Magazine

There’s no silver bullet with SEO, but start by making your website fundamentally sound and you’ll be on your way to improved search results.

Search 94
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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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Top 4 Crowdsourced Logo Design Sites for Small Businesses

Up and Running

Bplans and Palo Alto Software are strong supporters of entrepreneurs and small business owners. We work with like-minded partners who also want to help your businesses succeed by providing the best tools and content for the job. If our readers choose to learn more or purchase from links to our partners, sometimes we earn affiliate commissions that support Bplans’ mission.

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How The Marine Corps Builds an Innovation Culture

Steve Blank

Jennifer Edgin is the Chief Technology Officer of the Intelligence Division at the Headquarters of the Marine Corps. As the Senior Technical Advisor to the Director of Intelligence, she is responsible for building and infusing new technologies within the Marine Corps Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Enterprise (MCISRE). Jennifer is one the “innovation insurgents” inside the Department of Defense driving rapid innovation.

Framework 322

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7 Ways To Make Your People More Valuable Than Ideas

Startup Professionals Musings

Investors invest in people, not ideas. Customers buy from people, not companies. Employees rally for a great leader. As an entrepreneur, you need relationships to succeed. That means relationships with team members, investors, customers, and vendors. One of the best ways to build a good relationship with anyone is to make them feel important. One of my favorite authors, Brian Tracy, in his classic book “ No Excuses!

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Automation Amnesia

deal architect

Some of you know Denis Pombriant as a top-notch CRM analyst. I also know him as a historian. I look forward to meals with him where I can hear him talk about N. American history over the centuries. He recently.

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The ROI of Lead Scoring

Duct Tape Marketing

The ROI of Lead Scoring written by Guest Post read more at Duct Tape Marketing. According to the Content Marketing Institute, more than 85% of marketers consider lead generation to be their top priority in 2016 – a telling statistic on the priorities of the modern marketer. However, lead generation neglects a critical element for creating a real return on investment: lead scoring.

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Your Invoice Has Been Rejected: Top 8 Tips for Invoicing Corporations

Up and Running

Closing a deal with an enterprise or a corporate customer is a major boost for any business, small and big alike. Getting paid, however, is another thing entirely. It can go as smoothly as you’d hope, or end up in a total mess. It all depends on the way you invoice your customers. Once received and recorded, the invoice triggers a series of processes that result in money hitting your account—unless something goes wrong.

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How The Marine Corps Builds an Innovation Culture

Steve Blank

Jennifer Edgin is the Chief Technology Officer of the Intelligence Division at the Headquarters of the Marine Corps. As the Senior Technical Advisor to the Director of Intelligence, she is and is responsible for building and infusing new technologies within the Marine Corps Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Enterprise (MCISRE). Jennifer is one the “innovation insurgents” inside the Department of Defense driving rapid innovation.

Framework 322
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Beauty On Demand

YoungUpstarts

by Samar Singla, founder of Click Labs. Beauty is a much commented on subject – thousands of attempts have been made to define it. This elusive ideal, something that resides in the eyes of the beholder, the ghost of aesthetic perception – the physical and mental feeling that grips and does not let go, Beauty goes by many names. However, the business of beautification is much simpler, and much more straightforward.

Demand 138
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Some Things Haven’t Changed In The Business Workplace

Startup Professionals Musings

As a business advisor and advocate for entrepreneurs, I find myself almost always talking and writing about change. Yet there are many things about business and work that haven’t changed for a long time, and don’t need to change anytime soon. I’m always surprised when someone doesn’t seem to grasp these basics, or thinks it’s fine to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Equity 233
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Tech was a big loser in this election cycle

deal architect

There will be plenty of post-mortems from this highly unusual election season. As a technologist, we should face up to fact we did not do well in this election cycle Neither campaign really talked about science and tech futures and.

Campaign 210
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How NextView Makes Our Atypical Startup & VC Podcast, Traction

View from Seed

In this episode, we mix things up. Jenny Jao of Harvard Business School digs into the making of Traction with host Jay Acunzo. How does it fit into the overall strategy behind NextView Ventures? How should other entrepreneurs produce winning podcasts or content in general? What caused Traction to find early, well, traction…appearing high on the lists of Forbes, TechStars, and elsewhere, all after just a few episodes?

Startup 159
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BtoB Owners, Not Ready for Holiday Marketing?

Rembrandt Communications

No Problem. 3 Quick Tips to Make Sales Soar! It’s already November, and holiday marketing time is here for BtoB owners. But, as an entrepreneur, you may have been dealing with core business responsibilities, and this season just kind of “snuck up on you.” Well, don’t sweat it. There is still time to get your […]. The post BtoB Owners, Not Ready for Holiday Marketing?

Marketing 159
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Machine Learning Meets the Lean Startup

Steve Blank

We just finished our Lean LaunchPad class at UC Berkeley’s engineering school where many of the teams embedded machine learning technology into their products. It struck me as I watched the teams try to find how their technology would solve real customer problems, is that machine learning is following a similar pattern of previous technical infrastructure innovations.

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Why Brand Consistency Is Key When Creating Your Website

YoungUpstarts

When done right, branding can be a powerful thing. There are hundreds of companies out there that most of us would instantly recognise by their logo alone, and this is something we should all aspire to achieve. One way to start is through the development of your website. In creating your website, you need clear communication throughout in what your company represents.

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The Key to Ranking Your Local Business in Google

Duct Tape Marketing

The Key to Ranking Your Local Business in Google written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing. For local businesses, showing up on page one is a must – showing up in the Google 3-pack (or whatever it is called this week.) can be the difference between thriving and merely surviving. All Google products evolve as they find ways to make search better and, let’s face it, make more money from that fact.

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The Comparative Advantage of Nations applied to technology

deal architect

As Washington, London and other world capitals debate and revisit classical global trade thinking, a remarkable change has been happening in the technology world. SaaS, PaaS and IaaS competencies are becoming increasingly pronounced and vendors are recognizing the sheer scale.

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Great Entrepreneurs Work ON the Business, Not Just IN It [Traction #30: James Reinhart, thredUP]

View from Seed

What does the evolution from founder to CEO look like? And how does an entrepreneur balance working IN the business early to tinkering ON the business as it grows? How early does that mentality need to start? Today, we talk to the co-founder and CEO of thredUP, one of the largest and fastest-growing companies in the NextView portfolio (and in general).

Cofounder 149
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Help Make Pioneer In Skirts A Reality

Feld Thoughts

One of my core values is diversity of everything. I’ve been involved deeply in several organizations, such as National Center for Women and Information Technology , that have been focused on increasing gender diversity in computer science and entrepreneurship. More recently, I’ve expanded my lens a lot to include many other dimensions of diversity.

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Hacking for Diplomacy at the State Department – Breakthroughs, breakdowns and relentlessly direct critiques

Steve Blank

Time flies. We are already past the midway mark in our new Hacking for Diplomacy course at Stanford, and for both students and instructors, it’s an intellectually and emotionally charged period. Having logged more than 550 interviews of potential beneficiaries, the teams have delved deep into understanding the problems sourced from the State Department.

Eritrea 253
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Improving Customer Experience: How To Make Your Business More Interactive

YoungUpstarts

As a business owner, you should always strive to make sure that your customers enjoy a positive experience. Whether they’re visiting your shop, booking something online or simply calling to find out more, you need to leave a good impression. We live in an age where it’s easier than ever to communicate with clients around the clock. If you’re eager to improve your customer’s experience, here are some tips to make your business more interactive: Your website.

Customer 133
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Did Facebook and Twitter Make Us Better or Worse in 2016?

This is going to be BIG.

Yesterday, I got caught up in letting my frustration over the election boil over onto Twitter, and it's definitely not the first time. It made me ask the following question: Were we better off in 2016 having Facebook and Twitter around? I talked about it with a few people. One brought up #blacklivesmatter and while I hope some important issues were highlighted, I really don't see these platforms bringing about positive change in the real world.

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Enterprise processes and systems in a world of growing automation

deal architect

In recent blog posts you have seen me combat what I consider alarmist scenarios about job losses from automation being painted by many analysts, academics and folks in Silicon Valley.

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5 Quotes From Business Founders Destined To Fail

Startup Professionals Musings

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.

Founder 198
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For Startups, Where Does Brand Marketing Fit? [Traction #32: Nancy Go, Wayfair]

View from Seed

When you hear “brand marketing,” what do you think about? Maybe big brands, big budgets, or even big wastes of money and time as a startup, right? But what if brand marketing could help you get actual results, whether that’s user acquisition or raising a Series A? In this episode, we talk to the VP of Brand Marketing at ecommerce company Wayfair, Nancy Go.

Marketing 210
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Hacking for Diplomacy at the State Department – Breakthroughs, breakdowns and relentlessly direct critiques

Steve Blank

Time flies. We are already past the midway mark in our new Hacking for Diplomacy course at Stanford, and for both students and instructors, it’s an intellectually and emotionally charged period. Having logged more than 550 interviews of potential beneficiaries, the teams have delved deep into understanding the problems sourced from the State Department.

Lean 253
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7 Ways To Master The Art Of Running A One-Person Business

YoungUpstarts

By Greg Waldorf, CEO of Invoice2go. Being a one-man or woman-show is a tough gig, but for someone taking the leap of faith on a business idea, and taking control of your own destiny outside the 9 to 5, it can be extremely rewarding too. There are many solopreneur success stories out there. Some of these businesses are founded by people who are passionate about a cause, like Saha Global ’s mission to help with the world water crisis, others are entrepreneurs seeking to fill an underserved niche,

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The Techstars Origin Story

Feld Thoughts

Greg Avery recently wrote a detailed story in the Denver Business Journal of the origin story of Techstars a decade ago. It’s unfortunately paywalled but comes with a video. For all of you who have participated in or supported Techstars to date, thank you! The post The Techstars Origin Story appeared first on Feld Thoughts.

Denver 132
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Automate this!

deal architect

In my new book, Silicon Collar I looked at automation and impact on jobs in 50+ work settings. On my innovation blog I have been excerpting weekly from those settings — you can see some of them linked below. In.

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7 Poor Leadership Habits You Must Avoid At All Cost

Startup Professionals Musings

Like many other career-minded business professionals, are you still waiting impatiently for that appointment to a leadership position, so that you can begin demonstrating your real leadership ability? In reality, you are already being evaluated for leadership by the habits and attributes you demonstrate today, so now is the time to sharpen your focus and behavior, not later.

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In defence of liquidation preferences

The Equity Kicker

I just read a New York Times article that led with the sentence “Deep inside a Silicon Valley unicorn lurks a time bomb”. It turns out that ‘time bomb’ is the much maligned and, I suspect, little understood, liquidation preference. To be clear, liquidation preferences are sometimes used badly and founders should generally turn away from investors who ask for multiple liquidation preferences.

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What the Harvard Business Review and The People’s Daily think about leadership succession

Steve Blank

I had to laugh when my post about what happens when innovative CEOs retire or die appeared in both the bastion of capitalism– the Harvard Business Review — and in the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party – The People’s Daily. Then I didn’t. A Story is Just a Story. Why the Harvard Business Review published the story has a pretty simple explanation.

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How To Keep Track Of Employees’ Hours

YoungUpstarts

Keeping track of the hours your employees are working is essential. Upon starting out a business it may seem like a simple task. But once you start taking into account lunch breaks, people having to go home early or working overtime, holidays, sick days, jury duty and all other manner of paid absences, it can all get very complex. There are various methods in action today for keeping on top of your staff’s working hours.