Both Sides of the Table
JULY 1, 2010
We all like to think of startups as “non hierarchic&# organizations and to some extent that should be true. I’m not a big believer in too much hierarchy. A good early-stage CEO needs to be accessible, to be accountable for producing results and should be establishing the cultural norms of the company through direct leadership at all levels.
A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks
JULY 12, 2010
This is part 1 of the series: 5 Lessons from 150 startup pitches. Listening to first-time entrepreneurs talk about their competitive advantages is as predictably invalid as the local weatherman's 10-day forecast. Between this blog and reviewing applications to Capital Factory I see hundreds of pitches a year. Every pitch has a section on competitive advantages, and quite literally 95% of the time the claimed competitive advantages are pathetic, unoriginal, and not really advantages at all.
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deal architect
JULY 12, 2010
Abbie Lundberg, former editor-in-chief at CIO magazine in her review of my book, The New Polymath called it a “veritable firehose of innovation examples”. The book covers wide innovation ground across industries, countries and technologies.
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 3, 2010
Yesterday I received a discouraging note from an entrepreneur with a patent and a medical software application who couldn’t find a dime of investment, and was grousing that seed funding just wasn’t available anymore. After exchanging a couple of notes, I concluded that she was more likely a victim of item #1 on my reject list, rather than a drought on seed funding.
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 Lessons Learned
JULY 28, 2010
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, July 28, 2010 Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot (The following guest post is a new experiment for this blog. It was written by Sarah Milstein in collaboration with kaChing CEO Andy Rachleff. kaChing has been very active in the Lean Startup movement. If you havent seen it, Pascals recent presentation on continuous deployment is a must-see; slides are here.
Genuine VC
JULY 19, 2010
Before I wrote a couple detailed posts on Micro VCs, I thought I’d write an overview one sharing my broad perspective on this portion of the VC world. It’s clear that despite the varied terminology (Super Angel, Micro VC, Seed Stage VC, Seed Firms, etc.), a new segment of the institutional venture market is emerging. Both super-angels are institutionalizing “up” and formerly traditional VCs shifting “down” to fill a market opportunity.
Start Up Roar brings together the best content for start up professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
crowdSPRING Blog
JULY 27, 2010
We’ve recently discussed several useful topics for small businesses and startups, including naming your company , how to make you taglines stand out from the crowd., and tips for buyers looking for logo design. Today, we’ll cover web design marketing best practices and tips for small business. Most businesses, from one person start-ups to small and mid-size businesses to international conglomerates, need to have a presence on the Web.
Feld Thoughts
JULY 11, 2010
One of the side benefits of blogging are the various inspiring emails I get from readers about different topics. I got a great one yesterday that I thought addressed the question of “Why am I having so much fun with challenges in my personal life and at the same time am so bored with work. And – more importantly – what can I do about it?
Occam's Razor
JULY 12, 2010
Stale. One thing that I never want to be. We all have a tendency to learn up to a point, we get comfortable and keep chugging along rarely investing in our ongoing education. I call it the slow but sure path to irrelevancy. Let me share my prescription for avoiding irrelevancy: Try new things. Simple right? At any given time I have six or seven interesting tools running on this website.
Startup Lessons Learned
JULY 5, 2010
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, July 5, 2010 The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits have written a new book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development , which builds upon the foundational work of The Four Steps to the Epiphany , while improving accessibility, updating the ideas, and making it more actionable.
Entrepreneurs-Journey.com by Yaro Starak
JULY 5, 2010
Press play to begin streaming the audio or right click the text link and choose save as or save link. Download the MP3 [ 30 Minutes - 40 MB ]. Matt is the co-founder of one of the very first online forums I spent some time on, SitePoint.com , which today is a massive web community and information site. Sitepoint became a near-daily visit for me when I was focusing on buying and selling websites.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 22, 2010
Back in 1999 when I first raised venture capital I had zero knowledge of what a fair term sheet looked like or how to value my company. Due to competitive markets we ended up with a pretty good term sheet until we needed to raise money in April 2001 and then we got completely screwed. It was accept the terms or go into bankruptcy so we took the money.
crowdSPRING Blog
JULY 27, 2010
We’ve recently discussed several useful topics for small businesses and startups, including naming your company , how to make you taglines stand out from the crowd., and tips for buyers looking for logo design. Today, we’ll cover web design marketing best practices and tips for small business. Most businesses, from one person start-ups to small and mid-size businesses to international conglomerates, need to have a presence on the Web.
Austin Startup
JULY 12, 2010
Andy Meadows is the founder and CEO of Bearhug , an Austin-based customer engagement platform launching today. He is focused on delivering real business value by educating clients about the latest proven technologies, strategies that deliver improved profits and operational efficiencies, and using technology to improve life. Customer Care Today. 37signals’ dustup with GetSatisfaction almost 2 years ago now for bullying marketing tactics is still cited as an example of how, especially when it com
Software By Rob
JULY 1, 2010
Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Two Days Left for a Discount on the Business of Software Conference A Micropreneur Blueprint: How to Stay Solo, Bleed Passion, and Build Products that Matter → Why You Should Build Your Startup to Sell (But Not to Flip) Micropreneurship , Startups If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.
Startup Lessons Learned
JULY 9, 2010
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, July 9, 2010 Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# theory of management At any given time, something like four percent of the US population is engaged in some form of new-company-creation. And that narrow definition of entrepreneurship doesn’t count all of the managers inside established companies who are effectively engaged in the same process of building an internal startup (see What is a startup?
deal architect
JULY 16, 2010
A stone's throw from historic Trinity College in a place appropriately called the Library Bar we convened. You could feel the ghosts of Joyce and Yeats and Shaw and Goldsmith in the hallways. Dublin's glorious literary history provided a nice.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 29, 2010
We received so much positive feedback from our This Week in Venture Capital show walking through valuation calculations & term sheets that we decided to do a Q&A show this week to address topics that entrepreneurs want to learn about. We will continue to do more of this. If you want to watch the show click the image above or this link , but if you want a quick read – here’s a summary: 1.
crowdSPRING Blog
JULY 21, 2010
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!
Steve Blank
JULY 15, 2010
If you take funding from a venture capital firm or angel investor and want to build a large, enduring company (rather than sell it to the highest bidder), this isn’t the decade to do it. The collapse of the IPO market and dysfunctional math in the venture capital community has stacked the odds against you. Here’s why. The Golden Age for Entrepreneurs and VC’s.
Software By Rob
JULY 22, 2010
Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Book Review: Never Eat Alone Two Recent Press Appearances: Inc.com and the TechZing Podcast → Three Tips for Getting People to Read Your Email Newsletter Micropreneurship , Startups If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 16, 2010
If you expect to succeed in the thrill-a-minute, roller coaster ride of a startup, let me assure you it takes more than a good idea, a rich uncle, and luck. In fact, the idea is often the least important part of the equation. Investors tell me that they look at the people first, the business plan second, and only then at the idea. If you want some tips to beat the insurmountable odds, take a look at the following concepts, adapted from Richard C.
deal architect
JULY 19, 2010
John had just returned from a trip to Italy. His sisters, each a year or two older had come back from similar trips to Portugal, Egypt and Turkey. His cousin was headed to Amsterdam today, and another was describing her. Tags: Industry Commentary.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 14, 2010
Yesterday I wrote a post about top-down versus bottom-up thinking. There is a corollary to that advice, which is “doing the right things is more important than doing things right.&# Sounds simple but in practice I promise you most organization fall into the latter trap. Here’s how it goes: You have a business development group with two people.
crowdSPRING Blog
JULY 21, 2010
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 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! Considering buying a generic logo from a “logo store&# ?
Steve Blank
JULY 26, 2010
If you’ve had a great career what happens to all your knowledge and experience when you retire? Great Suit. My wife and I had dinner last night with a friend of hers from high school. Tom, her husband whom I had never met before joined us as well. I took one look at his suit and guessed “high-powered lawyer. “ (I was right, the suit probably added another $250 per billable hour.).
Software By Rob
JULY 13, 2010
Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Why You Should Build Your Startup to Sell (But Not to Flip) Lessons Learned Taking Parental Leave as a Solo Entrepreneur → A Micropreneur Blueprint: How to Stay Solo, Bleed Passion, and Build Products that Matter Uncategorized If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 27, 2010
If you are one of the many people who lost your job during these tough economic times, you should be working on starting your own business, in parallel with looking for that ideal replacement job. Let me explain why this is a win-win deal, no matter what the outcome. You have probably secretly always wanted to run your own show, but with a full-time job, never had the time to consider a startup.
deal architect
JULY 12, 2010
In the “social” chapter in my new book, I was honored to have Paul Greenberg talk about the social customer and the fact that he/she increasingly “controls the conversation”. He succinctly talked about “customer referral value” versus “customer lifetime value”. Tags: Industry Commentary.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 26, 2010
Social Proof in Action … Yesterday I wrote about the benefits of using social proof and authority in raising venture capital. If you didn’t read that yet it might be worth having a quick skim as a primer. Social proof is defined as “looking for others to guide our decisions&# and is also one of the most important techniques in acquiring customers in your company.
crowdSPRING Blog
JULY 14, 2010
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!
Steve Blank
JULY 22, 2010
Startup CEO’s can’t delegate sales and expect it to happen. Customer Validation needs to have the CEO actively involved. Here’s an example in a direct sales channel. Customer Development Diagnostics over Lunch. A VC asked me to have lunch with the CEO of a startup building cloud-based enterprise software. (Boy did I feel like Rip Van Winkle.) The board was getting nervous as the company was missing its revenue plan.
Software By Rob
JULY 20, 2010
Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Lessons Learned Taking Parental Leave as a Solo Entrepreneur Three Tips for Getting People to Read Your Email Newsletter → Book Review: Never Eat Alone Cool News, Links & Reviews If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 23, 2010
In previous articles, I have occasionally mentioned “red flags” which every potential investor unconsciously listens for. Other writers, like Guy Kawasaki, have irreverently called some of these “entrepreneur lies,” but I prefer to think of them as innocent over-enthusiasm or over-confidence that can kill your deal. At any rate, here is my summary of the top ten from my experience with hundreds of elevator pitches, business plans, and executive presentations: “ Our product is truly disruptive te
deal architect
JULY 27, 2010
Good friend Ray Wang lays out his 7 tenets of starting a new analyst firm - it’s a nice summary of his own decision process as he exited Forrester and what he has learned since. I would like to contribute. Tags: Industry analysts (Gartner, Forrester, AMR, others).
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 25, 2010
I recently read a book I’d highly recommend to every reader of this blog called “ Yes, 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive &# by Robert B. Cialdini who is also author of a very well received book called “ Influence &# (which I plan to read). “Yes&# was given to me by one of my favorite angel investor / seed VC’s to work with – John Greathouse of Rincon Venture Partners and author of the blog InfoChachkie that you should check out because it is fille
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