YoungUpstarts

JULY 17, 2020

Contributing seed money to an employee’s HSA or 401K, or instituting a match program for contributions, can encourage employees to save. As the president of BabyScripts, Juan-Pablo has focused his efforts on business development, sales and fundraising.

Startup 287

Startup Wisconsin Stock Options Dividend 287

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

They often make great team members such as head of products, CTO, head of sales, CFO, etc. VCs don’t have the same net worth litmus test and great entrepreneurs have a ton of sources for seed money to get financed very early. Great companies are comprised of great individual point people or functional leaders.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur CTO Hire South America Salary 293

This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

We're not in a nuclear winter--and if anyone tells you that they're having trouble raising money, it's probably due to the following: Their business isn't killing it, so they haven't gotten to that "next level" you need to get to move up to Series A funding.

Venture Capital 114

Venture Capital Marketing Term Sheet Software Review 114

YoungUpstarts

JULY 16, 2018

Use your extra time to network, create your product, and market your business until it’s making enough money to sustain itself. Offer Product Pre-Sales. If you have a business that’s selling a product, one quick way to raise money is to pre-sell it.

Seed Money 100

Seed Money Campaign Sales Cost 100

SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 2, 2011

They might have some seed money and are thinking or raising a Series A based on success of an early release (MVP). A few things jumped out at me: - Experience in sales or technology - considered a minor negative? If you've not had a C-level but have had experience in sales or tech. What are they really looking for?

Valuation 198

Valuation Revenue Pre-Money Valuation Early Stage 198

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2017

The most obvious way to explain this is with sales people. If you hire 6 senior sales reps in January at $120,000 / year salary then you’ve taken on an extra $60,000 per month in costs yet these sales people might not close new business 6 months. COGS” represents the amount that each sale costs you.

Stock Options 227

Stock Options Startup Dilution Venture Capital 227

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 14, 2014

But he chose to move forward with a positive attitude, raise seed money for his company, and network his way to a profitable future. For example, the drive and charisma required to hustle on the street may lend itself to legal sales.) How to Position Yourself for Funding. Starting a company can be difficult for anyone.

Bootstrapping 249

Bootstrapping Startup Seed Money New York 249

Steve Blank

APRIL 8, 2010

We thought we’d take our plan and go raise seed money. We can’t raise money knowing our plan is wrong.”. This team had spent their first two weeks laying out their hypotheses about sales, marketing, pricing, solution, competitors, etc. He replied, “Well the customers are not acting like we predicted in our plan!

Business Model 328

Business Model Business Plan Customer Cap Table 328

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 27, 2017

You’ll need people who are marketing, tech, and sales geniuses. There are a few ways to go about this, you can get loans, raise the money yourself, or get investors. Essentially you’ll need seed money, to begin with. You need the right team around you to be able to bring your idea to fruition.

Startup 133

Startup Seed Money Hiring Framework 133

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2019

If you’re managing the company effectively, you have a clear set of objectives and the ability to determine if you are on or off track from accomplishing those: did we hit our sales numbers, did we ship the product, etc.? First, the introduction of seed money as an institutional form of capital.

Lean 108

Lean Venture Capital Conversion IPO 108

Mike Michalowicz

MARCH 24, 2013

20 Use the Allowance as Seed Money. In teaching kids to develop an entrepreneurial mindset, you can start by helping them to think of their allowance as seed money. 32 Garage Sales. There are probably enough items around the house that aren’t being used to have regularly-scheduled weekend garage sales.

Entrepreneur 167

Entrepreneur Seed Money Social Media Sales 167

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 2, 2011

But when your only capital is your hard-earned seed money, every penny that goes out will be scrutinized painfully. If you spend $50K on a website selling party supplies but you soon realize it's the sales of catering supplies you offer that have taken off, you will want to have a site that promotes your newfound focus.

Sweat Equity 231

Sweat Equity Startup Angel Investor Seed Money 231

pandodaily.com

NOVEMBER 29, 2012

If you are raising a seed round now, there are a few things you can do to protect yourself. There are still the same debates on whether or not you should take seed money from VCs. NCR, a retail technology company, has acquired Retalix, a point of sale provider, for $650 million. Entrepreneurs are survivors by nature.

Technical Review 93

Technical Review Silicon Valley Incubator Syria 93

Hippoland

MARCH 27, 2016

Me: We acquire customers by doing outbound sales, and we… VC: But, the market just feels really small. Although you do not need a deck to raise seed money, this is why I like to use a deck in my conversations with seed investors. The market size is HUGE and… VC: What about your team?

Seed Money 48

Seed Money Conversion Leadership Partner 48

www.paulgraham.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

The woman in charge of sales was so tenacious that I used to feelsorry for potential customers on the phone with her. Stephen Hawkings editor told him that every equationhe included in his book would cut sales in half. A 10% improvement in ease of use doesnt just increase your sales 10%. Its more likely to double your sales.

Startup 105

Startup Cofounder Software Stock 105

Hippoland

JANUARY 23, 2018

It will be hard to raise a pre-seed round through traditional methods If you are raising money through traditional methods (such as with angels / micro VCs / VCs) via a convertible note or convertible security or equity deal, it will be a lot harder to raise pre-seed money in 2018. Cons: Slow.

Early Stage 48

Early Stage Convertible Security Seed Stage SEC 48

Hippoland

JANUARY 23, 2018

It will be hard to raise a pre-seed round through traditional methods If you are raising money through traditional methods (such as with angels / micro VCs / VCs) via a convertible note or convertible security or equity deal, it will be a lot harder to raise pre-seed money in 2018. Cons: Slow.

Early Stage 48

Early Stage Convertible Security Seed Stage SEC 48

Ben's Blog

NOVEMBER 3, 2010

We want to be in business with the best entrepreneurs going after the biggest markets and we do not care whether they need seed money, venture money or growth money. When you are raising seed money, you need an investor who can help you grow. As a matter of core philosophy, we invest in companies not stages.

Seed Money 78

Seed Money Venture Capital Angel Investor Partner 78

Hearpreneur

DECEMBER 9, 2018

Literally, one week later we had secured seed money, established business roles, added on another partner, ran the numbers, and started a pest control company! Sales and growth have always been important but this year we decided to focus some time and energy on becoming a socially more responsible company.

South Korea 58

South Korea Entrepreneur Portugal Social Media 58

Gregg Fraley, Author of Jack's Notebook

OCTOBER 12, 2012

If you can’t make the sale, well, you can always get a dog. Money is a big topic and I’ll be doing more on it in the next couple chapters, but suffice to say, you need seed money to crank things up. Groom them, seduce them, inform them, sell them, persuade them, and get them involved. No, better a cat, less maintenance.

Guerilla 87

Guerilla Seed Money Small Business Partner 87

Austin Startup

SEPTEMBER 17, 2017

The converse of calculating exactly how you will make the first sale, and then the first 10,000, and ultimately work your way up to 1.6 You want your valuation to keep marching upward; if you took in some seed money with the promised 10X venture return, you’ll hopefully be able to prove that you are proceeding on that trajectory.

Valuation 48

Valuation Forecast Seed Money Business Model 48

www.businessinsider.com

SEPTEMBER 6, 2012

Google Ventures has made more than 100 seed investments, Maris said, including some past and present Y Combinator companies, and is making one to two new ones a week. Parse, one of the most-anticipated startups in Silicon Valley these days , went through Y Combinator last year and raised seed money from Google Ventures , for example.

Silicon Valley 54

Silicon Valley Startup Valuation Venture Capital 54

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 23, 2015

They''re at a similar stage to my investments now out of Brooklyn Bridge backing Tinybop pre-launch, Canary before their Indiegogo pre-sale, and VIXXENN with just an alpha site and a few stylists. in seed money instead of $1.5M You should target 18 to 24 months of runway post Series Seed." Yay, participation trophies!

Post-Money Valuation 60

Post-Money Valuation Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Seed Money 60

cdixon.org

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

You’ll refine your sales and investor pitch. link] What’s the right amount of seed money to raise? You’ll learn about competitive products that exist or are being built. You’ll gauge people’s excitement level for the product and for various features. Yavor Ivanov said: RT @sensing: [link] [.].

Stealth 68

Stealth Startup NDA Cofounder 68

Version One Ventures

JANUARY 10, 2013

Once you can show traction, with scalable marketing and sales channels, you can get vastly superior valuations. Final thoughts Unless you’re able to bootstrap your startup until you reach profitability, you’ll need to raise money at some point in your company’s lifecycle.

Dilution 154

Dilution Valuation Bootstrapping Channel 154

readwrite.com

DECEMBER 3, 2012

And because , "According to our market research, the top vendor in the space does more than $450 million in annual sales." Share on LinkedIn. Like on Facebook. Like on Facebook. Because “there isn’t a centralized place to discover, discuss, rate or buy these kinds of gourmet meals.”

Silicon Valley 111

Silicon Valley Las Vegas Angel Investor Startup 111

Rob Go

MARCH 10, 2012

We’ve invested in some SaaS companies that acquire early customers through a combination of inbound marketing, inside sales, and channe partners. In some seed rounds, we invest mainly with seed investors and angels. We’ve invested in some that require building a 2-sided market with local businesses and consumers.

Seed Stage 49

Seed Stage Syndicate Syndication Marketing 49

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

It wasnt because they werent accredited investors that I didntask my parents for seed money, though. When we were starting Viaweb,I didnt know about the concept of an accredited investor, anddidnt stop to think about the value of investors connections.The reason I didnt take money from my parents was that I didntwant them to lose it.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 9, 2013

If you’re a venture-backed tech company or even an early-stage business fueled by angel or seed money I assume you have a good group of board members or advisors who will give you time to be helpful and they want to be helpful. should we ramp up sales hires now or wait for more traction?

Advisory Board 337

Advisory Board Valuation Stock Options Seed Money 337

techcrunch.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

For both companies, the initial traction enabled raising seed money to get them to a traditional VC investment.) Both PBworks and Ustream (the two most prominent companies I’ve been directly involved with) had a ton of work to do after gaining initial traction. I can’t code, and that’s a major disadvantage.

Technical Review 84

Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 84