socalTECH

MAY 28, 2013

The customer gets a great price, and the retailer gets both a new customer and a new sale. You can walk into any audio/video store, including Best Buy or Home Depot, and negotiate with the sales or customer service representative. Todd introduced me to Andrew, and Andrew is now our CTO.

Pricing 273

Pricing Product Help Sales 273

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

In the same year they won Business Insider’s Startup competition. And because I wanted Ethan to be able to attract a great team, build & iterate a product, test it with initial customers and refine his strategy before having to take the wrappers off of his company. I was standing with him when he won the TechCrunch 50 award.

CTO Coach 359

CTO Coach Google CTO Hire Yammer 359

SoCal CTO

JULY 23, 2012

I seem to encounter a lot of people who want to attach a CTO label to me as I'm the only programmer on the founding team of three. While I do fill that role at the moment, I'm a little hesitant to refer to myself as a CTO as we still haven't launched a product, acquired a single user, or turned or a penny in profit.

CTO Coach 231

CTO Coach CTO Hire Outsource Development Develop 231

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2010

You can always tell during this discussion whether the entrepreneur has logged into their products, talked to their customers, read all the news stories and gotten all of the back channel info on the competition. You can tell if they have a deep-seated competitive spirit. Can’t go a mile deep on competition?

Entrepreneur 286

Entrepreneur Startup CTO Hire Sales 286

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

Continuing my series of posts that I’ve been collecting that live at the intersection of Startups and being a Startup CTO : Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April 16 Great Startup Posts from March here are the top posts from May 2010. Putting customers first. Legendary customer support. You could just outspend. Innovative.

Startup 248

Startup Venture Capital Conference Social Media 248

socalTECH

DECEMBER 7, 2016

We talked with Eli Aizenstat , the founder and CEO of Beatshare�and still a student--as well as President and longtime technology vet Barry Lieberman about the startup. Photo: Barry Lieberman, President and COO; Eli Aizenstat, Founder & CEO; and Rob Patrick, CTO). What is Beatshare? How did you two connect?

Tech Coast Angels 100

Tech Coast Angels CTO Coach Startup Pasadena Angels 100

SoCal CTO

APRIL 8, 2010

Death By Competitive Analysis - Steve Blank , March 1, 2010 Trading emails with a startup CEO building an iPhone app, I asked him why potential customers would buy his product. In response he sent me a competitive analysis. It looked like every competitive analysis I had done for 20 years, (ok maybe better.)

Startup 150

Startup Software Review Competition SoCal 150

Tech Zulu Event

JULY 22, 2014

Through simple design, extensive sensing mechanism research, and behavioral science principles, Moving Analytics is carving out its own innovative niche in a heavily competitive space by providing a simple solution for highly sedentary people. How is Movn different than your competition? I would say, put your customers first.

USC 104

USC Southern California Activity Study 104

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 22, 2014

The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. The passion has to be in the business context – meaning results oriented, customer oriented, and sensitive to competition. Similar values and goals. Ethical and diversity boundaries.

Software Review 107

Software Review Entrepreneur CTO Hire Outsource Development 107

socalTECH

JUNE 9, 2014

Is there a lot of competition for the rights to all of that content? Lee Essner: That''s one of the competitive edges we have. It comes back to the technology we''ve built, and the team we''ve built. We''ve taken his methodology, and built a business, people, and technology around that methodology.

Media 235

Media Content Startup IP 235

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 23, 2013

Sergey Belyankin is our Chief Technology Officer. Sergey’s diverse experience as an entrepreneur, technology consultant and software executive qualifies him to lead amSTATZ’s technology development. We have 115 paying customers right now. Any competition in LA? How many users?

Social Network 92

Social Network Networking Training Summary 92

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 8, 2013

The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. The passion has to be in the business context – meaning results oriented, customer oriented, and sensitive to competition. Similar values and goals. Ethical and diversity boundaries.

Software Review 103

Software Review Equity CTO Hire Outsource Development 103

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2013

A CEO who has “been there and done that” is traction, especially if teamed with a financial lead (CFO) and a product lead (CTO). For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. Get a real customer and real revenue. Build qualified advisory board.

Funding 112

Funding Entrepreneur Startup CTO Hire 112

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 16, 2017

The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. The passion has to be in the business context – meaning results oriented, customer oriented, and sensitive to competition. Conflicting visions won’t work. Believe in similar values and goals.

Software Review 56

Software Review CTO Hire Outsource Development CTO Coach 56

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 20, 2011

You’ll learn about competitive products that exist or are being built. Beyond that, I want lots of conversations with experts, users, customers, VCs, partners, etc. Startups that come to me and ask me to sign an NDA in order to get Free Startup CTO Consulting really are missing it. You’ll get suggestions for improvements.

Startup 211

Startup IP Ideas Patents 211

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 20, 2011

You’ll learn about competitive products that exist or are being built. Beyond that, I want lots of conversations with experts, users, customers, VCs, partners, etc. Startups that come to me and ask me to sign an NDA in order to get Free Startup CTO Consulting really are missing it. You’ll get suggestions for improvements.

Startup 198

Startup IP Ideas Patents 198

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

But the thing I am most proud of about Rob is that he has taken a company with a uniquely talented founder & CTO – Nick Halstead – and managed to build a very tight working relationship with Nick where we drive world-class product development without having the usual founder / CEO conflicts. Ask for short conference calls.

Tips 365

Tips Email Venture Capital CTO Coach 365

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 23, 2012

When enhancing your value proposition, ask the same question a newcomer would ask, "what is the best way for users to interact with the new features, irrespective of the existing customer experience?" " I recently performed a 360-Review on two Co-Founders who were the company's CEO and CTO.

Startup 268

Startup Tips CTO Coach Technical Review 268

SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 25, 2009

Fantastic post by Christian Gammill - Startup Delta Force… From a competitive perspective (e.g. all the other folks out there that will try to enter the same market) the barriers have been dropping over the last few years.

Startup 150

Startup SEM IP SEO 150

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 31, 2012

A CEO who has “been there and done that” is traction, especially if teamed with a financial lead (CFO) and a product lead (CTO). For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. Get a real customer and real revenue. Build qualified advisory board.

Startup 104

Startup CTO Hire Press Customer 104

socalTECH

AUGUST 9, 2013

We had been building technology around a publisher interface, and starting seeing the same things from customers, who wanted to understand what was happening on their site, what their competition was doing, and what advertisers were doing. I met my co-founder and CTO, Tom, there, and worked on a bunch of projects together.

Advertising 153

Advertising Startup CTO Coach Study 153

socalTECH

MARCH 31, 2014

We''re rolling it out to finance and Wall Street, monitoring thousands of sources of continuously changing information, such as news, social media, internal email systems, and analyzing specific, material conditions that our customers are looking for. We''re looking for lighting bolts in time which are important.

Orange County 245

Orange County Startup News IBM 245

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 29, 2011

The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. The passion has to be in the business context – meaning results oriented, customer oriented, and sensitive to competition. Similar values and goals. Ethical and diversity boundaries.

Software Review 96

Software Review CTO Hire Startup Outsource Development 96

InfoChachkie

JULY 14, 2011

Messenger : Rob Duva , Co-Founder, COO RingRevenue, prior Director of Customer Acquisition, CallWave. At CallWave, Colin was CTO, Jason was CFO and I was in charge of product marketing and customer acquisition. Who do you view as your biggest competition? You’re right. Work hard to get the right people on your team.

Marketing 209

Marketing Advertising Paid Search Startup 209

socalTECH

JUNE 25, 2009

Once you get to 300-500 customers, it blows up, because it was never intended to scale. Nobody in our competitive space can do all of those things, because they simply don't control their own destiny, because they don't own their own technology. So, we see ourselves as a technology provider.

IP 165

IP Pasadena Angels Pasadena Los Angeles 165

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 17, 2011

A CEO who has “been there and done that” is traction, especially if teamed with a financial lead (CFO) and a product lead (CTO). For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. Get a real customer and real revenue. Build qualified advisory board.

Startup 101

Startup CTO Hire Press Customer 101

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 24, 2010

The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. The passion has to be in the business context – meaning results oriented, customer oriented, and sensitive to competition. Similar values and goals. Ethical and diversity boundaries.

Software Review 92

Software Review CTO Hire Outsource Development Startup 92

socalTECH

JANUARY 2, 2014

We''ve worked out he bugs, and since then have hired a full time CTO and others. Michael Chasin: The most challenging part of any startup is getting in front of people, and finding customers. We''re talking about an industry which is very competitive, first, and two, one that people overwhelmingly try to avoid.

Help 240

Help Startup CTO Hire Pricing 240

socalTECH

MARCH 22, 2012

We've got a really cool, social product development formula, which is a fancy way of saying we'll be sending sample formulas to our customers in the second month, send out two formulas to them, and have them come back and vote on which one they like better. It's not just with razors, but also shaving cream, aftershave, and moisturizers.

Dollar Shave Club 210

Dollar Shave Club Startup Pricing Sample 210

socalTECH

MAY 21, 2013

We''ve got a grid of 500 nodes, handling a billion and a half clicks and call impressions, which we drive for our customers. On the other side, we had incredible high ranking search results when we were baked off against the competition. How did what was a staid publisher of phone books become a hotbed of online talent?

Technical Review 223

Technical Review Glendale Advertising Google 223

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 22, 2010

A CEO who has “been there and done that” is traction, especially if teamed with a financial lead (CIO) and a product lead (CTO). For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. Get a real customer and real revenue. Build qualified advisory board.

Tips 88

Tips Startup CTO Hire Press 88

socalTECH

MAY 21, 2013

We''ve got a grid of 500 nodes, handling a billion and a half clicks and call impressions, which we drive for our customers. ON the other side, we had incredible high ranking search results when we were baked off against the competition. How did what was a staid publisher of phone books become a hotbed of online talent?

Technical Review 211

Technical Review Glendale Advertising Google 211

Frank Addante

JULY 20, 2012

With a great product comes great customers, and with customers comes revenue and profit, which in turn can be used to build more great products. A product manager is like the CEO of the product, the engineering lead like the CTO, and the top marketer the CMO. Here’s how. The best product wins.

Product 59

Product Company Companies Organization 59

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

It included one firm who I asked not to call Salesforce.com as a reference (they were our largest pilot customer) and in their kindness they called Marc Benioff (the CEO) and asked his opinion. Another called Parker Harris, the co-founder and CTO. I thought, what would I do if I was trying to sell to a customer.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

socalTECH

JULY 23, 2009

Therese is the former CTO at SunGard Treasury Systems, and has a wealth of experience in the financial software market. I had actually retired from SunGard as CTO before starting BlackLine. How much competition is there in this space with people like Oracle, SAP, etc? I've always worked on financial systems. READ MORE>>.

Startup 124

Startup Software Review CTO Hire Oracle 124

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2010

Colin Kelley, the CTO of RingRevenue , left a comment in my last post about the need to “ mask interrupts &# in order to get work done. This product seems to be dead-ended the way that Microsoft products become when they have no competition. So I often try to stay off of email during the day. Unfortunately I was wrong.

Product 280

Product Startup Email Technical Review 280

SoCal CTO

MAY 4, 2010

Some great posts from April 2010 that talk to me in terms of being a CTO at a Startup. Redeye VC , April 13, 2010 Startup Development - SoCal CTO , April 23, 2010 Want to Know the Difference Between a CTO and a VP Engineering? Ben Casnocha: The Blog , April 15, 2010 Everyone I spoke with loved the idea.

CTO Hire 150

CTO Hire Venture Capital Startup Social Network 150