Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 26, 2023

Every one of you business owners I know periodically introduces new products and services to sustain growth, fight off competitors, or take advantage of new technologies. The cost of any new product these days must include education and rollout marketing, perhaps equal or greater than the development costs.

Product 141

Product Services Technical Review Artificial Inteligence 141

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 2, 2010

This is part of a series on sales & marketing. I previously covered how early phase sales teams should be “evangelical&# and consultative in nature. The first post on scaling sales dealt with “aiming&# your sales teams – making sure they were focused on the right opportunities.

Sales 289

Sales Startup Training Pricing 289

Berkonomics

JANUARY 12, 2023

Management undertakes a simple exercise of calculating the increased profitability of shutting down all R&D, sales and subordinate operations, and universally notes with shock the high net profit that results – from shutting down all operations except customer service to recurring customers (as in software support operations.).

Sales 296

Sales Custom Customer SaaS 296

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

Most technology startups seem to be funded by product people or business people. Specifically what is often not in the DNA of founders are sales skills. The result is a lack of knowledge of the process and of sales people themselves. We focused together on improving our sales methodology, our training and our comp plans.

Sales 316

Sales Startup Pricing Custom 316

Berkonomics

APRIL 19, 2012

Professional investors laugh when they hear an entrepreneur state, “We have no competition.” Doing nothing is the main competitor for most products and services, whether a compelling new idea or a seasoned product long proven to be effective. That statement has killed more investment deals than almost any other.

Competition 189

Competition Slides Sales Ideas 189

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 31, 2010

This is part of my ongoing Sales & Marketing Series. In the first part of this post I talked about how sales in a startup is often evangelical , requires as consultative sale and needs constant adjustments based on customer feedback. We had 4 or 5 sales reps that had been around since the early days.

Sales 286

Sales Newsletter Technical Review Activity 286

socalTECH

MAY 28, 2013

To bring that ability to name your own price on products, Los Angeles-based Greentoe (www.greentoe.com) recently launched, allowing consumers to name their own price to retailers of everything from electronics to baby products. Joe Marrapodi: GreenToe is a name your own price marketplace for products. What is Greentoe?

Pricing 273

Pricing Product Help Sales 273

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 21, 2023

New product process. Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the kay to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. From time to time, include customers and sales members in ideation sessions. Product life cycles keep getting shorter and shorter, which mandates accelerated innovation cycles.

Coach 137

Coach Metrics Competition Ideas 137

TechCrunch LA

APRIL 9, 2020

The coronavirus pandemic has forced Energica to hit the brakes on production of its battery powered machines that can reach top speeds of 168 mph. general manager ( Stefano Benatti ) — filled more orders in the first two months of 2020 than all its sales for 2019, according to Cevolini.

Technical Review 277

Technical Review Competition Demand Sales 277

Berkonomics

APRIL 9, 2020

If it takes eighteen months to get a new product out the door and into the market, and if a product’s gross margin is ten dollars but the corporate overhead is a million a month, it will take the sale of 67,000 more units to break even than if it were to take only six months to market. A critical question for you.

Competition 156

Competition Sales Marketing Product 156

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 20, 2018

These are your candidates, because they are companies already absorbing much or all the marketing expense necessary to make sales of your invention. They will be more willing to pay a royalty fee if your product gets them to market earlier or is protected by patent to create a barrier to their competition. So, there you have it.

IP 136

IP Product Equity Tool 136

Tech.Co

SEPTEMBER 25, 2015

From apps to hardware, to KickStarter successes and international startups, we’re inching closer to finding out who will take home the title of Startup of the Year competition at our annual Celebrate Conference in October. Among the dozens of participants that applied for the online competitions, only a few progressed into the semifinals.

Competition 123

Competition Mobile Technical Review Startup 123

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 29, 2010

Mark Zuckerberg seems to be me to be one of the most talented young technology professionals of his generation and seems to have an amazing vision for technology and product. Competitiveness - One attribute that I believe most VCs look for in entrepreneurs is competitiveness. This competitive streak paid off.

Competition 296

Competition Entrepreneur Startup GRP Partners 296

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 20, 2018

These are your candidates, because they are companies already absorbing much or all the marketing expense necessary to make sales of your invention. They will be more willing to pay a royalty fee if your product gets them to market earlier or is protected by patent to create a barrier to their competition. So, there you have it.

IP 120

IP Product Equity Tool 120

Berkonomics

JUNE 2, 2022

Looking for an entrance into a VC, an angel group, a bank, a CxO for a sales opportunity, or any other entity? Few of your contacts will be willing to use their valuable social or political capital helping you with a sales effort, and you will definitely strain your relationship with the intermediary if not a close friend.

Ideas 156

Ideas Sales Competition Venture Capital 156

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 21, 2013

Startups are usually so focused on selling more of their branded product or service to their own customer base (organic growth) that they don’t consider the more indirect methods (non-organic growth) of increasing revenue and market share. Economies of scale also apply to marketing, distribution, and sales. Fresh customer base.

Organization 97

Organization Competition Startup Acquisition 97

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 2, 2022

A target market is the group of customers that the startup plans to attract through marketing and sales their product or service. This segment should have specific demographics, and the means to buy your product. Sales/Marketing. Be specific on sales channels and marketing initiatives. Production.

Sales 102

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 102

Berkonomics

JULY 26, 2018

These are so succinct, so well defined, so precise that everyone in sales and everyone involved in marketing must be able to answer these three questions without pause, and convincingly. It would pay you to work over this set of questions in a special session with sales, marketing and senior management in the room at once.

Sales 226

Sales Custom Customer Pricing 226

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 29, 2023

In my experience in large businesses as well as years of advising startups, I see far too much focus on product skills, and too little on people and process skills. His focus is on sales, but I see the same skills needed for entrepreneurs. Opening relationships and creating opportunities.

Startup 154

Startup Sales Entrepreneur Customer 154

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 14, 2021

As an advisor to new business owners, I’m accustomed to seeing primarily the simple traditional product pricing strategies , usually driven by competitor prices, or cost plus a reasonable margin. Convince customers that you are selling at a loss, or use a sale price much lower than the original price.

Pricing 145

Pricing Startup Competition Examples 145

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 16, 2014

Eventually you need a VP of Product to handle your product roadmap, a CTO for engineering leadership and VPs of sales, marketing & biz dev. If you hire truly talented people you end up definitionally with a lot of competitive peers who will inevitably jockey for resources and control. Do you hire more sales people?

Entrepreneur 385

Entrepreneur CTO Hire Startup Sales 385

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 20, 2022

Every entrepreneur assumes their product or service is so great that “word-of-mouth” will carry the day for them. Even great products need great marketing “content” to fuel the ascent of their online message. Lacks a sales angle. Great content shouldn’t have any obvious marketing messages or sales pitches embedded inside of it.

Content 146

Content Newsletter Competition Writing 146

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 13, 2014

We all know the products they give away, and the ones purchased by family and friends don’t count. The real milestone, proving the business model, is that first product sold for full price to a total stranger, leaving him happy. If you lose money on every sale, it’s hard to make it up in volume.

Sales 99

Sales Customer Custom Entrepreneur 99

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 25, 2020

New product process. Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the kay to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. From time to time, include customers and sales members in ideation sessions. Product life cycles keep getting shorter and shorter, which mandates accelerated innovation cycles.

Metrics 144

Metrics Coach Social Network Competition 144

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 10, 2023

Entrepreneurs need to document a process of responding to a market need, sizing opportunity, assigning a specific business model, and planning for marketing, sales, and customer satisfaction. Typically some production and delivery is outsourced, requiring formal contracts and documentation. Solution development and delivery.

Outsource Development 115

Outsource Development Startup Ideas Competition 115

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 9, 2023

Satisfy the seller’s need to claim a higher sales price victory by moving a substantial part of the price into a future earn–out or using the target company’s own cash to pay part of the price, or asking the seller to finance a significant piece of the sale. Offering too little in an acquisition to satisfy the seller? What power!

Pricing 156

Pricing Sales Examples Tool 156

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 18, 2014

Most technical entrepreneurs I know demand the discipline of a product specification or plan, and then assume that their great product will drive a great business. Serious investors, on the other hand, look for a professional business plan or summary first, and hardly ever look at the product plan.

Product 101

Product Entrepreneur Summary Activity 101

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 18, 2016

When entrepreneurs introduce new products to the market, their passion and conviction often leads them to assume that every potential customer will see the immediate need and value, and will quickly adopt the solution. Yet most of the startups I see these days are providing a solution that is easier to use, more fun, or more productive.

Product 95

Product Case Study Customer Custom 95

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2013

In my first enterprise software company we developed a methodology for sales that we called PUCCKA , which I wrote about previously. Having a good sales methodology can help you ensure your company runs more disciplined campaigns and focuses scarce resources on your best opportunities. It the second rule of sales, “Why Buy Me?”

Sales 336

Sales Startup Competition Custom 336

Berkonomics

APRIL 16, 2020

Do you still need marketing costs when there is no-one out there buying new product? Are you salespeople making few if any sales because your prospective customers are distracted by their own problems? Have you squeezed every dime of cost that is non-core related from your business?

Layoffs 218

Layoffs Sales News Marketing 218

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 31, 2012

Jeff (also an HBS alum) co-teaches the LTV course with Professor Eisenmann about a student of theirs who had written a blog post about sales taking on some of my previous assertions. That student is Erin McCann who formerly worked in sales at Google, so she has some ground to stand on in her assertions.

Startup 319

Startup Sales Course Competition 319

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 16, 2023

Most aspiring entrepreneurs understand that you can’t build a business if you won’t commit to delivering a product or service, but many are hesitant or refuse to commit to any financial forecasts. Yet every business requires revenue and volumes, as certainly as it requires a product to sell. Forecast sales-volume expectations.

Startup 116

Startup Pricing Sales Statistics 116

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 23, 2012

We all know the products they give away, and the ones purchased by family and friends don’t count. The real milestone, proving the business model, is that first product sold for full price to a total stranger, leaving him happy. If you lose money on every sale, it’s hard to make it up in volume.

Sales 96

Sales Custom Customer Pricing 96

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 24, 2022

Well, even though that acquisition is still playing itself out on the field of battle, it appears quite clear that the new parent has directed its new subsidiary to abandon the lower end of the market and focus upon the larger sales, corporate customers, and major brands. Opportunity can come when least expected. Battle or avoid? .

Resource 156

Resource Competition Examples Custom 156

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 9, 2023

When entrepreneurs introduce new products to the market, their passion and conviction often leads them to assume that every potential customer will see the immediate need and value, and will quickly adopt the solution. Yet most of the startups I see these days are providing a solution that is easier to use, more fun, or more productive.

Case Study 89

Case Study Custom Customer Study 89

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 20, 2012

Why is it that most of the business plans I see are really product plans? I define a product plan as a detailed description of your product or service, with a bit of business thrown in at the end. A business plan is a detailed description of your business, with a bit of product description thrown in near the front.

Product 92

Product Outsource Development Competition Outsource 92

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 20, 2013

Crowdfunder , the Los Angeles startup led by CHance Barnett, has launched another crowdfunding event aimed at the local industry, saying Wednesday that it has launched CROWDIMPACT LA , a pitching competition which will award $20,000 in a top prize to a winning social enterprise company. Deadline for entry is March 28th. READ MORE>>.

Startup 215

Startup Competition Demand Los Angeles 215