Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

The most important advice I could give you before you set out in fund raising mode is to understand that fund-raising a sales & marketing process and needs to be managed. Somehow many first-time founders equate “sales” with something that is beneath them. In sales there are also three rules: Qualify, qualify, qualify.

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 23, 2010

This is part of my ongoing series on startup advice but also filed under my sales & marketing posts. The only problem is that you can’t afford all of these expensive direct sales reps to go and sell it. Sort of amortizing the costs of their sales reps over more products. You decide to go out and hire a sales rep.

Startup 293

Startup Sales Marketing Product 293

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2019

Here is my summary of the key focus activities of that challenge for every business owner: Manage cash flow daily and plot a plan to profitability. You can’t afford to close every sale, or handle every customer complaint. With that first wave of customers comes a whole set of additional demands on your time and energy.

Metrics 86

Metrics Startup Training Customer 86

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

The most obvious way to explain this is with sales people. If you hire 6 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 for 4-6 months. “COGS” represents the amount that each sale costs you.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

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

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Of course it is super helpful if a VC can drop you in to important people for business development, recruiting, PR, sales and eventually M&A. Summary: Team Leadership skills, operating knowhow and industry knowledge are all tremendously important. Connections?

Venture Capital 364

Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

Executive Summary. Fund raising (as is much of life) is a sale – pure and simple. As with any sales campaign you need to: Qualify your buyers early so you focus your scarce resources on people likely to buy your product. . Three rules in sales: Why buy anything? ” (Zig Ziglar). Create scarcity. Why buy me?

Develop 366

Develop Development Funding Venture Capital 366

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 30, 2013

It also starts with a good summary of the intangibles, summarized as the five rules of relevancy, by Mark Zawacki: A startup needs to be relevant and stay relevant. This is not just sales traction, but a proper balance between resources, product, and customers. Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics.

Startup 117

Startup Education Customer Custom 117

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 28, 2012

Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics, but also starts with a good summary of the intangibles, summarized as the five rules of relevancy, by Mark Zawacki: A startup needs to be relevant and stay relevant. This is not just sales traction, but a proper balance between resources, product, and customers.

Startup 99

Startup Education Customer Custom 99

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 8, 2016

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 55

Product Startup Summary Entrepreneur 55

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 17, 2016

It also starts with a good summary of the intangibles, summarized as the five rules of relevancy, by Mark Zawacki: A startup needs to be relevant and stay relevant. This is not just sales traction, but a proper balance between resources, product, and customers. Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics.

Capital 58

Capital Startup Education Customer 58

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

Early in a services business there is usually no profits as the company reinvests in hiring people to grow, but by $20 million in sales the company should at least be pulling in 10% profits (if not more) depending on how much is reinvested. You end up needing to add staff and take on more risk without knowing what your future demand will be.

Services 332

Services Venture Capital IP Startup 332

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 28, 2018

If a consumer will pay a fixed price for a product or service then the battle over who gets the margin in any sale is between the person who merchandises a product and the person who manufactures it. Summary It’s hard to build a successful product company?—?even companies that have to spend too heavily on customer acquisition).

Product 296

Product Course Customer Custom 296

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 8, 2016

He lays out very plainly his own experiences on both sides of this equation, and I particularly enjoyed his summary startup roadmap of twenty-one steps to success, which add real content to the eight that I recommend to every entrepreneur: Select an idea you can clearly communicate in thirty seconds.

Entrepreneur 58

Entrepreneur Ideas Pricing Customer 58

InfoChachkie

JUNE 23, 2011

What follows is a summary which paraphrases Jason’s responses. The catalyst was that we saw the demand and it was confirmed by some of the leading advertisers in the marketplace. Value Prop Twitter Style : DataPop simplifies the lives of marketers and gives them the tools they need to build ads that people love to click on.

Yahoo 210

Yahoo Startup Advertising Summary 210

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 16, 2010

Ever had a meeting with a CEO who was really short with you, demanded the answer quickly and was fidgety while you spoke? For extroverted people I recommend that entrepreneurs have an “executive summary&# slide up front that cuts to the chase. And through the years I’ve seen the same behavior with sales & biz dev.

Slides 358

Slides Venture Capital Startup Summary 358

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

That said, a summary below is available for those who prefer to read the notes version. A very big thank you to Travis Biziorek of Kibin who did the summary notes below. If you value the summary notes please at least check out the Kibin website & see what they do. I love the concept. I argue the opposite.

Startup 292

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Summary 292

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 17, 2011

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: This is a long post, so I put an executive summary here if you want to get the point without reading all the detail. If you plan to read the post you can skip the summary if you want. Underpinning it all I wrote: sales, asset management, analytics & talent management. Will this hold in the future?

Writing 356

Writing Startup Ideas Summary 356

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 22, 2010

This states how the proceeds from a sale or dissolution of the company will be distributed. If I get demand from people after this video to do a deeper dive on term sheets we will. Luckily you all now have the spreadsheet to download that will calculate both for you. Heck, maybe we’ll even invite a lawyer on to do it with us!

Venture Capital 405

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Funding 405

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

and we were met with weak demand, slow growth and high costs. It wasn’t just front-end processes like sales tools, marketing funnels, dynamic pricing, driver routes and so forth but we also had to build comprehensive systems to manage numerous warehouses across four different cities.

Startup 286

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 286

Frank Addante

JUNE 4, 2006

. – Digital Messaging Infrastructure Company (incubated by Addante and Associates, LLC) Age: 25 - 29 (present) Time Period: 2002 - present My Role: Founder High Point: TBD Here is a summary of my experiences to-date with StrongMail: 1. It turned out that this drove even more demand for StrongMail. Relaxing 2. Incubation 3.

Startup 40

Startup Venture Capital Email CTO Hire 40