Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 14, 2022

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right. Nail the go-to-market strategy.

Technical Review 143

Technical Review Customer Custom Entrepreneur 143

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

Gross Burn vs. Net Burn. Burn rate in case you don’t know is the amount of money a company is either spending (gross) or losing (net) per month. (it Net burn is the amount of money you are losing per month. I often see companies burning $100,000 per month (net) looking to raise $6-8 million.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 31, 2023

Every entrepreneur knows that good demand generation marketing is the key to growth these days, but very few have the discipline or know-how to measure return in a world of a thousand tools and techniques. In fact, we now live in a buyer-led digital age, where the traditional media push-marketing efforts just don’t work.

Metrics 102

Metrics Demand Paramount Content 102

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 2, 2022

I expect that should seem intuitive to all entrepreneurs, but every investor I know has many stories about startup funding requests with major business model elements missing. The most common failures are solutions looking for a problem, lack of a defined market, or an inadequate revenue model. Target market. Sales/Marketing.

Sales 102

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 102

socalTECH

JULY 7, 2010

One complaint we sometimes hear from venture capitalists visiting Southern California for the first time, is the difficulty of finding experienced entrepreneurs and executives. socalTECH.com has mined its proprietary database of high tech companies and entrepreneurs and identified just a few of the repeat entrepreneurs to watch in the region.

Southern California 228

Southern California Entrepreneur SoCal Mahalo 228

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 27, 2014

Entrepreneurs typically embrace celebrity investments, while most sophisticated investors prefer to avoid famous entertainment or sports personalities on the cap table. In instances when the celebrity''s brand is aligned with the target market, such as Kim Kardashian''s promotion of ShoeDazzle, this approach works. Share and Enjoy.

Entrepreneur 193

Entrepreneur Technical Review Hollywood Southern California 193

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 21, 2015

Every entrepreneur knows that good demand generation marketing is the key to growth these days, but very few have the discipline or know-how to measure return in a world of a thousand tools and techniques. In fact, we now live in a buyer-led digital age, where the traditional media push-marketing efforts just don’t work.

Metrics 101

Metrics Marketing Demand Paramount 101

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 18, 2014

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right. Nail the go-to-market strategy.

Entrepreneur 113

Entrepreneur Startup Technical Review Customer 113

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

This is part of my series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity. Entrepreneurs are inherently risk takers.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital CTO Hire 293

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 8, 2022

In reality, a simple Excel spreadsheet model customized around your assumptions can save you hours and avoid a wasted expense in validating alternative vendor and marketing decisions. What if you need to change your market size and volume projections? Yet they can be done by a simple financial model in a few milliseconds.

Startup 147

Startup Pricing Sample Customer 147

Berkonomics

MAY 7, 2015

You, the lonely fisherman, have to weave a net to catch your fish. Should your net be large and bulky, requiring more effort and expense to weave? Or should it be small and delicate, to catch those fish that would otherwise fall through the net? The size of your market may well define the ultimate size of your dream.

.Net 120

.Net Research Marketing Entrepreneur 120

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 9, 2018

Every entrepreneur knows that good demand generation marketing is the key to growth these days, but very few have the discipline or know-how to measure return in a world of a thousand tools and techniques. In fact, we now live in a buyer-led digital age, where the traditional media push-marketing efforts just don’t work.

Metrics 57

Metrics Demand Marketing Paramount 57

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 21, 2017

Until the recession a few years ago, market research indicated that as many as 90 percent of the roughly 20 million American small business owners were motivated more by lifestyle than growth and money. Being called a lifestyle entrepreneur should be a point of pride, not an insult. It seems that more people are focused on money today.

Entrepreneur 69

Entrepreneur Startup Equity Course 69

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 15, 2019

Steve Blank via Flickr by jdlasica I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right.

Startup 98

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 98

Jason Nazar

MAY 1, 2016

I’ve been a part of dozens (maybe hundreds) of product launches And in each of these cases I ask my team to put together a simple dashboard of a small set of metrics for our paid and free products that let me know the success of our efforts. For startup entrepreneurs, you can also track these metrics with Google analytics.

Marketing 40

Marketing CPC Metrics .Net 40

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 9, 2019

With the advent and popularity of crowdfunding platforms, including Kickstarter and IndieGoGo , as a winning alternative for funding your new venture, I find that many aspiring entrepreneurs are confused about the need to ever seek a professional angel investor. Business-to-business products need professional investors.

Funding 119

Funding Startup Platform Examples 119

Jason Nazar

NOVEMBER 1, 2015

I’ve been a part of dozens (maybe hundreds) of product launches And in each of these cases I ask my team to put together a simple dashboard of a small set of metrics for our paid and free products that let me know the success of our efforts. For startup entrepreneurs, you can also track these metrics with Google analytics.

Marketing 40

Marketing CPC Metrics .Net 40

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2014

Both have worked.Google reached $1 billion in revenue within five years of incorporation, and now has a market capitalization of over $400 billion. Most modern investors still look for a business model that embodies a gross margin over 50 percent and a net margin in the 20 percent range. entrepreneur revenue startup user count'

Entrepreneur 98

Entrepreneur Organization Invest Customer 98

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 15, 2010

As an entrepreneur, you always need to be on the lookout for ways to expand your current business, and always on the lookout for your next big thing. I’ve netted out his and others to create the following basic strategy for entrepreneurial growth: Apply your core competency to related markets.

Entrepreneur 100

Entrepreneur Customer Custom .Net 100

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 6, 2020

In reality, a simple Excel spreadsheet model customized around your assumptions can save you hours and avoid a wasted expense in validating alternative vendor and marketing decisions. What if you need to change your market size and volume projections? Yet they can be done by a simple financial model in a few milliseconds.

Startup 123

Startup Pricing Sample Customer 123

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 30, 2021

I was reading an old article written by marketing guru Seth Godin a while back where he mentions that “it takes about six years of hard work to become an overnight success”. Even then, it struggled through the 80’s and 90’s, until the advent of the iMac and consumer products. In 2005, Facebook still showed a yearly net loss of $3.63

Yahoo 127

Yahoo IBM IBM Startup 127

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 7, 2014

This is something I think entrepreneurs don’t totally understand and it’s worthwhile they do. Entrepreneurs started demanding that VCs call their first-round financings “seed” rounds even if they were $3 million. Why the latter? and there''s always a but]. I saw this myself a few times in a row.

Seed Funding 399

Seed Funding Venture Capital Startup Entrepreneur 399

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 9, 2012

I was reading an article written by marketing guru Seth Godin a while back where he mentions that “it takes about six years of hard work to become an overnight success”. Even then, it struggled through the 80’s and 90’s, until the advent of the iMac and consumer products. In 2005, Facebook still showed a yearly net loss of $3.63

Entrepreneur 105

Entrepreneur Yahoo IBM IBM 105

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2009

There were tons of young entrepreneurs showing their latest Web 2.0 People mistook extra doses of Ajax for a successful product. The last couple of years has also seen the huge initial success of Ycombinator, the Lean Startup and many other product driven approaches to going to market. Short answer: absofuckinglutely.

Web 2.0 334

Web 2.0 Venture Capital Web Technical Review 334

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

” I mention journalists here because they perpetuate the myth that focusing on profits is ALWAYS the right answer and then I hear many entrepreneurs (and certainly many “normals”) repeating the same mantra. If you have a market lead then raising capital and making investments now will help you as others enter the market.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 12, 2017

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right. Nail the go-to-market strategy.

Startup 64

Startup Technical Review Entrepreneur Customer 64

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 20, 2012

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right. Nail the go-to-market strategy.

Startup 118

Startup Technical Review Entrepreneur Customer 118

socalTECH

MAY 30, 2019

Richards--a serial entrepreneur who has been involved in a number of technology companies here, including NTI Group (sold to Blackboard), Internships.com, MP3.com, com, and Vivendi Universal Net USA, where he was also CEO. Our interview this morning is with Robin Richards , the CEO of Los Angeles-based CareerArc (www.careerarc.com).

Content 193

Content Social Network Coach Help 193

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 23, 2013

I agree with the seven survival challenges from Michael Fertik, in an old Harvard Business Review article , for executives making the transition: Empire-building skills are counter-productive. At a small company, if you're constantly demanding more support, you risk turning your net impact into overhead-creep rather than value creation.

Entrepreneur 105

Entrepreneur Startup Training Technical Review 105

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

There’s a line of thinking in Silicon Valley that you should build product businesses rather than services businesses. They have created two internal technology “products&# and wanted to figure out how they could turn their services business into a product business that could be financed. This team is talented.

Services 332

Services Venture Capital IP Startup 332

Tech Zulu Event

MAY 1, 2013

Social media has transformed the way books are marketed and sold. Nolan Bushnell , Serial Entrepreneur, Founded Brainrush, Atari, Chuck E. Author of new book, “Finding The Next Steve Jobs” released via Net Minds. Tim Sanders , CEO Net Minds Publishing, Author, Speaker. Cheese, Etak, ByVideo, Axlon, uWink.

Social Media 101

Social Media eBook .Net Media 101

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 19, 2011

I see more and more entrepreneurs who seem to have everything going for them – vision, motivation, passion, even a good business plan, product, and money, and yet they can’t close customers. Success demands testing the solution early and quickly in the market, then iterating to get it right. Nail the go-to-market strategy.

Startup 114

Startup Technical Review Entrepreneur Customer 114

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 26, 2019

Until the recession a few years ago, market research indicated that as many as 90 percent of the roughly 20 million American small business owners were motivated more by lifestyle than growth and money. Being called a lifestyle entrepreneur should be a point of pride, not an insult. It seems that more people are focused on money today.

Startup 77

Startup Equity Entrepreneur Course 77

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 5, 2020

As an advisor to entrepreneurs, I find that I often have to remind them that the world of customers has changed since they started their last business. But even the older Boomers have learned to use technology and social media as the source of expectations from your business, more so than your own traditional marketing.

Customer 133

Customer Custom Social Media Startup 133

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 11, 2011

Value Prop Twitter Style : AngelList is the productization of raising startup funding. Venture Hacks is educating entrepreneurs on the game theory of how to raise venture capital. Venture Hacks is educating entrepreneurs on the game theory of how to raise venture capital. AngelList is the productization of that.

Startup 273

Startup Software Review Summary Technical Review 273

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 26, 2015

Not so long ago, every business assumed that the keys to success were the highest quality product, the best value for the buck, and the best customer service. Exactly what is that customer experience that every modern marketer is talking about, and how do you measure it? Entrepreneur of the Year” finalist. Detractors.

Customer 100

Customer Custom .Net Competition 100

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 28, 2015

In reality, a simple Excel spreadsheet model customized around your assumptions can save you hours and avoid a wasted expense in validating alternative vendor and marketing decisions. The way to start is with a sample financial model, freely available from many sources on the Internet, such as this one from Entrepreneur.

Startup 103

Startup Pricing Sample Customer 103