Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 17, 2015

For the elite startups and entrepreneurs who manage to attract the investor they dream of, and survive the term sheet negotiation, there is still one more hurdle before the money is in the bank. Due diligence always involves on-site visits, informal discussions with any or all members of the team, vendors, and good customers as well as bad.

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Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 27, 2015

But for startups with limited resources and experience, I always recommend a soft launch or toe-in-the-water approach in a local market -- and scale up later. In fact, for startups, it usually makes sense to announce your solution on social media and blogs even before you have built the first one.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 4, 2016

In my view, starting a new business has never been easier, and according to reports from the Kaufmann Foundation , the numbers are finally here to show it. The number of startups rose in 2015 for the first time in five years, with the largest year-over-year increase in two decades. The cost of social media done well is low.

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Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 18, 2015

It’s all about getting customers to make a buy decision. Customers are more in control of their buying decisions than ever before, with the wealth of alternatives and information available online, and interactive access to sources they trust via social media. Get the view from the customer early by talking to real people.

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Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 16, 2015

The smart ones get some extra support early on critical decisions, and work a bit harder on issues that are common startup killers. Don’t wait for the first cash-flow crisis to start talking to investors. Actively listen to mentor and customer feedback. Start marketing before you have a product to sell.

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Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 14, 2015

A few years ago, before the Internet was pervasive, before everyone carried a smartphone and before do-it-yourself software tools were available for free, it was difficult to reach a critical mass of new customers without spending a million dollars on a website, custom software and television advertising. Both are wrong.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 17, 2015

Customers and opportunities don’t wait. If your startup culture doesn’t include a sense of urgency, your probabilities of long-term success are miniscule. Some of you may remember MySpace , which came early to social media, but lost the lead to Facebook by evolving too slowly, many analysts say.

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Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 20, 2015

Proof of any business model starts with a finished product or solution, sold to a new customer for full price, with high satisfaction for the value received. The conundrum is that once you have really proven the business model, you no longer need the investor money you asked for to start the business.

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Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 14, 2015

Image via Flickr by Side Wages Some entrepreneurs forget that they need an innovative business model along with an innovative solution to have a successful startup. That’s why I say “two heads are better than one” in a startup. In fact, both customers and investors often avoid the perceived high risk of innovative technology pitches.

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Xconomy

SEPTEMBER 26, 2016

Tealium, a San-Diego startup that provides online advertising tag management and marketing services for enterprise customers, has raised $35 million in a growth financing deal intended to expand its technology and market reach. We help our customers weave together all the data across all of their data streams,” Lunsford said.

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Tech Zulu Event

JULY 10, 2015

Techstars Disney Accelerator class of 2015 was announced yesterday. The ten companies in this year’s program represent a diverse cross-section of technologies, and are inspired by their visions for the applicability of these technologies in the media space. Techstars Disney Accelerator Class of 2015 appeared first on TechZulu.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 4, 2016

Most first-time entrepreneurs seem to believe the myth that they need a minimum of a half a million dollars to start a business. Starting a new business in an area where you have no experience, just because it appears to have great potential, is a recipe for failure. Entrepreneurs who start without a plan spend more money.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 6, 2015

Your business name will have the same impact on potential customers. In this world of information overload, you need a name that will remain memorable and meaningful for years to come, even after trends change and your startup has pivoted. Tricky spellings send customers to competitors. Confusion will cost you customers.

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Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 30, 2015

Aspiring entrepreneurs often ask me what to do first when starting a business. The date of incorporation is the official start date for your business, so progress from this point will be scrutinized by investors. Start with the simplest legal entity, to minimize liability and taxes.

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Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 28, 2015

Too many entrepreneurs look for that one magic bullet -- an exciting new technology, perhaps, or their own determination to make the world a better place -- to override any shortcomings in their startup model. Such failures ignore the essential business elements investors look for before committing to a startup.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 23, 2015

If an entrepreneur can’t build a culture of excitement and commitment at a startup, the chances of long-term success are negligible. Customize your organizational structure based on individuals' strengths. There is no rule that marketing needs to report to the founder, or that every startup needs a chief operating officer.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 19, 2015

Most technologists have little interest in the mechanics of starting and building a business. Thus it’s a waste of time for most entrepreneurs to be looking for investors until they have a product and some customer revenue. Business efforts should start only after the product is right.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2015

Most new entrepreneurs assume that great investors will find their startups based on the compelling solution the founders have created. Here are some key recommendations to get you started: Plan for adequate time to find an investment. Don’t wait until your startup is out of money before looking for an investor.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 22, 2015

We all have to communicate and collaborate with other people at work, but most of us start out instinctively trying to maintain an emotional distance from others in the work environment. Yet the 2015 Office Romance Survey by Vault, Inc. Yet the 2015 Office Romance Survey by Vault, Inc. by Jan Yager, who is a Ph.D.

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Tech.Co

JULY 31, 2017

While back in 2011, a cell phone user received or made 12 phone calls a day on average, the number has dropped to just 6 calls in 2015. With all sorts of text/video messaging apps, email and social media as the primary mean of communication, the phone has become both a public and a business nuance.

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Tech Zulu Event

JANUARY 26, 2016

In 2015 an additional 237 thousand joined the online community. Top media giants Facebook and Alphabet are determined to grow this number with the introduction of various airborne devices designed to bring internet to the far corners of the globe to boost their revenues. One of the stars of 2015 was undoubtedly Slack.

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socalTECH

FEBRUARY 13, 2015

Los Angeles-based CurbStand (www.curbstand.com) is hoping to change that, by offering up a mobile app which connects you with the company''s network of CurbStand valet parking companies, which offers on-demand retrieval of your car, mobil payments, and on the valet parking operator side--lots of business analytics tools and reporting.

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Tech Zulu Event

JANUARY 28, 2016

For example, if a company website generates extensive visitor traffic at a particular point in time, the enterprise may continue to serve customers without obvious interruptions in service because its cloud-based server architecture permits the distribution of visiting traffic among servers in different locations. Greater Niche Functionality.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 27, 2016

Crowdfunding is the hot new vehicle for raising money to support your entrepreneurial efforts, with over 1,250 website platforms around the world to help you, according to a 2015 industry report. Understating or overstating your request will likely kill your credibility or your startup in lieu of follow-on requirements.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 2, 2012

Marketers see it as a better way to target customers, but the current consumer offerings have been slow to deliver. As outlined a while back by Adam Holden-Bache on Social Media B2B , I’m convinced that business-to-business has more money and more untapped opportunities, along the following lines: Strategic partnerships.

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Eric Greenspan

JANUARY 24, 2016

Like Ice Cube and Dr. Dre use rap lyrics, Seth and I use social media instead. I was cool with this and we agreed that I would handle the site build out, site management, all customer facing responsibilities, all sales, marketing and operational aspects of the business except for our accounting of course. I did the rest.

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Tech Zulu Event

FEBRUARY 17, 2016

And I’ll tell you why, starting with where you started and why you succeeded. In fact, Twitter was one of the first mobile social media platforms. Users could set up their phone to tweet from it; send an SMS txt and the tweet would appear on your profile. All these things set Twitter up for enormous user growth.

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