InfoChachkie

AUGUST 25, 2014

A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. During the intervening 20-years, Jeff has offered business executives numerous valuable tips, including the following: If you haven''t already subscribed yet, subscribe now for free weekly JohnGreathouse.com articles! You can be customer-focused or competitor-focused.

Tips 239

Tips Startup Customer Custom 239

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 14, 2012

All the experts these days are talking about the increasing need for customer focus and maximizing sales. Typically entrepreneurs and even professional sales people think this means more emphasis on the customer selling process, when in fact it really means spending more time understanding the customer buying process (view from the customer).

Sales 96

Sales Customer Custom Competition 96

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 23, 2011

All the experts these days are talking about the increasing need for customer focus and maximizing sales. Typically entrepreneurs and even professional sales people think this means more emphasis on the customer selling process, when in fact it means spending more time understanding the customer buying process (view from the customer).

Sales 93

Sales Customer Custom Competition 93

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 19, 2021

Some investors say half the ideas pitched to them don’t have any plan at all, even though some have great potential. Other entrepreneurs skip just a couple of the elements outlined in my original article, “ These 10 Key Elements Make a Business Plan Fundable. Isn’t your personal risk just as important as investor risk?

Funding 171

Funding Startup IBM IBM 171

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 24, 2021

Others schedule exhaustive training sessions for everyone on the team, including showcase customers, to make sure that everyone paints a consistent picture. The Founder needs to remember that meetings up to this point have been primarily off-site, with staged demos, and managed personally by the CEO or a small team.

Technical Review 151

Technical Review Startup Satisfaction Invest 151

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 18, 2021

You need to have business relationships with team members, investors, customers, and a myriad of other support people. So I thought I would drop back to some essentials in building and nurturing business relationships (most of these apply to personal relationships as well): Build your network. Work on your elevator pitch.

Entrepreneur 140

Entrepreneur Startup Social Network Mentor 140

Tech.Co

JULY 24, 2017

Especially in the early days of your startup, when you’re often only months from running out of money, hiring the wrong person can be disastrous. But how do you go about pitching your friends? I suggest to customize your pitch for them. Next, figure out a venue for the pitch.

Networking 82

Networking Startup Software Review Conference 82

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 24, 2014

A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. If you haven''t already subscribed yet, subscribe now for free weekly JohnGreathouse.com articles! Few customer pitches are too brief - fulfill your customers'' needs by saying less and listening more. Given the book''s commercial success, I had high hopes.

Hollywood 227

Hollywood Santa Barbara Entrepreneur Customer 227

InfoChachkie

MAY 22, 2012

“One of the big misconceptions in baseball is that playing the game keeps you in shape to pitch. Major League baseball pitchers spend far more time preparing to pitch than they actually do pitching. If you haven’t already subscribed yet, subscribe now for free weekly Infochachkie articles! I wish that was true.

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Capital Research Customer 236

InfoChachkie

MAY 7, 2012

If you haven’t already subscribed yet, subscribe now for free weekly Infochachkie articles! If you are fortunate to pitch a sophisticated investor in person, assume they already believe in the veracity of your idea, the market and the underlying technological trends. Think Stewardship. The same precept holds true today.

Ideas 251

Ideas Venture Capital Education Entrepreneur 251

InfoChachkie

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

Most sophisticated investors ignore them, focusing their attention on an entrepreneur's pitch and presentation materials, financial forecast and executive summary. As noted in Entrepreneurs Shouldn't Pitch Their Ideas To Venture Capitalists , most sophisticated investors place their bets on people rather than opportunities.

Venture Capital 211

Venture Capital Summary Technical Review Template 211

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 19, 2015

The average length of a funding pitch to Angel investors is ten minutes. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. Remember you are pitching to investors, not customers. Some entrepreneurs seem to think that their product pitch is also their investor pitch.

Slides 105

Slides Technical Review Startup Research 105

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2013

This article initially appeared on Inc. The point of PUCCKA was to develop a common methodology to make sure our whole team approaches sales with the same mindset and to give us a language to talk with each other about our prospects, as in, “have you identified your customers pain point yet?”. Click here.

Sales 367

Sales Slides Startup Customer 367

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 23, 2011

They get pitched by so many blowhards that more genuine people who aren’t in it for just a story stand out from the crowd. PR isn’t something that can be delegated – The other thing that tech execs often want to do is to delegate the PR to their marketing person. In my opinion it’s worth its weight in gold.

Startup 349

Startup Writing Press Blogging 349

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2013

The average length of a funding pitch to Angel investors is ten minutes. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. Equally bad is an extended pitch on your new disruptive technology. Remember you are pitching to investors, not customers. Let the top person do all the talking.

Angel 102

Angel Funding Slides Technical Review 102

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

free weekly Infochachkie articles! Net Promoter Scores (NPS) are the darling of many Big Dumb Company (BDC) product marketing and customer support executives. Created by consultants to generate additional fees, such scores attempt to rate a company’s overall customer satisfaction. " Answers are based on a scale of 0 – 10.

.Net 168

.Net Satisfaction Customer Custom 168

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 16, 2016

The average length of a funding pitch to Angel investors is ten minutes. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. Remember you are pitching to investors, not customers. Some entrepreneurs seem to think that their product pitch is also their investor pitch.

Startup 64

Startup Slides Technical Review Research 64

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 29, 2019

Equally important, if someone does find your site, your content must stand out above all similar sites, to keep visitors engaged, close a sale, and get customers to return. One of these is blogging, to let people know about your brand, provide links to supportive articles, and generate back-links to your content from other sites.

Blogging 85

Blogging Search Engine Optimization Writing SEO 85

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

free weekly Infochachkie articles! Net Promoter Scores (NPS) are the darling of many Big Dumb Company (BDC) product marketing and customer support executives. Created by consultants to generate additional fees, such scores attempt to rate a company’s overall customer satisfaction. " Answers are based on a scale of 0 – 10.

.Net 182

.Net Satisfaction Entrepreneur Customer 182

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 15, 2015

People cite sources like this BusinessWeek story a while back “ Real Entrepreneurs Don’t Write Business Plans ,” or even my own article on this subject, “ 10 Reasons Not To Write A Business Plan First.” Investor and strategic partner pitch. Pitch your company, not your product.

Startup 104

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Slides 104

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 22, 2012

The average length of a funding pitch to angel investors is ten minutes. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. Equally bad is an extended pitch on your new disruptive technology. Remember you are pitching to investors, not customers. Let the top person do all the talking.

Tips 97

Tips Slides Technical Review Startup 97

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 31, 2012

Her post is short & well written so definitely worth a read if you’re a startup person and want to hear some sensible views on sales. That said, I think it is written without taking the full extent of my sales articles into account. To aim – which means helping sales reps figure out which target customers to focus on.

Startup 319

Startup Sales Course Competition 319

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 20, 2018

People cite sources like this recent Inc.com article “ 5 Reasons Why You Don't Need a Business Plan ,” or my own blog discussion on this subject, “ Situations Where A Business Plan Does Not Add Value.” Investor and strategic partner pitch. Pitch your company, not your product.

Startup 65

Startup Entrepreneur Slides Content 65

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 18, 2014

People cite sources like this BusinessWeek story last year “ Real Entrepreneurs Don’t Write Business Plans ,” or even my own article a while back, “ 10 Reasons Not To Write A Business Plan First.” Investor and strategic partner pitch. Pitch your company, not your product. Even if you have an hour booked, the advice is the same.

Entrepreneur 108

Entrepreneur Startup Writing Slides 108

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 19, 2018

In fact, according to a classic article on Fundable , and other statistics, friends and family are still the major funding source for new ventures, investing over $60 billion annually, more than all professional sources combined. Pitch your personal investment and commitment to date. This shows respect and professionalism.

Tips 86

Tips Funding Startup Entrepreneur 86

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 29, 2011

The average length of a funding pitch to angel investors is ten minutes. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. Equally bad is an extended pitch on your new disruptive technology. Remember you are pitching to investors, not customers. Let the top person do all the talking.

Slides 95

Slides Technical Review Startup Research 95

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 17, 2015

Others schedule exhaustive training sessions for everyone on the team, including showcase customers, to make sure that everyone paints a consistent picture. The Founder needs to remember that meetings up to this point have been primarily off-site, with staged demos, and managed personally by the CEO or a small team.

Technical Review 108

Technical Review Startup Satisfaction Entrepreneur 108

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

On December 2nd, 2006 I wrote the blog post published later in this post when I was CEO of startup Koral about my experiences in pitching VCs. I had kept a personal blog for more than a year and was new at keeping a professional blog. You have an “hour” to pitch in your first meeting. My blog was wiped out.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 10, 2017

You need to have business relationships with team members, investors, customers, and a myriad of other support people. So I thought I would drop back to some essentials in building and nurturing business relationships (most of these apply to personal relationships as well): Build your network. Work on your elevator pitch.

Startup 75

Startup Social Network Networking Mentor 75

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 30, 2015

You need to have business relationships with team members, investors, customers, and a myriad of other support people. So I thought I would drop back to some essentials in building and nurturing business relationships (most of these apply to personal relationships as well): Build your network. Work on your elevator pitch.

Startup 108

Startup Social Network Mentor Entrepreneur 108

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 14, 2013

This article originally appeared on TechCrunch. ” The ultimate measure of success for a journalist is viewership so if nobody cares about your shitty little company and the story you’re trying to pitch then the journalist doesn’t want to publish. And it’s their judgment that becomes the ultimate arbiter of this.

Marketing 389

Marketing Press Blogging Startup 389

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 24, 2013

Guest article by Richie Hecker, Founder of Bootstrapper Media. This is the most important role because this person graduates a company from startup to viable long-term business. Awesome, now you know it works, so you need a lot more customers to become an actual business.

Hulu 111

Hulu Startup Social Media Organization 111

Tech Zulu Event

JULY 28, 2012

Pitch and form teams! People had one minute to “pitch” their idea to the group as a whole. Of the 150+ participants, about 45 people pitched that night. I was #33 to go up and pitch my idea. Once the pitches were done we were given a cup and paper with our company name on it. We had exactly 54 hours!

Startup 99

Startup Technical Advisors Ideas USC 99

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 29, 2013

You need to have business relationships with team members, investors, customers, and a myriad of other support people. So I thought I would drop back to some essentials in building and nurturing business relationships (most of these apply to personal relationships as well): Build your network. Work on your elevator pitch.

Entrepreneur 108

Entrepreneur Tips Startup Social Network 108

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2010

Here are some of the tools in the Swiss Army Knife that your team needs to be armed with to scale: (this article was originally posted on GigaOm in a shorter format.). This document was important both for giving customers confidence as well as protecting our liability in the case of outages. And that was my opinion, too.

Sales 296

Sales Pricing Startup Customer 296

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 18, 2010

The average length of a funding pitch to investors is ten minutes. I suspect the real problem is that they are often pitching the wrong point. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point. If you start by pitching your extended life story, that’s the wrong point.

Tips 56

Tips Slides Startup Research 56

InfoChachkie

OCTOBER 5, 2011

free weekly Infochachkie articles! As such, simply refuse any and all requests for confidential information (especially financial data) from prospective customers, partners, suppliers, etc. Thus, by never giving it out, you can honestly say, “Look, it’s not personal. Shocking HP.

Startup 216

Startup Slides Resource Organization 216