Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 3, 2016

In the VC insider baseball world a discussion has gone on about “VC platforms” over the past 5 or so years. While firms define platforms differently, let’s just say they are the services that a VC offers outside of investment capital and partner time on boards or providing intros.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Platform Startup Resource 150

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 14, 2013

Mostly it’s because your marketing campaigns suck. Or more directly – they are likely narcissistic resuscitations of your newest features or bragging points that nobody but your marketing team and your mom care about. I am a VC. They offer a point-of-view about their market. I hand out money.

Marketing 389

Marketing Press Blogging Startup 389

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 21, 2010

Finally, a lot of people asking me about typos on my blog. This is the market that Wonga serves and they are killing it! Peer-to-peer lending service; started on FaceBook; claim to own 79% of the US peer lending market in March 2010 with a whopping $8,664,750. Big market. Blogging has gone through many iterations.

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Capital Email Blogging 265

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

This is part of my ongoing series on Understanding Venture Capital. I recently wrote a blog post on understanding how the size and age of a venture capital fund might affect you when you’re raising money. I believe these VC funds have suffered some amount of reputation fall out. Let me explain: 1.

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Seed Funding Pricing Invest 265

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2010

One of the questions I’m most often asked is, “what’s it like being a VC?&# I’ve been a VC for nearly 3 years now. Since I answer this all the time anyway I thought it might make an interesting blog post. But let’s face it, as a VC you spend time with whichever companies you want.

Venture Capital 312

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Entrepreneur 312

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 1, 2009

In the first post in this three part series I described why I believe the VC market froze between September 2008 – April 2009. When the market run started in March people were relieved that “the world wasn’t ending” so they started spending again. This will likely cause the stock market to contract.

Venture Capital 269

Venture Capital Startup Funding Technical Review 269

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2011

I recently filmed a show for This Week in Venture Capital in which I talked about how to prepare for a VC meeting: whom you’ll meet, who should attend from your side, what materials you should bring and how you should run the meeting. I wrote the summary notes in this blog post. But take prompts from the VC.

Venture Capital 299

Venture Capital Slides Technical Advisors Startup 299

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 30, 2015

What Can You Do if a VC Pulls Their Term Sheet? This isn’t Dave McClure secretly taking over Mark’s blog. Finally, know that the VC & entrepreneurial worlds are very, very small. I have spoken with many VCs in the past about which VCs pull out of deals. Sorry for using f**k two posts in a row.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Content Writing Blogging 150

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 18, 2010

I’ve been using Chartbeat for over a month now to track performance of my blog and I find myself looking at Google Analytics much less these days. The next users after that is reading a blog post that I wrote nearly 9 months ago. I tend to agree with them but I think that numbers are important in VC meetings.

Blogging 287

Blogging Google Screening Mahalo 287

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 29, 2010

I’m often asked by people, “how do I get into VC?&# Well, I know 3-4 VC jobs that are publicly available. Every time I do recruiting I get somebody who says, “I’m willing to take a step back in my career to work in VC.&# This isn’t likely to appeal to us. Tags: VC Industry. Yesterday.

Venture Capital 290

Venture Capital Technical Review GRP Partners Email 290

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 18, 2012

According to the SEC we’re not allowed to market the fact that we’re fund raising, so I won’t. As I’ve written about before, You’d Have to be a Big Baby to Complain about Being a VC. And I’m happy as a VC. I promise you that won’t be a bit market for us. And so it goes again.

Blogging 420

Blogging Press Entrepreneur Venture Capital 420

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 8, 2010

I guess let’s file this under sales & marketing advice. I recently wrote a piece for Mashable on how to create a company blog. Since it’s already written (and since I promised not to republish on my blog other than a summary) if you’re interested please have a read over there. What should you blog about?

Blogging 286

Blogging Startup Writing Summary 286

Xconomy

JANUARY 28, 2019

Venture capital firms invest in potentially disruptive technologies with the hope of profit, then keep watch for further advances that could overtake their existing portfolio companies. All this is done while they guide startups through other external challenges such as fundraising droughts and overall market downturns.

Venture Capital 67

Venture Capital Marketing Guide Invest 67

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 6, 2015

As an active investor in the Los Angeles technology market we’re always seeking to better understand the data and trends of why our market has grown so rapidly since 2009. The report on the LA Tech Market can be found on this link. It will also serve as home to our partner blogs and to our company announcements.

Marketing 150

Marketing Newsletter Venture Capital Blogging 150

InfoChachkie

JULY 23, 2012

Serial entrepreneur, venture investor and startup accelerator pioneer Brad Feld has notoriously mocked traditional marketing throughout his career. If you have amazing products, the marketing of those products is trivial. If you have $hitty products, the marketing is impossible. Trada – Guerilla Marketing In Action.

Marketing 233

Marketing Blogging Startup Venture Capital 233

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2010

To see the video of This Week in VC click on this link. What a pleasure that I got to spend an hour talking with both Om Malik (whom I’ve always respected his views) and Paul Jozefak , a venture capital partner at Neuhaus Partners in Germany (and formerly the head of Europe for SAP Ventures).

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital Google Web Sites 225

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2015

I began asking around who the likely investors were for such a market. At the time almost nobody had heard of the following funds: FirstRound Capital, TrueVentures, Floodgate and SoftTech. Some quick highlights include: The Role of a Seed Stage VC. Each VC raises money – say $90 million.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Startup Invest Cloud Computing 150

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2013

It is simply the most important way to proactively control your career development and how the market perceives you. It will affect your ability to get the right jobs and promotions as well as your ability to attract talent and capital. That was fine with me – the market is the market. That was the market.

Technical Advisors 385

Technical Advisors Marketing Startup Venture Capital 385

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2011

The following are some lessons I learned about early-stage startup marketing. Because market is such a broad topic, I’m restricting these lessons to PR marketing (as opposed SEO, SEM, product marketing, etc.). Also be careful about VCs. But once a VC has heard your idea he can’t “un-think&# it.

Marketing 380

Marketing Startup Press Technical Advisors 380

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 9, 2014

We all know that funding markets have changed for startups. I have blogged about some of the downside consequences of the changes and the private information I have says the consequences are much worse than is reported in the press since few people publicly talk about. Does he blog about venture capital and try to advise entrepreneurs?

Venture Capital 352

Venture Capital Seed Funding Email Blogging 352

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. Should I trust my instincts for founders and products or should I be more focused on the market size or business plan? Should I trust my instincts for founders and products or should I be more focused on the market size or business plan?

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Startup Pricing Invest 347

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

I was reading Chris Dixon’s blog tonight. I came across this blog post about getting a computer science degree as the best degree for getting into venture capital or working at a VC-backed start up. I just completed an exercise where I went out to hire a new associate for my VC firm, GRP Partners.

Startup 337

Startup Venture Capital Study Course 337

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 19, 2011

All the marketing they could do. And as they sit and dream, most entrepreneurs think about venture capitalists. Venture capitalists, or VCs, are the folks with millions upon millions of dollars to invest in companies such as theirs. Below are the three core things they do: They go after venture capital at the right time.

Venture Capital 93

Venture Capital Capital Invest Entrepreneur 93

SoCal CTO

MARCH 20, 2007

Early Stage Marketing and Branding – Farida Fotouh. Marketing, Startups and Networking in Los Angeles. Kevin Federline Search Engine Realistic Entrprenuer's Guide to Venture Capital Time Rich, Time Poor and Apple F2F Still Matters 8 Ways the Internet has Changed Software Marketing. in Computer Science.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Guide CTO Coach Southern California 150

socalTECH

JULY 14, 2009

Contrary to the common belief that Southern California "should be an easy place to raise money" with all of its' entertainment and real estate wealth, it is a very difficult place to raise Venture Capital for technology start-ups. So how does an entrepreneur based in SoCal get the attention of VC funds today?

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Southern California Invest Tech Coast Angels 100

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

As a result I didn’t write my first venture capital check until March 2009 – exactly 5 years ago. It turns out it actually takes time to build a high-growth business with differentiated intellectual property and roll out large, enterprise-class marketing solutions. 5 years ago. 5 years ago. The monkey on my back.

Venture Capital 387

Venture Capital Downey Writing Press 387

SoCal CTO

MARCH 9, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Friday, March 9, 2007 Map of VC Investments Found this Map of 2006 VC Investments post. Early Stage Marketing and Branding – Farida Fotouh. Marketing, Startups and Networking in Los Angeles. Some very interesting graphics including this heat map: Very cool visualization tool!

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Invest CTO Coach Southern California 150

TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 21, 2019

Hello and welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week’s noteworthy news pertaining to startups and venture capital. Landline , the operator of a bus network in the Midwest, is one of the latest companies to raise venture capital. Before I jump into today’s topic, let’s catch up a bit.

Services 207

Services Startup Venture Capital Redpoint 207

socalTECH

DECEMBER 15, 2014

One of the highest profile startup accelerators in Los Angeles, LaunchpadLA , is officially shifting its model and getting out of the startup accelerator market--handing over its space to General Assembly, with its various partners embarking on different activities. launchpadla accelerator startup venture capital upfront mark suster'

Venture Capital 178

Venture Capital Blogging Los Angeles Activity 178

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

I was reading Danielle Morrill’s blog post today on whether one’s “ Startup Burn Rate is Normal. by Michael Woolf that is worth any startup founder reading to get a sense of perspective on the reality warp that is startup world during a frothy market such as 1997-1999, 2005-2007 or 2012-2014. Profitability.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 3, 2010

This was really a fun week at TWiVC because we decided to have an entrepreneur come and talk about raising capital rather than having a VC come on. In particular I tried to do most of the “entrepreneur advice on VC” up front so that if you don’t want to watch our views on the deals you don’t have to. They sponsor TWiVC.

Venture Capital 214

Venture Capital Startup Design S3 214

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 2, 2011

It’s apropos because there is so much noise these days with email, Twitter, Facebook, blogs, web shows, etc. I was thinking back to a few previous “insider baseball&# blog debates that raged for several weeks: AngelGate (aka Bin38 secret cabal), convertible debt vs. equity, bubble vs. not, and now the AngelList discussion.

Email 287

Email Blogging Venture Capital Writing 287

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 12, 2013

Brunson’s short and to-the-point blog post, “ It’s Called Networking, Not Using.” It’s why I wrote the blog post on 50 Coffee Meetings. It’s why I talk about building VC relationships early – Lines, Not Dots. “I’ve never been a VC before. ” Be authentic.

Venture Capital 407

Venture Capital Press GRP Partners Blogging 407

socalTECH

MARCH 18, 2014

near real-time automated intelligence gathering systems that scour public and private data sources like websites, blogs, social media and email to unearth information businesses can use for competitive advantage. bitvore data intelligence gathering venture capital yuri pikover' READ MORE>>.

Software 227

Software IBM IBM Social Media 227

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 22, 2010

Back in 1999 when I first raised venture capital I had zero knowledge of what a fair term sheet looked like or how to value my company. Due to competitive markets we ended up with a pretty good term sheet until we needed to raise money in April 2001 and then we got completely screwed. Investors own 25%, the founders own 75%.

Venture Capital 405

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Funding 405

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 24, 2012

I wrote a blog post on how to work with lawyers at a startup nearly two-and-a-half years ago. He knows every startup & VC in town.” This was 2005 when I had no exits under my belt, no blogs … nobody was looking. I told him that our market was absolutely booming and was worthy of a commensurate investment.

Venture Capital 299

Venture Capital Startup Los Angeles GRP Partners 299

Xconomy

JUNE 16, 2016

What does it take to build a startup in today’s market? Put a half-dozen entry-level tech entrepreneurs together anywhere outside of the Bay Area, and it won’t take long before they start listing the local market deficiencies. In San Diego, the complaints often focus on the relative scarcity of venture capital and hometown VC firms.

Venture Capital 49

Venture Capital San Diego Truecar Web 49