Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 16, 2014

It’s not uncommon for me to see a startup business plan “mission” to be the “premier brand” for their product, yet their marketing budget in the financials is trivial. This combination will almost certainly get your plan tossed by potential investors, who understand all too well the need and cost for marketing in today’s environment.

Marketing 102

Marketing Funding Social Media SEM 102

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 17, 2013

It’s not uncommon for me to see a startup business plan “mission” to be the “premier brand” for their product, yet their marketing budget in the financials is trivial. This combination will almost certainly get your plan tossed by potential investors, who understand all too well the need and cost for marketing in today’s environment.

Marketing 106

Marketing Startup Social Media SEM 106

InfoChachkie

DECEMBER 2, 2009

As noted in Pour and Stir Part I , the key to the successful execution of this strategy is managing the following equation: The cost to acquire a customer < lifetime value of a customer. Decreasing Your Customer Acquisition Costs. This is equivalent to being handed a free customer for every ten customers you acquire.

Customer 164

Customer Custom Advertising SEM 164

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 3, 2010

Probably every one of you who has a business and a website have been approached through email or personal contact, and asked to spend money on Search Engine Marketing (SEM). Search engine marketing is simply buying advertising for your business from Google or another search engine company. Cost per action (CPA).

SEM 90

SEM Marketing Startup Search Engine Optimization 90

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 4, 2015

Social media is now one of the key marketing tools, but not the only one, so the challenge is to manage the resource tradeoffs effectively by constantly assessing payback versus cost. Startups should begin by selecting just a few of the vast array of social media offerings out there, and customize based on results.

Social Media 108

Social Media Media Startup Tips 108

socalTECH

MARCH 13, 2020

Dmitri Leonov: We built a distribution business for equipment for the spa industry, and have had 10,000 client over that time, but in the last few years, we've really focused on talking to spa customers about their needs in the market. Essentially, the customer wants natural and organic ingredients. Do users buy or rent these?

Template 124

Template Beverly Hills Startup SEM 124

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 7, 2010

It’s not uncommon for me to see a startup business plan “mission” to be the “premier brand” for their product, yet their marketing budget in the financials is trivial. This combination will almost certainly get your plan tossed by potential investors, who understand all too well the need and cost for marketing in today’s environment.

Marketing 94

Marketing Startup Social Media SEM 94

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

When I publicly Tweeted that all companies should be gross margin positive many people pointed out that Amazon wasn’t profitable for many years. profitable and companies like Amazon who chose to focus on growth > profitability were not losing money on each book sale (ie they were gross margin positive). Customer acquisition cost.

Metrics 150

Metrics Startup SaaS Course 150

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 17, 2018

Contrary to popular opinion, viral marketing has not eliminated the need for old-fashioned lead generation to bring customers to a startup. His professional background includes having held marketing-executive roles at big companies as well as startups. Email marketing. Direct mail marketing.

Social Media 55

Social Media SEM Startup Advertising 55

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

I’m super excited to announce that GRP Partners led the investment in Ethan Anderson’s new company MyTime (link has LA-based merchants but will give you a good feel for the product). BuildOnline (the company I founded) has just announcement plans to be more aggressive in growing in the US. Let me not bury the lede.

CTO Coach 359

CTO Coach Google CTO Hire Yammer 359

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 14, 2010

They are tasked with “getting deals done&# so they race around talking to tons of potential partners inking anything from channel sale deals , product integration, international distribution agreements, co-marketing arrangements, M&A discussions, etc. You have a marketing department with three people. I love that saying.

Startup 323

Startup Press Development Team Review SEM 323

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 25, 2014

Contrary to popular opinion, viral marketing has not eliminated the need for old-fashioned lead generation to bring customers to a startup. His professional background includes having held marketing-executive roles at big companies as well as startups. Email marketing. Direct mail marketing.

Startup 99

Startup Social Media SEM Advertising 99

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 4, 2011

One of the things I discuss the most with the portfolio companies I’m involved with is that “you manage what you measure.”. Make them widely available inside the company and share your most important goals with your board. My experience has proven that even some well known companies are under-whelming in this department.

Metrics 346

Metrics Startup SEO Customer 346

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 25, 2016

It turns out that to build a successful company you ultimately need this strange thing called “revenue” that people don’t just hand you: You need to earn it. Most of this advice boils down to an argument in favor of basic planning before starting a company or raising money. Market Size.

Startup 150

Startup Marketing Study SEO 150

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 24, 2013

For about 50 years, (…cough M) Ad Men, or marketing and sales individuals, have been the kings of organizational hierarchy … and then came the Internet of things and engineers took over the throne. This is the most important role because this person graduates a company from startup to viable long-term business.

Hulu 111

Hulu Startup Social Media Organization 111

InfoChachkie

OCTOBER 13, 2009

Customer Service – As newspaper boys were the face of their employers, savvy carriers learned to establish healthy customer relationships to facilitate timely collections and generous tips. Other entry-level experiences for budding entrepreneurs included selling items marketed in comic book ads.

Web 2.0 222

Web 2.0 Web Sales Outsource Development 222

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 21, 2010

One of the investment themes I’ve been focused on in the past 3 years has been Performance-Based Marketing. When I started investing the US advertising market was $300 billion with only 10% of it ($30 billion) of it being online and measurable. I believe that many social networks confused this idea. Early evidence is good.

Advertising 284

Advertising Invest RSS CPC 284

socalTECH

MAY 5, 2009

The company was incorporated in January of 2004, and we provide outsource e-commerce services to organizations, such as brands and retailers. Third, is we provide customer care and phone support for orders; the fourth is the software technology, the platform that powers everything. John Tomich: We've been around for five years.

Venture Capital 113

Venture Capital SEM Commerce Email 113

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 18, 2012

Do basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Marketing (SEM) yourself. Sales and marketing costs. Print your own collateral and marketing materials until the business is rolling. Use the Internet and social networking instead of public relations companies and advertising agencies. Wages and benefits.

Startup 102

Startup Search Engine Optimization SEM Social Network 102

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 16, 2011

A while back I emphasized how important is to have a company website these days ( Publish Your Website Or Customers Won’t Find You ). Unless someone searches for your company by name, it won’t show up in the first few pages of any search results. The usual culprit is a picture or graphic that is larger than 20 kilobytes.

Google 93

Google SEO Search Engine Optimization SEM 93

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 15, 2011

Do basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Marketing (SEM) yourself. Sales and marketing costs. Print your own collateral and marketing materials until the business is rolling. Use the Internet and social networking instead of public relations companies and advertising agencies. Wages and benefits.

Entrepreneur 94

Entrepreneur Startup Search Engine Optimization SEM 94

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2013

When polled 88% of marketing professionals said they couldn’t accurately measure the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns and the majority said lack of ROI measurement is their single greatest frustration with social media (Forbes). The other major pilot customer was. End of story. Or Likes – LIKES! No brainer.

Marketing 307

Marketing Technical Review Startup Tool 307

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 27, 2010

A while back I emphasized how important is to have a company website these days ( Startups Without a Website Won’t Start ). Unless someone searches for your company by name, it won’t show up in the results. Yet my random poll of a dozen company sites found 25% were missing even the most basic tag info.

SEO 48

SEO HTML Search Engine Optimization Web 48

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 13, 2010

Do basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Marketing (SEM) yourself. Sales and marketing costs. Print your own collateral and marketing materials until the business is rolling. Use the Internet and social networking instead of public relations companies and advertising agencies. Wages and benefits.

Startup 50

Startup High Tech Search Engine Optimization SEM 50

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

About eight years ago, I founded a recreation company, which, oddly enough, is now one of my own suppliers. I was in advertising and marketing, working in Newport Beach on the Mazda account. Billy Fried: We first tested it in California, which was our launch market a year and a half ago. How is the company funded?

Activity 164

Activity Startup Sites Web 164

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 23, 2013

Paid search engine ranking (PPC) is buying advertising for your business from Google or another search engine company. It pays only if a customer clicks through AND takes a further action (conversion), such as buying a product or filling out a web form. For sites displaying the ads, this is called pay per click (PPC).

Paid Search 90

Paid Search PPC Organization SEO 90

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2011

He was a life-long entrepreneur and the first business he created out of college (actually, he founded it while he was at Caltech) was a company that manufactured high quality audio speakers. So he launched a company with exclusively paid search. They were a juggernaut and Google was a small company. Overture was sold to Yahoo!

Competition 350

Competition Idealab Product CitySearch 350

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 15, 2013

Here are a few examples: Marketing specialists. As your business starts up, you need marketing programs, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), a modern “pull” strategy based on social networks, and lead generation. The days when these roles were stable careers for company employees are gone.

Entrepreneur 106

Entrepreneur Services Search Engine Optimization Startup 106

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 21, 2011

Here are a few examples: Marketing specialists. As your business starts up, you need marketing programs, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), a modern “pull” strategy based on social networks, and lead generation. The days when these roles were stable careers for company employees are gone.

Entrepreneur 89

Entrepreneur Services Product Search Engine Optimization 89

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

Here are a few examples: Marketing specialists. As your business starts up, you need marketing programs, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), a modern “pull” strategy based on social networks, and lead generation. The days when these roles were stable careers for company employees are gone.

Entrepreneur 48

Entrepreneur Search Engine Optimization Startup SEM 48