Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 30, 2022

According to one study a decade ago, only 45% of founders plan to exit after stage one, and my guess is that less than half the remainder survive the next stage in their own company. These only come with the proper training, investment in tools, and focus on customer relationships. Managing business growth is more than metrics.

Sales 147

Sales Metrics Guide Startup 147

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 18, 2023

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entree for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Startup 112

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 112

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 2, 2010

Some objections are real and they end up becoming changes to your product, your service plan or your pricing / bundling. As a founder, when you’ve been dealing with these kinds of objections for a couple of years it becomes natural and you easily handle objections on price, product & competition without much thought.

Sales 289

Sales Startup Training Pricing 289

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2019

For example, one of the first home grocery delivery companies, Webvan, was so enamored with early traction in Silicon Valley, it raised and spent nearly a billion dollars and went public, before filing for bankruptcy three years later. Control costs and adjust prices to maintain your margin.

Metrics 86

Metrics Startup Training Customer 86

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 21, 2020

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entrée for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Startup 156

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 156

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 21, 2021

In my experience, less than half of founding entrepreneurs even aspire to stay and scale their company. Explosive growth to an enterprise normally requires a scalable sales model, a well-documented process with incentives, training, and metrics for tracking and management. Switch your focus from product development to sales.

Startup 151

Startup Course Sales Entrepreneur 151

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2 preamble issues having read the comments on TC today: 1: I know that the prices of startup companies is much great in Silicon Valley than in smaller towns / less tech focused areas in the US and the US prices higher than many foreign markets. You can be pissed off, but I don’t set prices. That’s stupid.

Startup 336

Startup Pricing Technical Review Marketing 336

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 7, 2020

In the short term you need customers to find you at any price, and in the longer term you need revenue, profit, and return loyalty. In a larger public company, it’s all about making your quarterly numbers, versus investing in strategic growth alternatives that may not pay off until several quarters later.

Technical Review 124

Technical Review Layoffs Social Media Metrics 124

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

According to one study a while back, only 45% of founders plan to exit after stage one, and my guess is that less than half the remainder survive the next stage in their own company. These only come with the proper training, investment in tools, and focus on customer relationships. Managing business growth is more than metrics.

Startup 97

Startup Sales Metrics Guide 97

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

An alternate outcome that I also unfortunately observe in some cases are companies who had extreme early success with an initial product adoption but failed in key areas that limited the growth and therefore the ultimate financial outcomes. I see many companies that don’t make this transition well.

Startup 286

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 286

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

We need venture debt, factoring companies and public markets. So what took me $2 million at my first company now takes $20,000. Some companies should raise less money and consider early exits – We had a discussion about whether companies should raise less money and have smaller goals for an exit. We all know that.

Venture Capital 308

Venture Capital Training Startup Entrepreneur 308

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 8, 2018

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entrée for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Startup 81

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 81

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 8, 2018

If you are one of these owners who wants to do the right thing to survive and delight your customers, but doesn’t know where to start, I am here to recommend some best practices that I see successful companies, and many startups, who have focused on this issue. Define stretch goals and challenge your team to deliver.

Technical Review 84

Technical Review Customer Custom Startup 84

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 21, 2013

Train them fully, give them authority, make them accountable, and tie their pay to customer satisfaction. It must be understandable, written down, and verifiable, with regular measurements and metrics to make it real, benchmarked against the competition. Train and coach continuously. Know your customers intimately.

Customer 92

Customer Custom Startup Services 92

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 4, 2016

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entrée for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Entrepreneur 93

Entrepreneur Startup Coach Metrics 93

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 4, 2015

According to one study a while back, only 45% of founders plan to exit after stage one, and my guess is that less than half the remainder survive the next stage in their own company. These only come with the proper training, investment in tools, and focus on customer relationships. Managing business growth is more than metrics.

Startup 108

Startup Sales Metrics Entrepreneur 108

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 25, 2016

It must be written down, with measurable team objectives, validated by metrics and compared against competition. Provide coaching and mentoring as well as training. Formal training for the team is just the beginning, not the end. Most importantly, your actions speak louder than words.

Customer 55

Customer Custom Startup Coach 55

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 1, 2019

Too many employees expect a raise or promotion before they accept new responsibility, rather than demonstrating their value, getting training and experience first. Get out of dead-end jobs, and don’t be afraid to move on to a new company if the current one is not healthy. Be willing to invest in effort, before expecting results.

Technical Advisors 75

Technical Advisors Startup Satisfaction Customer 75

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 13, 2017

According to one study a while back, only 45% of founders plan to exit after stage one, and my guess is that less than half the remainder survive the next stage in their own company. These only come with the proper training, investment in tools, and focus on customer relationships. Managing business growth is more than metrics.

Startup 56

Startup Sales Metrics Guide 56

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 3, 2013

According to one study , only 45% of Founders plan to exit after stage one, and my guess is that less than half the remainder survive the next stage in their own company. Weinfurter, who has made the leap a couple of times himself, and spent many years consulting with other companies who have done the same.

Sales 96

Sales Metrics Startup Entrepreneur 96

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 30, 2012

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entree for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Startup 96

Startup Writing Metrics Marketing 96

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 16, 2018

Without taking a dime of outside capital, the company has achieved impressive success in a competitive, SaaS market segment, landing companies such as Nike, Intuit, NASA, AutoDesk and PBS. What makes their story more remarkable, in the age of 20-something billionaires, is that both of the company’s founders are in their 50’s.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

SoCal CTO

MARCH 5, 2007

However, there are lots of companies that are making money from open source and freemium models. A friend of mine has a company that builds open source applications in spaces that are a bit less innovative than Elgg, but they do very well financially through the packaging and support models.

Southern California 150

Southern California CTO Coach CTO Hire Social Media 150

InfoChachkie

MAY 22, 2012

However, the greater degree you can sequentially follow these steps and maintain your discussions with each venture capitalist (VC) at relatively the same stage, the sooner you can spend less time in the company of investors and get back to running your business. Such follow-up are akin to a train whistle. Prep Steps.

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Capital Research Customer 236

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 7, 2011

I realized a while back that creating a new company for the first time is a lot like whipping up a great dinner entree for the first time – you need a recipe, even though it may look simple. In all cases, don’t skip the basic training. All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team.

Entrepreneur 91

Entrepreneur Startup Writing Metrics 91

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 29, 2014

MapMyFitness became one of the first companies to successfully mesh the health and fitness culture with technology before the first iPhone came out. If we rewind to 8 years ago, it was me in San Diego training for my second marathon and I was trying to start another company at the time.

Social Media 83

Social Media Activity Startup Help 83

Tech Zulu Event

MARCH 25, 2014

It’d been a big year in tech, and the different supporting parts of team TZ – so what better way to kick off the festivities with an inaugural train-bound journey, courtesy of the good people at Amtrak. Erin Korogosky – Beckon , Performance management for marketing companies.

Entertainment 99

Entertainment Google Entrepreneur Course 99