Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 2, 2021

In case you hadn’t noticed, the key elements of a competitive advantage for your business have changed as businesses move online, and your domain is instantly global. As a business advisor, I have to recommend even to established companies that they review and revamp their competitive strategy now, even if it appears to be working today.

Competition 142

Competition Software Review Social Media Summary 142

Berkonomics

SEPTEMBER 21, 2023

Your customers know what they want more than you do. This week’s insight came from personal experience and from a good friend who advanced the notion of the “teacher-customer” years ago. The customer would be the first to receive the new functionality in a new release. Providing feedback to your teacher customer.

Customer 156

Customer Custom Design Conference 156

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 27, 2022

In my experience as a business advisor, most organizations, large and small, struggle to keep up with the pace of change and competitive forces today. A question I often get is how to transform that overall team into a smooth-running machine that will keep up with the pace of market change, and competition in today’s world.

Competition 136

Competition Resource Startup Organization 136

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 23, 2020

Today’s customers demand more than a good product; they expect a great customer experience. A few companies are leading the way, including Apple with their iPad and iPhone, offering irresistible stores with friendly experts, elegant packaging, and customer service that never ends.

Customer 150

Customer Custom Design Product 150

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 21, 2021

Most startups are happy to find any customer, and will hang on for dear life to every one. Only later do they realize that some of these cost more than they are worth, or lead into commitments they can’t sustain, but no business wants to violate the golden rule that every customer needs to be treated as if they were the only customer.

Customer 150

Customer Custom Startup Pricing 150

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 17, 2014

In our video we discussed leadership topics such as managing product and engineering teams, communication and company organization. In this short clip below, Nanea emphasizes this important point – if you create a product customers love, it will ultimately be a good business decision as well. Company Organization.

Technical Review 315

Technical Review Blogging RSS Organization 315

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 9, 2020

Of course, as you work with contract players, explore the potential for a long-term relationship, and wait until your organization matures to pursue career positions. Focus on a very flat organization, with minimal hierarchy. You can advertise your “greener” strategy, which today will get you greater customer loyalty and advocacy.

Competition 168

Competition Startup Demand Training 168

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 9, 2022

Most businesses spend big money testing their brand logo, catchy marketing phrases, and demographics, but spend little time training and validating that their employees can and do deliver exceptional experiences to their customers. They have to out-behave and outperform your competition. Gregg Lederman, in his classic book, “ ENGAGED!:

Customer 123

Customer Custom Services Training 123

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 11, 2020

They forget that adapting their company and themselves as their customers evolve is the key to long-term survival. Think of Blockbuster and Toys ‘R’ Us , both of whom missed customer changes and the move to online. Create an overt strategy to react to emerging customer trends. Remember when you were a startup?

Customer 143

Customer Custom Examples IBM 143

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2020

A business startup is not an academic environment, or a big company research organization. They are attracted to people who agree, but may not be able to help. Evaluate their problem-solving ability in the context of your business. Practical problem solving, and communicating to business people, is often a big challenge for technical experts.

Competition 174

Competition High Tech Startup Social Media 174

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 20, 2010

A few people have asked me to try and define the perfect startup organization chart. If you don’t have somebody inside your organization who is setting the technology direction then I’m convinced you’ll never head for greatness. They care about the quality of what is build more than they care about end customers.

CTO Hire 400

CTO Hire Fractional VPE Startup Outsource Development 400

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 1, 2010

We all like to think of startups as “non hierarchic&# organizations and to some extent that should be true. I never built a Google-sized business but I did build an organization from scratch that grew to 120 employees in 5 countries before we sold it. The organization gets used to it and adjusts. Skipping is insidious.

Startup 308

Startup CTO Coach Technical Review CTO Hire 308

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 25, 2020

The world keeps changing, and visible business strategies that worked well in the past, including being the premium brand or low price producer, simply don’t get the customer loyalty they once did. Today, customers are looking for real relationships, a memorable shopping experience, and satisfaction of a higher purpose.

Customer 133

Customer Custom Satisfaction Examples 133

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2014

Whenever I heard why we didn’t feel a sales process at an important customer was going well (or if we lost) I would get involved myself. They are as good at selling you as they are at selling your product to customers. Customer also buy social proof because others are acting as strong references.

Sales 382

Sales Help Startup Pricing 382

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2010

Packaging, pricing & discounts – In the early days of my first company we always had “list prices&# we quoted to customers and of course we were always willing to negotiate based on who the client was, how important the business was to us, who the competition was and how well the deal was negotiated. I was the laggard.

Sales 296

Sales Pricing Startup Customer 296

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 4, 2010

This is important because the customers they serve (the red line) demand a product that meets their complex requirements. In fact, the incumbent is usually very dismissive of this new competition as our the large buyers of the incumbent’s products. So the startups tend to focus on totally new customers. They can’t.

Startup 376

Startup Framework Marketing Customer 376

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 28, 2010

In business competitions the clock has rarely expired when you’re told you’ve lost – even in government tenders – key text below. For simplicity, let’s call this person inside your new potential customer, “the enemy.&#. They may solicit the support of people more senior in the buying organization.

Organization 309

Organization Blogging Startup Sales 309

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

There is nothing more pure than building a product, putting it out in the world and seeing paying customers using your product and in some cases loving it. As companies get this initial customer feedback on their product they start to have to ask harder questions about unit economics: How much does it cost us to acquire a new customer?

Startup 286

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 286

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 22, 2021

As I talk to many of you in my role as business advisor, I still often hear the concern for maximum return to the business and stakeholders, more than a passion for sustainably enriching the lives of your customers and team. This applies to your own team, as well as customers. Make every customer experience memorable.

Customer 114

Customer Custom Metrics Satisfaction 114

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 9, 2023

Today’s customers demand more than a good product; they expect a great customer experience. A few companies are leading the way, including Apple with their iPad and iPhone, offering irresistible stores with friendly experts, elegant packaging, and customer service that never ends.

Design 105

Design Customer Custom Product 105

Xconomy

OCTOBER 5, 2016

However, there is still room for competition. Companies must learn to become ecosystem drivers – even if only for a subset of their customers – in order to survive. A distinguishing feature of this model is that they are the destination in their space for a subset of their customers. – Ensure great customer experience.

Organization 91

Organization Customer Custom Study 91

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 16, 2019

Most businesses spend big money testing their brand logo, catchy marketing phrases, and demographics, but spend little time training and validating that their employees can and do deliver exceptional experiences to their customers. They have to out-behave and outperform your competition. Gregg Lederman, in his classic book, “ ENGAGED!:

Customer 84

Customer Custom Training Satisfaction 84

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 15, 2021

Even without B-Corp status, entrepreneurs are speaking out more on the positives to support business models that benefit not just shareholders, but customers, workforce, the environment, and the greater community. Startups can use social responsibility as a competitive advantage. Doing business is a human process.

Startup 149

Startup Organization Customer Custom 149

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 3, 2023

One of the reasons that now is the time to be an entrepreneur is the explosion of startup assistance organizations, usually called incubators or accelerators. A few are still trying to make a profitable business out of nurturing startups, but it’s a challenge to make money when your customer startups don’t have many resources to give.

Organization 92

Organization Incubator Startup Resource 92

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

Whenever I heard why we didn’t feel a sales process at an important customer was going well (or if we lost) I would get involved myself. They are as good at selling you as they are at selling your product to customers. Customer also buy social proof because others are acting as strong references. They’re in beta).

Sales 316

Sales Pricing Startup Customer 316

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2017

Sounds simple but in practice I promise you most organization fall into the latter trap. So they create a task list of all the marketing activities an organization can do: press releases, web site updates, customer case studies, blog posts, daily Tweets, Facebook fan page, attending conferences, etc.

Activity 164

Activity Conference Press Case Study 164

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 4, 2011

4 times / 100 means if a customer uses your app frequently (say 10-20 times / day) then they are crashing nearly every day. Customer Acquisition. At the highest level you’ll obviously want to track how many customers your adding every month (and for some businesses that have hit scale this is measured on a daily basis).

Metrics 346

Metrics Startup SEO SEM 346

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

He listed all of the product releases that were up coming, the customers that were in the pipeline and where he saw his competition moving. I don’t care if you’re a 10-person organization, a 1,000 person organization or a multinational corporation – often it is the few key players that change the dimensions.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 20, 2014

Sometimes it is easy for someone at the top of an organization to make a statement that, in the enthusiasm of the moment or to make a point, crosses the line between fact and fiction. An often-expressed example seems to come from the salesperson who quotes a larger number of users or customers than the facts support.

Customer 189

Customer Custom Examples Email 189

socalTECH

AUGUST 27, 2014

We spoke with one of those companies-- El Segundo-based ConsumerTrack (www.consumertrack.com)--which is a $30M, bootstrapped an online marketing company which is driving millions of customers to big name, financial customers. What is ConsumerTrack all about? Brett Rossman: ConsumerTrack is a performance-based, online marketing company.

Startup 239

Startup El Segundo Marketing Media 239

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 21, 2020

In my view, the pendulum is swinging back, with investors looking more for the traditional indications of business integrity, stability, and growth: Some element of organic growth is a good thing. Re-investing profits to grow the business is organic growth. High customer loyalty and high team passion. Martin Zwilling.

Organization 173

Organization Invest Social Media Customer 173

Berkonomics

JULY 30, 2011

Second, some of the original employees, occasionally one or two friends of the founders, are discovered to be falling behind as more professional employees show them up to be less competitive in their jobs. So management reorganizes the structure of the organization to fit the new needs of the growing enterprise.

Startup 222

Startup Customer Custom Funding 222

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2020

With services, scaling the business often implies cloning yourself, since you are the intellectual property and the competitive advantage. For example, both need to provide exemplary customer service, build customer loyalty, and provide real value for a competitive price. The customer experience is more than the service.

Startup 174

Startup Training Services Writing 174

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 4, 2017

Not so long ago, every business assumed that the keys to success were the highest quality product, the best value for the buck, and the best customer service. Now all we hear about is providing the best “customer experience.” You have to hear your customer’s dreams, goals, passions, and aspirations.

Customer 85

Customer Custom Product Marketing 85

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 4, 2019

Is your marketing focus product-centric or customer-centric ? With a wealth of products now available, customers look for the most memorable experience , not just the best product. Amazon is very customer-centric, but it can make all the difference in retail as well as online. Status factors are more important than demographics.

Customer 85

Customer Custom Product Metrics 85

InfoChachkie

APRIL 14, 2014

Even the organization''s lexicon reinforces its startup mindset. Rather, the organization provides ongoing support of its "portfolio," including strategic planning, recruitment of Board members and public relations expertise. I am curious as to A Better Chicago''s origin and how the organization differs from traditional non-profits.

Organization 199

Organization Startup Technical Review Invest 199

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 31, 2011

So it is now very common for news organizations to announce on the air, “to follow my updates please follow me on Twitter at @myname. Movie studios are evaluating audience reactions to films and adjusting marketing spend based on early customer reactions to films. you’re not following him?

News 324

News Web Email Startup 324