Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 18, 2023

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Startup 112

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 112

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

On the one hand, you’re over paying for every investment and valuations aren’t rational. Our fund (Upfront Ventures) recently returned >1x an entire $200 million fund just selling small minatory in secondary sales while still holding most of our stock for an ultimate public market exits. That used to be called A-round investing.

Venture Capital 471

Venture Capital Writing Invest Pricing 471

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 22, 2021

You need to work just as hard to convince investors that you are the best person to take your idea from a dream to a successful business, and provide an impressive return on their investment at the same time. Offer an attractive and viable investment equation. Emphasize the value and skills of your team.

Ideas 140

Ideas Entrepreneur Equity Resource 140

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 7, 2020

Entrepreneurs need to document a process of responding to a market need, sizing opportunity, assigning a specific business model, and planning for marketing, sales, and customer satisfaction. Even if you are not requesting outside funding, I would expect a clear process for sourcing and managing the investment you plan to apply.

Entrepreneur 131

Entrepreneur Outsource Development Startup Competition 131

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 21, 2020

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Startup 156

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 156

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 22, 2021

Your goal must be to make every aspect of a customer interaction a joy to both you and them, starting from the shopping experience, to the sales close, to delivery and service. Use metrics to assess needs and growth economics.

Customer 114

Customer Custom Satisfaction Metrics 114

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 12, 2015

It starts with a vision, but benefits quickly from a structured process of idea generation, evaluation, prototyping, customer feedback, and success metrics. Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the key to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. Innovation is not a random walk into the unknown.

Entrepreneur 101

Entrepreneur Startup Coach Metrics 101

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 22, 2010

In fact, a business plan is needed more by you than investors, as the blueprint for your company, team communication, and progress metrics. Things that make it investment-grade for outside investors will also benefit you, since you are the ultimate investor. Competition and sustainable advantage. Marketing, sales, and partners.

Invest 74

Invest Tips Competition Metrics 74

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 3, 2021

To keep you on a positive track with potential investors, I recommend the following logic principles, to balance your passion in presenting your vision of a new business: Make sure your plan includes some business metrics. Postulate competitive reactions and your responses. Don’t forget to focus on the value of you and your team.

Entrepreneur 162

Entrepreneur Social Media Examples Metrics 162

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

The most obvious way to explain this is with sales people. If you hire 6 sales reps in January at $120,000 / year salary then you’ve taken on an extra $60,000 per month in costs yet these sales people might not close new business for 4-6 months. If you don’t, somebody else WILL!” ” The Details.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 13, 2012

In fact, a business plan is needed more by you than investors, as the blueprint for your company, team communication, and progress metrics. Things that make it investment-grade for outside investors will also benefit you, since you are the ultimate investor. Competition and sustainable advantage. Marketing, sales, and partners.

Competition 113

Competition Metrics Startup Invest 113

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 8, 2018

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Startup 81

Startup Coach Metrics Marketing 81

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 7, 2015

Competitor positioning and sustainable competitive advantage. Customers may be attracted to your marketing message, but investors look harder at the startup team, seeking superior expertise in the key areas of growing a business, product domain, financial, marketing and sales. Specific elements of your marketing and sales plans.

Product 103

Product Slides Customer Custom 103

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 13, 2011

In fact, a business plan is needed more by you than investors, as the blueprint for your company, team communication, and progress metrics. Things that make it investment-grade for outside investors will also benefit you, since you are the ultimate investor. Competition and sustainable advantage. Marketing, sales, and partners.

Competition 116

Competition Metrics Startup Sales 116

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 24, 2015

Entrepreneurs need to document a process of responding to a market need, sizing opportunity, assigning a specific business model, and planning for marketing, sales, and customer satisfaction. Even if you are not requesting outside funding, I would expect a clear process for sourcing and managing the investment you plan to apply.

Outsource Development 99

Outsource Development Startup Competition Ideas 99

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

If you invested in the first angel round of a startup company it is usually very hard to sell your stock – usually for many years if ever at all. The earlier you invest the higher the chances the company won’t work out and thus you pay a lower price than later-stage investors. Private markets for stocks are the opposite.

Startup 336

Startup Pricing Technical Review Marketing 336

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

This financial leader could well have come through the finance org at another startup or at a larger company but they often also can come from strategy consulting (Bain, BCG or McKinsey) or through investment banking (Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, etc.). We built a strong brand in the city and acquired a ton of organic traffic.

Startup 286

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 286

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 4, 2016

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Entrepreneur 93

Entrepreneur Startup Coach Metrics 93

socalTECH

JANUARY 14, 2011

We have a very sophisticated, analytics and software platform that over half the Fortune 50 are now using, to help guide how they invest in marketing and sales activities and investments. Did the TV stimulate search? But, they're not looking at how those swim lanes interact with each other.

Social Media 235

Social Media Demand Activity Marketing 235

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 17, 2019

As a business advisor, when I bring this up, at best I will hear the defense that you are focused on the strategy of the moment, such as such as how to increase sales, or reach a new market. Highlight your competitive value, not your technology. The result is a business plateau that hits you like a ton of bricks.

Technical Review 87

Technical Review Customer Custom Competition 87

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 28, 2016

Entrepreneurs need to document a process of responding to a market need, sizing opportunity, assigning a specific business model, and planning for marketing, sales, and customer satisfaction. Even if you are not requesting outside funding, I would expect a clear process for sourcing and managing the investment you plan to apply.

Ideas 62

Ideas Outsource Development Startup Competition 62

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. The problem is that stakeholders, like marketing and sales, don’t know what the latest version of the roadmap is.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

Through advertising or direct sales, these sites harvest intent. Instead of making a few dollars per sale and hoping for thousands of sales, you sell to only a few customers, and charge much higher rates. friend of mine asked me to chat with a startup he’d invested in. they have purchasing intent ).*. Here’s why.

Startup 248

Startup Venture Capital Conference Social Media 248

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 12, 2010

That’s because a company’s value is a composite of all of the quantitative and qualitative factors that comprise a company: revenues, expenses, risks, growth prospects, quality of the management team, competitive advantages, strength of the intellectual property, and so forth. Liabilities: Your liabilities detract from your venture’s value.

.Net 89

.Net Metrics Competition Template 89

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 10, 2012

Bloom’s “ The New Experts ,” that today’s customers are armed with three lethal weapons – instant access to information about every potential purchase, immense choice, and real-time comparison of competitive prices. These are the transactions that require far less investment and will create far more profitable revenue.

Customer 93

Customer Custom Startup Competition 93

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 30, 2012

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Startup 96

Startup Writing Metrics Marketing 96

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 11, 2011

Bloom’s “ The New Experts ,” that today’s customers are armed with three lethal weapons – instant access to information about every potential purchase, immense choice, and real-time comparison of competitive prices. These are the transactions that require far less investment and will create far more profitable revenue.

Customer 88

Customer Custom Competition Metrics 88

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2013

I remember just a decade ago in 2003 when we all laughed at how dumb people in the 90′s were talking about the race to “capture as many eyeballs as possible” before your competition. The minute you try to monetize now they have metrics with which to beat you up and say you’re business has limitations.”

Venture Capital 412

Venture Capital Startup Funding Snapchat 412

Tech Zulu Event

MARCH 16, 2015

There’s plenty of capital out there, but there’s also a lot of competition for startup funding. If you go this route, be careful to make the stakes clear: i.e., that they could lose their whole investment. Angels (invest their own money) and super angels. His best advice: take capital where you can get it. Thoughts on pitching?

Startup 40

Startup Venture Capital Equity Funding 40

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 7, 2011

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Entrepreneur 91

Entrepreneur Startup Writing Metrics 91

InfoChachkie

MAY 22, 2012

Send them a private message via Twitter or Quora that contains a compelling link relevant to their investment focus. Step 4: Reconnaissance Mission, Under Promise – An effective technique for acquiring investment capital is to initially not ask for money. Follow them on Twitter, Quora and become familiar with their Facebook presence.

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Capital Research Customer 236

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 20, 2015

We love capital efficiency until we love land grabs until we abhor over funding until we get huge payouts and ring the bell for more funding until we attract every non-VC on the planet to invest in startups until it crashes and we start the cycle all over again none the wiser. Amnesia sets in and we get back on the merry-go-round.

Funding 150

Funding Venture Capital Startup Marketing 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

Understanding where your VC partner sits in their respective fund and where their fund is in the cycle of its investment lifecycle will help you understand your VCs behavior. Each of your angels or seed investors may have 20-30 investments. What Rob wrote in his post is right. In his spare time he raised nearly $30 million.

Tips 365

Tips Email Venture Capital CTO Coach 365

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 23, 2013

Through ongoing analysis and refinement of existing processes, establishment of standards and metrics, team building and mentoring, Sergey has established a foundation and culture in which developers can flourish. Bobby’s strong sales acumen, genuine charisma and leadership abilities make him an invaluable asset to the founding team.

Social Network 92

Social Network Networking Training Summary 92

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 27, 2010

All the investment money in the world won’t make your company succeed, if you have the wrong team. investors invest in people, not ideas) Effective and timely go-to-market. Have you projected sales and marketing costs, cash flow, and capital requirements? Show return on investment, growth rates, and market penetration.

Entrepreneur 48

Entrepreneur Startup Metrics Class 48

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 25, 2016

What would it take in investments to acquire and retain traffic to support these businesses? billion in sales and thus controls less than 10% of the market. The metrics were good but we wondered how much better they would be when we expanded our product. Competition. If you’re not successful then who cares.

Startup 150

Startup Marketing Study SEO 150

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 2, 2018

Yet, when you are pitching to investors, this has to be balanced by generating enough profit to keep the venture thriving, growing, and providing a healthy return-on-investment (ROI) to investors. Highlights a sustainable competitive advantage. Includes balanced and hard-hitting marketing and sales. billion a few years ago.

Customer 19

Customer Custom Acquisition Entrepreneur 19