Berkonomics

JUNE 2, 2022

Looking for an entrance into a VC, an angel group, a bank, a CxO for a sales opportunity, or any other entity? Few of your contacts will be willing to use their valuable social or political capital helping you with a sales effort, and you will definitely strain your relationship with the intermediary if not a close friend.

Ideas 156

Ideas Sales Competition Venture Capital 156

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 21, 2023

Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the kay to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. From time to time, include customers and sales members in ideation sessions. Once a new product is launched, a key metric is the ratio of new product sales to overall sales. Accountability.

Coach 137

Coach Metrics Competition Ideas 137

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 8, 2018

Every entrepreneur I know is short on resources, including time, money, and skills. Waste in a startup is any activity that spends resources, but creates no value or competitive advantage in the eyes of customers. Recovery efforts are wasted resource which rarely succeeds. That’s a deadly waste you can’t afford.

Resource 52

Resource Training Entrepreneur Activity 52

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 31, 2010

This is part of my ongoing Sales & Marketing Series. In the first part of this post I talked about how sales in a startup is often evangelical , requires as consultative sale and needs constant adjustments based on customer feedback. We had 4 or 5 sales reps that had been around since the early days.

Sales 286

Sales Newsletter Technical Review Activity 286

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 16, 2014

Eventually you need a VP of Product to handle your product roadmap, a CTO for engineering leadership and VPs of sales, marketing & biz dev. If you hire truly talented people you end up definitionally with a lot of competitive peers who will inevitably jockey for resources and control. As CEO, do you step in? Engineering?

Entrepreneur 385

Entrepreneur CTO Hire Startup Sales 385

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 4, 2021

Every entrepreneur I know is short on resources, including time, money, and skills. Waste in a startup is any activity that burns resources, but creates no value or competitive advantage in the eyes of customers. Recovery efforts are wasted resource which rarely succeeds. That’s a deadly waste you can’t afford.

Startup 161

Startup Resource Training Entrepreneur 161

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 21, 2013

This initial focus is usually driven by limited financial and people resources, as well as the bandwidth of the executive team. Yet a creative and skilled team will often find that non-organic growth techniques can better leverage these limited resources. Economies of scale also apply to marketing, distribution, and sales.

Organization 97

Organization Competition Startup Acquisition 97

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2023

Some businesses require very little capital and the founder can self-finance the enterprise and retain 100% of its ownership and control from ignition through liquidity event (startup through sale). For those of you who fit that description, nice work. There is a lot to say about retaining control. The post Need money?

Venture Capital 295

Venture Capital Startup Class Invest 295

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 25, 2020

Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the kay to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. From time to time, include customers and sales members in ideation sessions. Once a new product is launched, a key metric is the ratio of new product sales to overall sales. Accountability.

Coach 144

Coach Metrics Social Network Competition 144

Berkonomics

JULY 18, 2019

By carefully recognizing and focusing upon the very core of the business, these CEO’s are allocating their scarce cash resources to hire the best talent they can find to support that core business, and then reaching out to partners, independent contractors, and other small businesses to provide all other functions.

Patents 120

Patents Resource Training Advertising 120

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 29, 2016

Management undertakes a simple exercise of calculating the increased profitability of shutting down all R&D, sales and subordinate operations, and universally notes with shock the high net profit that results – from shutting down all operations except customer service to recurring customers (as in software support operations.).

.Net 226

.Net Sales Customer Custom 226

Berkonomics

OCTOBER 21, 2021

Or concentrate our available resources on just plain money as an attraction? Salaries or hourly wages must be within reasonable limits set by the industry and matched by the competition, both regionally and for the same job classification. Some obvious qualifiers. Second, a substantial carrot, a bonus for outstanding achievement. .

Design 156

Design Examples Competition Pricing 156

Tech Zulu Event

MARCH 19, 2015

Computers and the Internet have now brought in a new era that relies on data to make profitable business decisions in the competitive environment. Below is a full explanation of how small businesses can leverage technology to earn a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Cloud Services. Social Media Automation Tools.

Competition 40

Competition Technology Social Media Tips 40

Berkonomics

APRIL 18, 2019

So, here’s one to help you with squeezing the most out of your own available resources. And if there are people depending upon the output of that wrongly-placed individual, they too will suffer from reduced resources to complete their jobs. Well, here are the four areas you should focus upon every day. Enough said.

Help 120

Help Resource Product Email 120

Berkonomics

APRIL 25, 2011

Marketing or merchandising (expert and diligent use of resources). The genius of this insight is that no employee is exempt, even those in accounting or human resources. Without constantly improving or increasing products to offer, a company today is quickly overtaken by its competition. Email readers continue here.]

Resource 136

Resource Competition Sales Marketing 136

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2013

In my first enterprise software company we developed a methodology for sales that we called PUCCKA , which I wrote about previously. Having a good sales methodology can help you ensure your company runs more disciplined campaigns and focuses scarce resources on your best opportunities. But how would I use it?”.

Sales 336

Sales Startup Competition Customer 336

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 29, 2021

Whether it be in person, on the phone, or implied in your marketing, your people and their engagement level is the key driver of customer loyalty, advocacy, and sales growth. People-centric leaders realize that the right motivated and accountable people are their real competitive advantage. Even process changes require people first.

Satisfaction 154

Satisfaction Demand Resource Competition 154

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 3, 2023

It allows all members of your team, including marketing, support, and sales, to size and build the business plan processes they need to find customers, deliver, and maintain grow the business. Each of these activities should have associated costs and resource requirements. Opportunity segmentation and competitive environment.

Product 112

Product Summary Activity Entrepreneur 112

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 26, 2023

New offerings which build your brand will increase acceptance and sales of all solutions, not just the new one. The result can be a host of new competitive and price challenges which can stall growth or require excessive resources and time. Even more important than solution marketing is building your brand.

Product 141

Product Services Technical Review Artificial Inteligence 141

Berkonomics

SEPTEMBER 19, 2019

Is it time to focus more resources upon collections, credit research, or even time to “fire some customers” who continually break your rules or take up too much of your resources? Are receivables collections slowing? If so, is it one critical customer or a trend? Keep the information to yourself? Bad things happen to good people.

News 120

News Statistics Resource Sales 120

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 23, 2022

In many cases, the ideas may be small ones, such as starting a promotion to kick-start sales on a stalled item, or suggesting a huge strategy move to acquire Netflix and supplement an already healthy Blockbuster DVD rental business. Your idea has unpredictable negative side effects. The suggested change won’t create desired results.

Ideas 116

Ideas Netflix Resource Customer 116

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 23, 2021

Some investors seem to focus wholly on the strengths of the management team, or a sustainable competitive advantage, and in reality these are the core attributes for every funding equation. This is not just sales traction, but a proper balance between resources, product, and customers. A startup must gain balanced traction.

Education 151

Education Customer Custom Sales 151

Berkonomics

OCTOBER 13, 2016

Well, even though that acquisition is still playing itself out on the field of battle, it appears quite clear that the new parent has directed its new subsidiary to abandon the lower end of the market and focus upon the larger sales, corporate customers, and major brands.

Resource 120

Resource Competition Examples Customer 120

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 29, 2023

On the product side, once you have a proven product and business model, all you need is money to build inventory, and a sales and marketing operation to drive the business. With services, scaling the business often implies cloning yourself, since you are the intellectual property and the competitive advantage. Marty Zwilling

Startup 111

Startup Training Services Writing 111

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 25, 2016

Looking for an entrance into a VC, an angel group, a bank, a CxO for a sales opportunity, or any other entity? Every sales person with a bit of street history will resonate with this question. After all, you have a paying relationship with these resources, and asking for help is not considered a daunting request.

Ideas 120

Ideas Sales Competition Venture Capital 120

Berkonomics

MAY 2, 2012

Here’s one to help you with squeezing the most out of your available resources. And if there are people depending upon the output of that wrongly-placed individual, they too will suffer from reduced resources to complete their jobs. Some of us remember things better when given a catchy phrase or rhyme. The first “P” stands for people.

Resource 228

Resource Product Email Competition 228

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2022

On the marketing side of the equation, there are so many “marketing gurus” and “marketing resources” out there, the real challenge for most of us is to sort out the basic do’s and the don’ts that apply to startups. Craft a no-follow-up sales letter, after you have positioned yourself as the right expert, with powerful testimonials.

Marketing 141

Marketing Startup Social Media Technical Review 141

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 22, 2021

Unfortunately, most of us don’t have enough resources to bootstrap our own startups, so we are completely dependent on investors to help turn great ideas into great businesses. You need to show you have a “Plan B,” and a never-give-up mindset, in handling any competitive threat or customer reaction.

Ideas 140

Ideas Entrepreneur Equity Resource 140

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2020

On the product side, once you have a proven product and business model, all you need is money to build inventory, and a sales and marketing operation to drive the business. With services, scaling the business often implies cloning yourself, since you are the intellectual property and the competitive advantage. Marty Zwilling.

Startup 174

Startup Training Services Writing 174

Tech.Co

MAY 31, 2023

But while competition remains fierce, the advancement and accessibility of smart solutions are making it easy than ever for startups to find their feet. Read our guide to the best VoIP desk phones to check out its competition. Check out how it compared to its competition in our guide to the best CRM marketing platforms.

Tool 128

Tool Startup Software Review Technical Review 128

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 30, 2022

Almost instantly, via the Internet or on their smartphone in the store, they can find the lowest price alternative or their favorite features, without waiting for push marketing or listening to your best sales person. Of course, both you and they will make mistakes, which are the best learning experiences.

Customer 146

Customer Custom Startup Course 146

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

The most important advice I could give you before you set out in fund raising mode is to understand that fund-raising a sales & marketing process and needs to be managed. Somehow many first-time founders equate “sales” with something that is beneath them. In sales there are also three rules: Qualify, qualify, qualify.

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 31, 2020

It allows all members of your team, including marketing, support, and sales, to size and build the business plan processes they need to find customers, deliver, and maintain grow the business. Each of these activities should have associated costs and resource requirements. Opportunity segmentation and competitive environment.

Entrepreneur 124

Entrepreneur Startup Summary Product 124

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 25, 2021

There are lots of resources available for that question, including the Internet and mentors like me. As an example of a good resource, I enjoyed the classic book, “ Idea To Invention ,” by Patricia Nolan-Brown, that does a great job on the key steps. Now get real (cook it). Before you get too excited, it’s time to do some homework.

Ideas 136

Ideas Entrepreneur Mentor Resource 136

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 28, 2011

Demand pull: too much demand for a product or service and not enough supply cause a competition for the product that drives prices higher without increasing the intrinsic value of the product. All of our enterprises have limited resources, even the largest of the Fortune 500, and especially the smallest of competitors in a market.

Demand 136

Demand Resource Pricing Study 136

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2010

Conventional wisdom in most companies is that “the competition is the enemy&# – it’s the rallying cry to dig deeper, get more features out the door, issue press releases citing differences and attack the competition’s weaknesses in sales presentations. You know, frenemies. When Enemies are Good.

Cloud Computing 320

Cloud Computing Competition Press Startup 320

Berkonomics

OCTOBER 25, 2012

Is it time to focus more resources upon collections, credit research, or even time to “fire some customers” who continually break your rules or take up too much of your resources? Whatever the problem, the person or board to whom you report does not want to hear about it after it has become a threat to the enterprise.

News 166

News Statistics Resource Sales 166