InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

Net Promoter Scores (NPS) are the darling of many Big Dumb Company (BDC) product marketing and customer support executives. Created by consultants to generate additional fees, such scores attempt to rate a company’s overall customer satisfaction. The higher your company’s NPS, allegedly the higher your customer satisfaction.

.Net 182

.Net Satisfaction Entrepreneur Customer 182

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

Net Promoter Scores (NPS) are the darling of many Big Dumb Company (BDC) product marketing and customer support executives. Created by consultants to generate additional fees, such scores attempt to rate a company’s overall customer satisfaction. The higher your company’s NPS, allegedly the higher your customer satisfaction.

.Net 168

.Net Satisfaction Customer Custom 168

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 4, 2009

Many entrepreneurs who start technology companies are product people, technologists or savvy business people who worked previously for a larger company. Most start-up entrepreneurs have little or no sales experience. This is the easiest one for most entrepreneurs. But most good entrepreneurs do this naturally.

Sales 319

Sales Startup Platform Tips 319

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2009

I recently got a phone call from an entrepreneur whom I respect and who runs a company that I hope will do great things one day. Entrepreneurs get so used to friends and family congratulating them on their press coverage that they forget sometimes that this isn’t real. Many entrepreneurs have a PR page in the PowerPoint deck.

Venture Capital 291

Venture Capital Press News Startup 291

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 18, 2013

Boss Reference - Your potential boss will check your references. Even if the reference did not work directly with your future manager, they may still have valuable insights that would otherwise be impossible for you to uncover during the interview process. You should do the same. Share and Enjoy.

RSS 229

RSS Entrepreneur Startup Email 229

InfoChachkie

APRIL 28, 2011

Many entrepreneurs encounter a similar dilemma. Thus, entrepreneurs must decide when to stop listening to the Sirens’ song of a quick buck and position their company to take advantage of long-term, sustainable business models. However, in the long run, entrepreneurs always benefit from delivering Maximum Utility for a fair price.

Entrepreneur 225

Entrepreneur SaaS Pricing Cloud Computing 225

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 28, 2012

When is it appropriate for a VC to call your customers? I have seen some entrepreneurs go into first meetings willing to share almost anything about their company. I have seen some entrepreneurs go into first meetings willing to share almost anything about their company. The First Meeting. What did he do?

Technical Review 316

Technical Review Venture Capital Customer Custom 316

InfoChachkie

MAY 7, 2012

Skilled entrepreneurs bring ideas and money together by building a bridge of trust. I likewise value an entrepreneur who treats my money like their own and understands the difference between spending and investing. Confirmation from people whom the entrepreneur did not cite as a reference is vital.

Ideas 251

Ideas Venture Capital Education Entrepreneur 251

socalTECH

AUGUST 7, 2014

Bryce Maddock: TaskUs is the best provider in the world of customer care and back office services for emerging growth companies. Customer care, obviously, is emails, phone calls, and customer service back office services. The two of us really wanted to be entrepreneurs. What''s the story behind the company?

Startup 231

Startup Technology Outsource Santa Monica 231

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 31, 2012

So what’s an entrepreneur to do to get his new business noticed these days? Today’s platform is built of people, including yourself, contacts, connections, and followers, who can amplify your message through social media and spread it to your target customers. Make your customers your platform.

Startup 104

Startup Social Media Platform Blogging 104

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 20, 2009

The promised to follow up with: calls, using your product, talking to customers or “noodle on things.&# Will they? I like to tell entrepreneurs to treat it like a sales campaign. You would never go see an important executive at a customer and then sit around and wait for them to realize how great you are.

Venture Capital 277

Venture Capital Startup Email News 277

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 5, 2015

In his premier film appearance in the blaxploitation send-up “I’m Gonna Git You Sucka,” Chris Rock inadvertently addresses a key pricing challenge faced by most entrepreneurs. When we launched GoToAssist, we offered our customers the option to brand the customer-facing webpages with their logo and brand colors. Price = Value.

Pricing 100

Pricing Product Startup Customer 100

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 24, 2013

Awesome, now you know it works, so you need a lot more customers to become an actual business. Thus, you need to enable new ways to create a scalable customer acquisition process. A good example of growth hacking was Andrei Marinescu’s role as head of customer acquisition for Hulu. He currently resides in NYC.

Hulu 111

Hulu Startup Social Media Organization 111

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 20, 2011

In that same post Why you shouldn’t keep your startup idea secret where he argues to make things open, he defines only one group of people that you may want to avoid having a conversation with: The handful of people in the world who might copy your idea are entrepreneurs just starting up with a very similar idea.

Startup 211

Startup IP Ideas Patents 211

InfoChachkie

MAY 22, 2012

The same should be true of an entrepreneur who is attempting to secure money from sophisticated investors. Step 1: The Person, Not The Firm – As Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson make clear in their book Venture Deals , entrepreneurs should identify specific venture partners, rather than target firms as a whole. It’s not.”

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Capital Research Customer 236

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 20, 2011

In that same post Why you shouldn’t keep your startup idea secret where he argues to make things open, he defines only one group of people that you may want to avoid having a conversation with: The handful of people in the world who might copy your idea are entrepreneurs just starting up with a very similar idea.

Startup 198

Startup IP Ideas Patents 198

socalTECH

OCTOBER 19, 2018

Fortunately, the Director of Global Customer Experience at Google, became our first investor, so we could start and figure out the content problem for small and medium businesses. One of the keys to solving the content problem, is to be able to find an approach to service customers, without dedicating a ton of account management resources.

Help 133

Help IP Content Google 133

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 21, 2010

I recently read a post over on VentureHacks titled, “ Top Ten Reasons Entrepreneurs Hate Lawyers &# written by Scott Walker (who blogs on legal issues for entrepreneurs ). Because many great entrepreneurs work with lawyers in registering their companies they have their ear to the pavement on the earliest of company formations.

Startup 318

Startup IP Southern California Entrepreneur 318

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 1, 2012

The following guest post is from Courtney Englert, Customer Success Intern at The Resumator , a SaaS applicant tracking system and hiring platform trusted by many of the fastest-growing companies in the world, including: Pinterest, Tumblr, Hootsuite, Klout, Posterous, Bitly, Atari and Mashable. Be prepared to take a fall. Share and Enjoy.

Startup 184

Startup RSS SaaS Press 184

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 3, 2010

I know because many entrepreneurs I spend time with I can tell are in their own brains when we’re meeting rather than trying to understand what my position is. You’re in sales mode. Let’s assume you run a Customer Support software company. They don’t handle Twitter feedback, emails or IM.

Sales 314

Sales Startup Venture Capital Customer 314

socalTECH

OCTOBER 24, 2013

That''s why people tend to gravitate towards SMS messages, rather than something like email. How difficult has it been to get your customers to understand the exposure with SMS? Some of the first customers we had were in obstetrics. Having that support is a huge, important thing to unlock lots of growth in our customer base.

Yammer 229

Yammer Startup Mobile Organization 229

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

We typically do not ask entrepreneurs to visit our offices in Santa Barbara, but Jeff wanted to meet with Kevin, an investor in our Fund who helped us vet opportunities and occasionally invested alongside of us. <Note: I edited a few comments from Jeff's email, none of which related to our meeting in 2008.> > -jeff.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 8, 2010

Define your customers, partners and other relevant people to your organization (e.g. That’s blogging to the echo chamber unless they’re your target customers. Much of my traffic is through referring websites and/or social media. I was an entrepreneur. and it’s where I got my custom URL’s grp.vc

Blogging 286

Blogging Startup Writing Summary 286

Jason Nazar

AUGUST 15, 2013

Referring Traffic / Press. The Viral Loop / User Email. Referring Traffic / Press. make sure you maximize the potential for referring traffic: 1.) Helpful Resources about for Getting Referral Traffic : Top Blogs List (with email contacts). Search Engines. Social Media. Online Partnerships / Distribution Deals.

Web 61

Web Social Media Content Sites 61

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2011

The list of war references used in business is almost endless, from “gathering the troops” to “losing a battle but winning the war.” Your business model is how you get customers, grow and make money. You can contact him directly through his website or email.

Startup 95

Startup Competition Guide Software 95

socalTECH

MAY 7, 2012

By prints, I am referring to anything that hangs on a wall, whether that's a framed photo, framed canvas, acrylic. myself and two women who do customer service and tech support for me via phone and email. days, and it's all fully integrated back into our system which ships, tracks the information, and sends out an email.

Santa Monica 258

Santa Monica Pricing Sites Sales 258

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 2, 2011

The caveat is that these young entrepreneurs have to drop out of college to do it. Don't equate "startup entrepreneur" with "future millionaire" or visions of a buy-out by a big-time corporation. A local fishing guide might make friends with folks at the bed and breakfast, each referring clients to each other.

Startup 92

Startup Capital Blogging Ideas 92

Tech.Co

DECEMBER 6, 2017

Coachella Valley is referred to as the “Desert Empire” to differentiate it from the neighboring urbanized Inland Empire and the Imperial Valley. All of this attention has helped raise the profile of the region as a lifestyle destination, which has led entrepreneurs to see the valley in a positive light.

Startup 119

Startup Technical Review Patents Services 119

socalTECH

MARCH 5, 2012

It's really about providing a customized approach, and the best experience for both the dog and dog owners. We do phone interviews, and check references for lots of our hosts. What makes us different from a Craiglist with a checkout button, is we also offer protection to customers. How did the company come about?

Technical Review 164

Technical Review Startup Sites Malibu 164

socalTECH

MARCH 5, 2012

It's really about providing a customized approach, and the best experience for both the dog and dog owners. We do phone interviews, and check references for lots of our hosts. What makes us different from a Craiglist with a checkout button, is we also offer protection to customers. How did the company come about?

Technical Review 160

Technical Review Startup Sites Malibu 160

Jason Nazar

JANUARY 14, 2009

Referring Traffic / Press. The Viral Loop / User Email. Referring Traffic / Press - The web is interconnected, and traffic flows among sites that interlink. To make sure you maximize the potential for referring traffic: 1.) Helpful Resources about for Getting Referral Traffic : Top Blogs List (with email contacts).

Web 62

Web Social Media Content Sites 62

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

I raised money as an entrepreneur, like you, in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005 for two different companies. I never suggest that entrepreneurs just randomly pitch VCs. You’ll never make a great entrepreneur. So your journey to fund raising begins by strengthening your relationships with other entrepreneurs.

Develop 366

Develop Development Funding Venture Capital 366

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 27, 2011

If you care about accessing customers, reaching an audience, communicating your vision, influencing people in your industry, marketing your services or just plain engaging in a dialog with others in your industry a blog is a great way to achieve this. I’ll bet your customers, business partners or suppliers would love similar.

Blogging 373

Blogging Startup Writing Venture Capital 373

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 29, 2018

As a long-time advisor to small businesses and startups, I still find many who think marketing is still primarily broadcasting your message to as many customers as possible, hitting them again and again, until it sticks. They don’t realize that customers today are looking for relationships, meaning two-way conversations with your business.

Marketing 91

Marketing Examples Startup Customer 91

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 6, 2010

But in my experience as an entrepreneur and now spending my time amongst investors I can generalize that almost all VC investments in early stage technology & Internet investments come down to just four key factors. This post was prompted by an email exchange I had with a young entrepreneur. That’s fine.

Startup 360

Startup Venture Capital Invest Slides 360

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 7, 2018

There is an old management saying, “measure twice, cut once” which refers to the benefit of doing some planning. As an investor I can tell you that when I meet an entrepreneur who knows very little about our fund or me as an individual it’s a huge turn off. You could easily guess their email addresses or ping them on Twitter?—?don’t.

Funding 215

Funding Startup Venture Capital News 215

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2009

This posting was inspired by an email from Rajat Suri who wrote me an email in response to Chris Dixon’s blog post (link below) from August, which recently re-ran on Business Insider and has generated much Twitter chatter. I told entrepreneurs that it was a bit of a Faustian bargain. I was an early cynic.

Seed Funding 283

Seed Funding Venture Capital Funding Software Review 283