Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2013

The most likely outcome if you manage to interest the senior exec (for the sake of this post let me call her the CEO) is that she will refer you down the organization to somebody who would be involved in the decision. Having senior executive air cover is invaluable to help streamline these leg-breakers. The Case for Calling Low.

Sales 375

Sales Technical Review Organization Case Study 375

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

I had an enjoyable conversation this morning with a young team straight out of college this morning and they were calling to ask advice on how to approach fund raising (angels vs. VCs, how to select a VC, etc.) In my experience 90% of VCs fall short on their promises of how helpful or not they can be with intros. Connections?

Venture Capital 364

Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2017

Your first customers for any product or service form your reference base, the important group of allies that your marketing and sales people rely upon when attempting to create buzz and make a mass market for a new product. Call the customer CEO and thank him for helping launch a product so very important to your success.

Customer 243

Customer Custom Resource Sales 243

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 3, 2022

These people don’t help you or your startup. Here are some clues that will help you see and attract the best advisors, as well as the right team members: Is there a sense of trust and mutual respect? Pushing to reply immediately prevents comprehension or even hearing any advice or feedback. Marty Zwilling.

Mentor 115

Mentor Entrepreneur Help Email 115

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

It is in these contexts that I am often asked for specific advice. Identifying your goal will help you avoid getting pulled into any drama and stay focused on constructive tactics. Write down your key goals and refer to this list before any interaction with your colleague. Be clear with yourself about goals for a relationship.

Startup 114

Startup Examples Satisfaction Mentor 114

InfoChachkie

JULY 4, 2011

For sake of grammatical convenience, I will refer to Sam as a male in the remainder of this entry. He is so confident in his green eggs and ham product that he cannot help but smile. Man or woman, the tactics deployed by Sam are applicable to any sales situation and can be put to use by any salesperson, irrespective of their gender.

Sales 219

Sales Entrepreneur Startup Product 219

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 23, 2023

My advice is to leave the investing in startups to the professionals (or friends and fools). Ask for references, and call or visit previous “successes” of the company to verify experience and satisfaction. If others had done this sooner, his clones wouldn’t be out there today looking to help you out (of your money).

Startup 92

Startup Funding Offshore Invest 92

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2013

.” In the article I discussed the downside of raising capital at a too high of a price and referred people to a previous article I had written encouraging founders to raise “ At the Top end of Normal ” as opposed to stratospheric prices. Startup Advice' In the comments section Siqi Chen wrote a great question.

Pricing 302

Pricing Seed Funding Invest Venture Capital 302

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 6, 2010

doing a reference call on a prospective employee. But more than anything I just wanted the nuggets of information to help me better target this individual in the future. My goal was to learn as much as I could to help inform my analysis. THE REFERENCE CALL: Reference calls are hard. Dumb, I know. Conclusion.

Startup 311

Startup Invest Course Research 311

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 13, 2022

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Leave the world of new computer chips and new drugs to the big companies, and people with deep pockets.

Startup 136

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 136

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 1, 2022

I expect questions about how a business works, or what are best practices, but I really can’t help you with removing doubts on your abilities, or providing a sure-fire idea and formula for success in business. Ethical behavior refers to actions consistent with personal principles and commonly held values in your business community.

Capital 114

Capital Coach Satisfaction Ideas 114

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2012

And in most cases I would heed Fred Wilson’s advice about the “double opt-in” email for intros – where you ask for permission before green-lighting an unsolicited introductions. At best “over introducers” are driven by a sincere desire to help other people. ” That you’re helpful.

Email 359

Email Venture Capital Startup Technical Review 359

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 1, 2020

Each of these decisions could be a blog post in its own right but for today I want to avoid tactical advice and offer something more about your temperament as you wade through complexity and deal with decisions that affects the lives and the livelihoods of others. To say it simply …. you should do all that you can. you should do it.

Demand 215

Demand Guide Customer Custom 215

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 29, 2020

My advice is to leave the investing in startups to the professionals (or friends and fools). Ask for references, and call or visit previous “successes” of the company to verify experience and satisfaction. If others had done this sooner, his clones wouldn’t be out there today looking to help you out (of your money).

Tips 141

Tips Invest Offshore Startup 141

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 14, 2011

Peer Group – Meet with other emerging entrepreneurs who will help you objectively evaluate your experiences and provide relevant feedback regarding your successes and failures. It will also allow you to refer back to past experiences without risking an erroneous decision based on a false memory.

Startup 206

Startup Journal Writing Blogging 206

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2009

This is part of my series on How to Raise VC but could equally be filed under Startup Advice more generally. But it got me thinking about how often entrepreneurs overplay their PR so I thought I’d try to offer some advice and how to play PR with VCs (or more broadly with customers or business development partners).

Venture Capital 291

Venture Capital Press News Startup 291

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 3, 2020

These people don’t help you or your startup. Here are some clues that will help you see and attract the best advisors, as well as the right team members: Is there a sense of trust and mutual respect? Pushing to reply immediately prevents comprehension or even hearing any advice or feedback. Marty Zwilling.

Mentor 124

Mentor Entrepreneur Help Email 124

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 18, 2013

Below are a five suggestions that may help you avoid another unhealthy career move. Boss Reference - Your potential boss will check your references. Ultimately, as described more fully in Advice For Emerging Entrepreneurs (And Anyone Else With A Boss) , if you have a problem with your boss, you have a problem, not your boss.

RSS 229

RSS Entrepreneur Startup Email 229

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 3, 2009

When people refer to a strategic investor they are usually talking about an investor that comes from the industry you serve as opposed to an independent venture capital investor. When they promise to help you with marketing, sales, distribution, integrated product development, etc. And they probably have every intent of helping you.

Venture Capital 279

Venture Capital Startup Entrepreneur Framework 279

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2014

The entire dinner was a discussion of what it would take for our software to help this customer be successful, what he liked about it and where we needed to improve. Who else is going to tell a VC if he got a bad reference from an entrepreneur or fellow VC? Contrast that with a VC conversation I had. You can’t.

Customer 341

Customer Custom Venture Capital Software Review 341

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2013

Having a methodology instead of just going on random sales visits helped force a bit of rigor and honesty amongst team members about how well or not we thought we were doing. These references make for great discussions with customers. Startup Advice' But that’s the next post, “Unique Selling Proposition” or USPs.

Sales 367

Sales Slides Startup Customer 367

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 4, 2022

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Leave the world of new computer chips and new drugs to the big companies, and people with deep pockets.

Tips 104

Tips Startup Technical Review Equity 104

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2012

Some of the most helpful people to me personally have been people not being directly compensated for doing so. And they will offer you some of the best business advice you will ever receive if you’re open to it. And that’s why it’s super important to reference check your VC as I wrote in the linked post.

Startup 363

Startup Venture Capital Coach Press 363

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

Rather than blindly follow this advice, consider measuring your NPS after unpleasant customer interactions, via a web form. A binary question will help you identify which customers are more likely to lead to future prospects and which will not. Yes” responses are prime candidates for future references. Shots On Goal.

.Net 182

.Net Satisfaction Entrepreneur Customer 182

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 23, 2013

The next logical piece of work is therefore to help your prospect quantify the problem so they can attribute economic value to your solution and help you complete your sale. Preferably you’d have a customer testimonial where the customer reference will be able to talk through their economic benefits. Startup Advice'

Sales 328

Sales Customer Custom Examples 328

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

They wanted advice. I gave them advice I don’t think they were expecting from a VC, “Don’t raise venture capital for this business. It is advice I give entrepreneurs often as I have written here on why most businesses should never raise VC. These products help him win his core sales.

Services 332

Services Venture Capital IP Startup 332

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2010

My favorite two quotes of the weekend were: “Never trade your cat for somebody else’s dog” (referring to selling your company for stock to another privately held company – quote was from Alan. Tags: Entrepreneur Advice Start-up Advice Startup Advice. I’m going to save that for a future blog post.

Startup 279

Startup Venture Capital Tips Custom Development 279

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 28, 2012

Having been on both sides of this sensitive topic, the following is my personal advice. The best advice I could give you for first meetings is that you should have a limited number of discussions until you’re pretty sure that you’re likely to have positive results in fund raising and you should be open in the meetings that you do have.

Technical Review 316

Technical Review Venture Capital Customer Custom 316

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 19, 2011

They’re essential in helping us get our jobs done because they specialize in something we do not. Often recruiters want to handle the final negotiations on package and/or do the reference calls. I’m also reluctant to hand over reference calling. Unfortunately that’s how reference checking works.

Venture Capital 319

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Outsource 319

socalTECH

MARCH 16, 2017

We want to take our contacts at Google, Apple, Facebook, Disney, Microsoft, Cisco, Verizon, AT&T, Comcast, and other companies we believe should have a relationship with our portfolio companies, and help the CEOs and management teams more effectively do business development. Our investment thesis we refer to as the connected consumer.

Invest 145

Invest Funding Capital Startup 145

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 12, 2013

The feedback was always universal, “that was the most helpful marketing meeting I’ve every had.” Natural mentors – a desire to help. I made some reference calls. ” I always felt the same. When I think about what defines us as a VC I think: Operationally knowledgeable / strong startup competence.

Venture Capital 360

Venture Capital GRP Partners Startup Invest 360

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2013

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

Sales 336

Sales Startup Competition Customer 336

socalTECH

OCTOBER 26, 2012

With our Insights and Opinions section on socalTECH, we're trying to help the startup and high tech community, including including hints, tips, and other education on the world of high tech startups. Stubbs Alderton is a sponsor of socalTECH, but the Insights section is open to everyone in Southern California's high tech community.

High Tech 147

High Tech SoCalTech Southern California Tips 147

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 6, 2019

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Leave the world of new computer chips and new drugs to the big companies, and people with deep pockets.

Startup 128

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 128

socalTECH

JUNE 20, 2012

We caught up with Sam Teller , who is directing efforts at the accelerator, to help fill entrepreneurs in on where the program fits in the world of technology and startup acceleration. It was really just something built for the community to help support entrepreneurs. That's my first piece of advice.

Class 261

Class Mentor Startup Santa Monica 261

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 19, 2010

if you don’t have the reference and want it you can click the image above). You really can’t help but become pumped up with he’s on stage. Medicine can help – I’ve seen in first hand with people I’ve been close to. Tags: Startup Advice. Will you choose the dopeness or the wackness ?

Blogging 407

Blogging Tips Press Startup 407

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 3, 2011

Their primary intended reader is a “first-time entrepreneur”, but clearly other stakeholders within the startup universe can also benefit from the book’s hands-on advice. In contrast, Venture Deals focuses on pragmatic, tactical advice. This chapter provides spot-on, tough-love advice. Things I Liked. Things I Liked Less.

Venture Capital 205

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Writing Guide 205