Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 3, 2020

Then write them down. By writing these goals, you add validity to each target and create a mental desire to see them fulfilled. Thus it’s clear to me that your journey from corporate America to being an entrepreneur does not begin with just an innovative idea, or an annoying dissatisfaction.

Entrepreneur 123

Entrepreneur Satisfaction Writing Startup 123

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Start writing down predictions about people, companies, and markets. Theodore Schleifer at Recode reported a rare deep dive into the internal intrigue at a prominent VC firm, in this case Mithril Capital. We get at least a dozen at the TC offices every week, which is why we write about books so often around here these days.

Venture Capital 202

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Invest 202

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 13, 2019

If you want people to invest in your idea, then my best advice is first write a business plan, and keep it simple. This means writing at the level of an average newspaper story (about eighth-grade level). If necessary, create a separate white paper for other details and reports. Polish the overall look and feel.

Tips 96

Tips Entrepreneur Writing Content 96

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2012

As an entrepreneur, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your idea. How about talking to some real customers to see if they are as excited about your idea as you are? Don’t wait for journalists to find you; they all publish their email addresses, and they’re looking for something interesting to write.

Startup 96

Startup Writing Newsletter Blogging 96

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 18, 2010

By Mahesh Raj Mohan Writing a business plan can be a difficult process. you still have to write the plan for a particular audience. Your business plan’s writing style should take their preferences into account. So what writing styles should you use for these very different audiences? What does that mean?

Writing 97

Writing Summary Ideas Research 97

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 21, 2017

of all Statistics are Made Up ” My summary is an example I use often: when I consumed reports from Goldman Sachs about the future predictions of mobile phone penetration for a report I was working on for a client I would call the analyst to ask how she calculated her data because I wanted to be sure of my conclusions.

Venture Capital 182

Venture Capital Statistics Writing Report 182

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 2, 2014

Now, you’re handling payroll and doing writing as well. You may even discover that you enjoy writing more than crunching numbers. Piaw Na, who spent over six years at Google, writes on Quora that she recommends fresh grads to join a startup instead of big companies. Startup founders are innovative and creative individuals.

Startup 102

Startup Social Media Writing Google 102

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 14, 2013

.” Here’s what I mean … Let’s start with what it takes for a journalist to want to write a story. Do I have an “angle” from which to write the story (first company to do X, company does biggest X, consumer behavior is doing X)? ” Or I guess that was the slogan for Arthur Andersen.

Marketing 389

Marketing Press Blogging Startup 389

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 7, 2011

As an entrepreneur, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your idea. How about talking to some real customers to see if they are as excited about your idea as you are? Don’t wait for journalists to find you; they all publish their email addresses, and they’re looking for something interesting to write.

Startup 92

Startup Writing Newsletter Blogging 92

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 17, 2010

As an entrepreneur, it’s never too early to start selling yourself and your idea. How about talking to some real customers to see if they are as excited about your idea as you are? Don’t wait for journalists to find you; they all publish their email addresses, and they’re looking for something interesting to write.

Startup 90

Startup Writing Newsletter Blogging 90

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 31, 2014

According to several recent reports , job satisfaction for employees is at an all-time low. Then write them down. By writing these goals, you add validity to each target and create a mental desire to see them fulfilled. The rewards, as reported by everyone who has been there, will still be well worth it.

Entrepreneur 100

Entrepreneur Satisfaction Startup Writing 100

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2015

I’m going to write a pure admiration piece. I loved the idea. The story as reported in Forbes is worthy of your reading directly (small edits below for brevity). He morphed the idea from a passenger transport system to a more readily possible cargo transport system. Not this one. And also a “thank you.”

Startup 150

Startup Conference Ideas Writing 150

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 10, 2012

UCLA 48hr Startup brings together people with technical, design or business background to share ideas, form teams, build products and launch startups. Some attendees bring just enthusiasm to join a startup, an idea for a startup or pre-built technology. They pitch ideas during the open mic session and inspire others to join their team.

UCLA 87

UCLA Startup Ideas Mentor 87

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 7, 2015

According to several reliable reports , job satisfaction for employees is at an all-time low. Then write them down. By writing these goals, you add validity to each target and create a mental desire to see them fulfilled. The rewards, as reported by everyone who has been there, will still be well worth it.

Satisfaction 57

Satisfaction Entrepreneur Writing Startup 57

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 30, 2013

But it was reported compassionately by Christina Allen in this moving piece on Pando Daily. I started out this year writing about how much I hate December. Nobody that I’ve spoke with who had seen Jody recently has even an inkling of a idea. I knew that but didn’t want to speak the unspeakable. How to say it?

Blogging 400

Blogging Startup Ideas Press 400

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 26, 2013

If you want people to invest in your idea, then my best advice is first write a business plan, and keep it simple. This means writing at the level of an average newspaper story (about eighth-grade level). If necessary, create a separate white paper for other details and reports. Polish the overall look and feel.

Writing 95

Writing Content Summary Entrepreneur 95

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 10, 2014

If you’re an early investor like I am that often means writing the first $2-3 million check into a business that previously had either survived on fumes or on a $500,000 angel round. And while this might sound to the inexperienced person like a sensible idea – it is not. Other B-round scaling issues?

Startup 381

Startup Resource Venture Capital Activity 381

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Huge thank you to Steve De Long for the write up. Was it David Cohen’ Idea? It was David’s idea.” “Well I didn’t know David. Oblong, Minority Report, and the rise of Spatial Operating Systems. You have a company called Oblong (in your portfolio) which is a Minority Report type company.

Venture Capital 288

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Software Review 288

socalTECH

APRIL 30, 2009

According to CEO Chris Lyman and VP of Product and Marketing Corey Brundage, the idea for the fight club came when Lyman ran into Reilly in a restaurant, and learned about his fighting class.

Culver City 140

Culver City Startup Training Class 140

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 18, 2012

If you want people to invest in your idea, then my best advice is first write a business plan, and keep it simple. This means writing at the level of an average newspaper story (about eighth-grade level). If necessary, create a separate white paper for other details and reports. Polish the overall look and feel.

Tips 101

Tips Writing Content Summary 101

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2010

If I’m interested I get to spend more time with them, if I’m not I don’t have to – A few companies per month come in that have fascinating business ideas that warrant my spending more time trying to understand their people, company, technology and market. I’ll write about that in a couple of weeks.

Venture Capital 312

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Entrepreneur 312

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 19, 2011

And many short-termists will think it’s a bad idea. In my opinion it’s the most natural fit and it would give Netflix a very strong presence in Los Angeles and in TV (obviously subject to getting the right writes from the studios). [most importantly] – It’s a great strategic decision. For investors this is huge.

Netflix 329

Netflix Evite Pricing Hulu 329

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 16, 2018

I was happy to see a real focus on preparing for tomorrow highlighted in a new book, “ Start a Successful Business ,” by Colleen DeBaise, who has made a career of studying and writing about entrepreneur challenges. I often hear entrepreneurs who seem to rely wholly on their own passion, and the view of a few friends.

Customer 57

Customer Custom Technical Review Software Review 57

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 27, 2011

If you want people to invest in your idea, then my best advice is first write a business plan, and keep it simple. This means writing at the level of an average newspaper story (about eighth-grade level). If necessary, create a separate white paper for other details and reports. Polish the overall look and feel.

Writing 104

Writing Content Summary Entrepreneur 104

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 16, 2018

Greathouse: How did you come up with the idea for ProductPlan? Semick: It wasn’t our first idea. We spent a lot of time talking about what type of company we wanted to create, how many employees we’d eventually have, whether we would take funding, our lifestyle, and a dozen other things that had nothing to do with writing software.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 26, 2013

Here’s how to write an executive summary with impact: 1. Just as I don’t recommend you outsourcing the writing of your business plan, I wouldn’t pass on this task. This isn’t a book report; it’s more of a promotional brochure. With every sentence that you write, give it the test: Will this make a VC want to know more?

Summary 76

Summary Tips Startup Writing 76

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 27, 2011

Too many people still believe the urban myth that you can sketch your idea on a napkin, and people will throw money at you. You may think you are an expert in your domain, but until you try to write things down in simple terms in a blog for other people, you don’t realize what you don’t know.

Entrepreneur 96

Entrepreneur Startup Blogging Social Media 96

TechEmpower

FEBRUARY 13, 2013

You're in the thick of it and about to write a small chunk of server-side code. It takes a bit more time for each developer, but it saves the effort of reporting, tracking, and dealing with bugs that leak beyond the developer's sieve. but getting work done requires shutting down the news feed and writing code.

Web 200

Web Platform Technology JavaScript 200

socalTECH

APRIL 8, 2014

We''ve also had a pretty wide range of check writing in terms of amount. Rami Rostami: One of the things about the new crowdfunding phenomenon, is that everyone is raising money, validating their ideas, and maybe raising $500,00, or $50,000, or $5 million. But, what do they do from there? Why start an investment firm in Los Angeles?

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Seed Funding Santa Monica Funding Startup 220

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 22, 2010

If you want people to invest in your idea, then my best advice is first write a business plan, and keep it simple. This means writing at the level of an average newspaper story (about eighth-grade level). If necessary, create a separate white paper for other details and reports. Polish the overall look and feel.

Tips 93

Tips Writing Content Summary 93

socalTECH

APRIL 29, 2014

So the idea is to create a device that does all of that, and you get judged on how well it does, and how easy it is to use. We were looking at it, and saw that if we could take all these off-the-shelf sensors, and put it all together, and write some code, and make a user interface, it''s basically done. We expect to win.

Startup 262

Startup Competition Software Review UCLA 262

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2012

The idea came from having been recently married herself and seeing how expensive it can be to buy a new wedding dress. Daily Candy was one of the earliest successes in the newsletter business, which ultimately sold to Comcast for a reported $125 million. She learned at the kitchen table as so many spouses do.

Startup 363

Startup Entrepreneur SEO Venture Capital 363

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2012

I loved the idea of “mobile first” but something always bothered me. I’ve wanted to write a blog post called “Mobile Second” for a long time to make this point more forcefully. BUT … I’ve talked to a number of eCommerce sites that also report much higher conversion rates than standard web.

Web 334

Web Mobile Startup Software Review 334

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

I had seen many cycles and decided that since I was going to do it all over again I should write about it. I decided to write about my experience and to be blunt. It became a huge kerfuffle with many VC partners writing to thank me for the post, which exposed those that gave their industry a bad name. And covered we did.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Xconomy

AUGUST 10, 2016

As CEO Rao wrote in a blog post Monday , “Nervana started with the idea that we can engineer better solutions for computation by bringing together computer engineering, neuroscience, and machine learning.”. Just over a year later, Jurvetson led the Series A round of venture funding for Nervana Systems.

Artificial Inteligence 40

Artificial Inteligence San Diego Framework Venture Capital 40

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 9, 2012

We didn't go into Disneyland just with the idea of making money." Industry pundits generally spend their time writing about what they see in the rear view mirror. Big Dumb Companies consume such analyst reports, as they are unable to parse the past from the future. ." [Tweet this quote]. " [Tweet this quote].

Tips 277

Tips Startup Entrepreneur Entertainment 277

socalTECH

JUNE 30, 2010

My partner is a documentarian and reports for the New York Times, Time, and Newsweek, and was given a story to write about for the New York Times, about the sounds that fish make , for their Science section. The idea emerged from that real life pain in the market, and as we like to say, we've grown incrementally from there.

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Journal USC News Startup 187