Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

There was no money train. Sure, we built SaaS products before the term even existed but at 31 it was hard to delineate reality from what all of the monied people around us were telling us what we were worth. In those years I learned to properly build product, price products, sell products and serve customers.

Venture Capital 466

Venture Capital Startup LAMP Marketing 466

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 2, 2023

Depending upon the size of the companies and complexity of the products or services involved, it is fair to assume that you’ll need to dedicate a resource to this effort, sometimes a full-time resource at that. Consider a sales relationship where your product will be in the bag of salespeople from the partner company.

Press 156

Press Sales Training Resource 156

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 22, 2023

Train them fully, give them authority, make them accountable, and tie their pay to customer satisfaction. Train and coach continuously. Companies with great service routinely spend 3% to 5% of salaries training team members – experienced as well as new. Know your customers intimately.

Competition 99

Competition Services Startup Training 99

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 21, 2022

Start with only the very best people, demand excellence, and train them to stay ahead of the pack. Know the issues they face, and search for ways to help them, make them happier, more productive, and more profitable. Simultaneously deliver the best selection, service, and price. Craft mutually beneficial relationships.

Training 127

Training Custom Customer Social Media 127

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 29, 2023

The critical success factors for a product business are well known, starting with selling every unit with a gross margin of 50 percent or more, building a patent and other intellectual property, and continuous product improvement. Low cost and low margin products can be winners, if the volume is high enough.

Startup 111

Startup Training Services Writing 111

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 18, 2023

With pervasive access to social media, customers no longer differentiate poor product repair and replacement from a poor shopping experience or customer usage satisfaction. This means real customer value emphasis in all interactions and marketing, versus low price and price concessions. Inflexible processes.

Competition 109

Competition Services Custom Customer 109

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

Hire and train your own managers for internal and external work projects. Labor rates are lower in some countries, but culture and language match are the real keys to productivity. Fixed price bidding is the only effective outsourcing model.” Fair compensation is the lowest price we can negotiate.” Be flexible.

Outsource Development 138

Outsource Development Outsource Training Summary 138

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2014

Most technology startups seem to be funded by product people or business people. I had never had any sales training so everything we did for the first couple of years was instinctual. They like a solid product, well defined pricing, good references to sell against, a clear quota and well defined competitors.

Sales 382

Sales Help Startup Pricing 382

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 24, 2015

Santa Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand , the developer of cloud-based software for talent and employee management, said it has launched a brand new product called Cornerstone Insights. Cornerstone OnDemand said the new product uses machine learning and Cornerstone's data set, to help companies better recruit, train, and manage people.

Cornerstone OnDemand 100

Cornerstone OnDemand Artificial Inteligence Software Santa Monica 100

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 16, 2023

Most aspiring entrepreneurs understand that you can’t build a business if you won’t commit to delivering a product or service, but many are hesitant or refuse to commit to any financial forecasts. Yet every business requires revenue and volumes, as certainly as it requires a product to sell. Forecast sales-volume expectations.

Startup 116

Startup Pricing Sales Statistics 116

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 21, 2023

Too many founders have learned that passion and free beta products do not imply a sustainable business. Proof of any business model starts with a finished product or solution, sold to a new customer for full price, with high satisfaction for the value received. Marketing is everything these days. Plan for a real revenue model.

Customer 109

Customer Custom Satisfaction Sales 109

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2020

The critical success factors for a product business are well known, starting with selling every unit with a gross margin of 50 percent or more, building a patent and other intellectual property, and continuous product improvement. Low cost and low margin products can be winners, if the volume is high enough.

Startup 174

Startup Training Services Writing 174

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 10, 2021

In fact, our education and training to logically associate related concepts reduces our ability to add the creative side, even though we were all born without that bias. Many businesses have found that raising the price of a product to give it status can win more customers than a price war. Think the unthinkable.

Ideas 171

Ideas Patents Training Entrepreneur 171

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 8, 2021

Train them fully, give them authority, make them accountable, and tie their pay to customer satisfaction. Train and coach continuously. Companies with great service routinely spend 3% to 5% of salaries training team members – experienced as well as new. Know your customers intimately.

Startup 154

Startup Training Custom Customer 154

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 23, 2021

Here are my recommendations for training and managing your team to keep their delivery memorable for customers, as well as profitable for your business: Hire team members who enjoy customer interaction. Provide training, tools, and required decision authority. That approach still is meaningful today.

Customer 147

Customer Custom Technical Review Metrics 147

Xconomy

OCTOBER 6, 2016

is rolling out its first commercial product—a “brain-enabled” commercial floor scrubber that is part mini-Zamboni and part Roomba. But as a pragmatic industrial product, Brain Corp. two years ago as vice president of marketing and product development. John Black trains self-driving system of floor-scrubbing machine.

Product 106

Product Artificial Inteligence San Diego Training 106

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 17, 2022

Initially, all companies sell to customers who are the easiest to reach and most excited about the new product. Prices begin to decline quickly. The first customers are early adopters who are the least price-sensitive. Unfortunately, the mainstream customers who can really drive revenue care more about price.

Startup 106

Startup Pricing Cloud Computing Custom 106

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 2, 2022

You can’t succeed in business without an operational model that delivers value to customers at a reasonable price, with an underlying cost that allows you to make a profit. A target market is the group of customers that the startup plans to attract through marketing and sales their product or service. Production. Distribution.

Sales 102

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 102

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 10, 2023

Products and services for a business need to be attuned to customer requirements, cost and quality tradeoffs, with milestones for pricing and completion. Typically some production and delivery is outsourced, requiring formal contracts and documentation. Show that you have a process to hire, fire, and train others as required.

Outsource Development 115

Outsource Development Startup Ideas Competition 115

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 2, 2010

Some objections are real and they end up becoming changes to your product, your service plan or your pricing / bundling. As a founder, when you’ve been dealing with these kinds of objections for a couple of years it becomes natural and you easily handle objections on price, product & competition without much thought.

Sales 289

Sales Startup Training Pricing 289

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 12, 2013

Santa Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand , the developer of software-as-a-service for talent and human resources management, said today that it has launched a new product which connects directly into Salesforce.com. Pricing on the new software was not announced.

Cornerstone OnDemand 171

Cornerstone OnDemand Santa Monica Training Resource 171

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 28, 2022

Employees and customers alike are looking for meaning, not simply employment and commodity prices. Create an environment that unleashes these competencies and trains and pushes them to the fore. More and more customers choose a company based on their perceptions about the good that they do, as well as their price and service.

Organization 143

Organization Startup Pricing Customer 143

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 20, 2023

For example, consider Whole Foods , whose focus on healthy foods and a sustainable environment is legendary, even though their prices are often a bit higher. Quantify the results, and avoid any fuzzy words, such as better usability, advanced technology, or more productivity. Keep your product focus narrow and messages clear.

Marketing 116

Marketing Resource Training Startup 116

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 22, 2021

Too many founders have learned that passion and free beta products do not imply a sustainable business. Proof of any business model starts with a finished product or solution, sold to a new customer for full price, with high satisfaction for the value received. Marketing is everything these days. Plan for a real revenue model.

Sales 165

Sales Custom Customer Social Media 165

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 25, 2021

Will the marketplace accept your product? Is there a market for your class of product at all? If you are big enough to have a dedicated product manager, that person is a good candidate for this ongoing task, as is a marketing manager, who should be attuned to the changes in the environment. Second is product risk.

Competition 156

Competition Marketing Class Product 156

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2021

Most aspiring entrepreneurs understand that you can’t build a business if you won’t commit to delivering a product or service, but many are hesitant or refuse to commit to any financial forecasts. Yet every business requires revenue and volumes, as certainly as it requires a product to sell. Forecast sales-volume expectations.

Startup 147

Startup Pricing Sales Statistics 147

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 28, 2020

Start with only the very best people, demand excellence, and train them to stay ahead of the pack. Know the issues they face, and search for ways to help them, make them happier, more productive, and more profitable. Simultaneously deliver the best selection, service, and price. Craft mutually beneficial relationships.

Startup 122

Startup Training Custom Customer 122

socalTECH

AUGUST 23, 2010

Citrix GotoTraining is the firm's online training product. The firm said the new feature allows users to connect into the product using toll-free, toll, and voice-over-Internet connections. Among capabilities of the new feature are ability to record and playback audio sessions, and monthly or quarterly pricing and rates.

Santa Barbara 145

Santa Barbara SaaS Training Pricing 145

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 14, 2023

Ready to scale is when you have a proven product and a proven business model, about to expand to new geographies and markets. A software product is a classic example of a scalable solution, since it costs real money to build the first copy, but unlimited additional copies can be quickly cloned for almost no incremental cost.

Tips 135

Tips Invest Startup Outsource 135

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

Most technology startups seem to be funded by product people or business people. I had never had any sales training so everything we did for the first couple of years was instinctual. We focused together on improving our sales methodology, our training and our comp plans. Sales people often blame the product.

Sales 316

Sales Startup Pricing Custom 316

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 18, 2021

Others stage elaborate “training” sessions, to “assure” that everyone tells the same story. Explain that they may be called, and use the opportunity to check their satisfaction with your company and your product. Validation of product. If the product is in customer hands, expect some customers to be interviewed.

Technical Review 152

Technical Review Satisfaction Startup Summary 152

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 11, 2019

Hire and train your own managers for internal and external work projects. Labor rates are lower in some countries, but culture and language match are the real keys to productivity. Fixed price bidding is the only effective outsourcing model.” Fair compensation is the lowest price we can negotiate.” Be flexible.

Outsource Development 121

Outsource Development Outsource Entrepreneur Summary 121

InfoChachkie

MARCH 1, 2011

In essence, the Beatles offered a product with a higher value proposition as compared to their American counterparts. Minimally Viable Product Does Not Mean Minimal Utility. Much has been written regarding the benefits of crafting a minimally viable product (MVP) as a means of accelerating the product validation process.

Product 232

Product Marketing Sales Customer 232

Berkonomics

JANUARY 19, 2017

Depending upon the size of the companies and complexity of the products or services involved, it is fair to assume that you’ll need to dedicate a resource to this effort, sometimes a full time resource at that. Consider a sales relationship where your product will be in the bag of salespeople from the partner company.

Press 120

Press Sales Training Resource 120

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. Make sure you adopt the right hiring practices and training to keep your team responsive.

Customer 146

Customer Custom Startup Course 146

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 20, 2020

Initially, all companies sell to customers who are the easiest to reach and most excited about the new product. Prices begin to decline quickly. The first customers are early adopters who are the least price-sensitive. Unfortunately, the mainstream customers who can really drive revenue care more about price.

Pricing 123

Pricing Cloud Computing Custom Customer 123

socalTECH

APRIL 10, 2012

Orange-based media storage provider Apace Systems said this morning that it has shipped an appliance product which allows companies, schools, governments, and others to create their own private YouTube site. Pricing on the new product was not announced.

Training 133

Training Sites Media Pricing 133