Crowdfunding Law Will Turn the Start-Up World Upside Down - Tim Rowe - Voices Remember that special moment when we all realized that the Web was going to remake yard sales and auctions, but we didn’t know yet who was going to win? (And then eBay left the rest in the dust?) Such a moment has come again, and with a choice prize: Investing in start-ups. The House has already passed crowdfunding legislation, by a whopping majority. The president supports it. What would this mean? Everybody likes the innovation and jobs that this could propel. Here’s how this is going to play out: Intermediaries (the future eBays of this space) will spring forward to handle the paperwork, do background checks on issuers (required), ensure that offerings are well described and enforce balanced investment terms. This could be big. Up next? Tim Rowe is the founder and CEO of Cambridge Innovation Center, which houses approximately 450 start-up companies in a large office tower in Kendall Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
SME marketing channel preferences | B2B market research agency By Andrew Dalglish - SMEs. There are close to two million, they generate half of the UK’s GDP and employ 60 per cent of the private sector workforce. SMEs are a potentially significant opportunity for many B2B marketers then, but how best to open a conversation? This was puzzling me so I asked 450 buyers of B2B services within SMEs to imagine a prospective supplier wanted to engage with them. Their answers provide clear guidance on where best to target marketing resources. An overview The fourteen channels explored fall into four categories based on their effectiveness. Prioritise – channels with the highest impactDeploy selectively – channels without mass appeal but effective amongst manyThink carefully – channels disliked by the majority but appealing to a minorityHandle with care – channels that may alienate as many dislike And there are six specific learnings – outlined below – which will help ensure marcoms have the best chances of breaking through. Adopt a segmented approach
Stanford 2012 Lean LaunchPad Presentations – part 2 of 2 Today, the second half of the Stanford Engineering Lean LaunchPad Class gave their final presentations. Here are the final four (the first five are here.) Team ParkPoint CapitalThis team spoke face-to-face with 326 customers. As often happens, this team came into class convinced that their market research proved that their business was providing credit to underbanked customers. 8 weeks later they ended up as a financial service provider for immigrants. Lots of learning and pivots on the way. If you can’t see the slide presentation above, click here. The ParkPoint Capital customer discovery narrative blog is here. We thought the team summarized their lessons learned well: If you can’t see the image above, click here. Team DentalOpticsTeam DentalOptics spoke face-to-face with 72 customers. If you can’t see the slide presentation above, click here. The DentalOptics customer discovery narrative blog is here. Team MiCasaThey spoke to 105 customers and surveyed 98 more. Stanford e245 2012 class photo
The 9 Most Common Start-up Mistakes Making mistakes is a great way to learn. Making mistakes is also not particularly fun. It's a lot more fun to avoid them entirely. Here are some of the most common mistakes entrepreneurs—and businesspeople in general—tend to make: 1. Most successful people are solid planners and excellent adapters. 2. Just be you. 3. Great, but execution is everything. Check out everything on the business menu, but only select a few items at a time. 4. An estimate is theoretical. 5. 6. Apply sensitivities and create plans in case your estimates are wrong. 7. Sometimes it's not the business or the market. 8. Business is serious enough. 9. What matters most is what matters most to you.
Frighteningly Ambitious Startup Ideas March 2012 One of the more surprising things I've noticed while working on Y Combinator is how frightening the most ambitious startup ideas are. In this essay I'm going to demonstrate this phenomenon by describing some. Any one of them could make you a billionaire. That might sound like an attractive prospect, and yet when I describe these ideas you may notice you find yourself shrinking away from them. Don't worry, it's not a sign of weakness. There's a scene in Being John Malkovich where the nerdy hero encounters a very attractive, sophisticated woman. Here's the thing: If you ever got me, you wouldn't have a clue what to do with me. That's what these ideas say to us. This phenomenon is one of the most important things you can understand about startups. [1] You'd expect big startup ideas to be attractive, but actually they tend to repel you. 1. The best ideas are just on the right side of impossible. Microsoft : Google :: Google : Facebook. 2. Whatever you build, make it fast. 3. 4. 5.
5 Easy Ways to Kick-start Your Business Planning - Business Plan Strategy Don't know where to start with your plan? Here are some tips to get you going--today. Have you been putting off the business planning? You know who you are. Do a SWOT Analysis SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. The author is an Entrepreneur contributor. How to Make It as a First-Time Entrepreneur Vinicius Vacanti is co-founder and CEO of Yipit. Next posts on how to acquire users for free and how to raise a Series A. Don’t miss them by subscribing via email or via twitter. If you want your start-up to become the next big thing, it’s not good enough to just build a great product. The difference between getting one of your new users to convince one friend to sign up and that person getting two new friends, is huge. Below are 9 ways your start-up can grow virally: Get Your Users to Spread the Word Get users to tell others about your app simply by using it. Get users to push content they create on your app to Facebook, Twitter. Increasing Conversion Adjust your product to become more mainstream. Conclusion Building a great product is only half the battle.
What is Branding and How Important is it to Your Marketing Strategy? The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines a brand as a "name, term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify the goods and services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of other sellers. Therefore it makes sense to understand that branding is not about getting your target market to choose you over the competition, but it is about getting your prospects to see you as the only one that provides a solution to their problem. The objectives that a good brand will achieve include: Delivers the message clearlyConfirms your credibilityConnects your target prospects emotionallyMotivates the buyerConcretes User Loyalty To succeed in branding you must understand the needs and wants of your customers and prospects. Your brand resides within the hearts and minds of customers, clients, and prospects. A strong brand is invaluable as the battle for customers intensifies day by day.
How To Increase Your Productivity 500% Altucher Confidential Posted by James Altucher I missed investing in Google. I missed investing in Foursquare. I made fun of the guy who started Lycos. I missed, I lost, I suffered, I cried. I could’ve started other businesses instead of the ones I did. I want to be productive, healthy, and happy.When you spend even two minutes mentally debating the worst people in your life (as I did the first two minutes after I woke up today) those two minutes add up. People say, “well I played too many games. Better to not have 80% of my thoughts (or more on some days!) Nine types of thoughts that will prevent you from succeeding at your business or in your job. 1) Pessimistic thoughts: For instance, judging myself too harshly. Or, before I give a talk, thinking that I’m going to do horribly despite the fact that I’ve prepared well and it’s a friendly crowd, etc. 2) Vice – My vice thoughts start when I wake up. Perfectionism is a form of bondage. 5) Painful – We just had the Thanksgiving holidays. 6) Fear. 7) Obsessive.
Branding in the Digital Age - What Does That Mean? If this title makes you feel like you’ve just won a game of Jargon Bingo, you are not alone. Us Web types are quick to latch on to names for things – Web 2.0 (and 3.0), LAS, “The Online Conversation” – and it’s easy to talk about a concept without really thinking about what it means. Most people, by now, understand that a brand is a sum of perceptions; what do you, your staff, your business partners and your customers think about you and what collective meaning is then ascribed. So, when you apply this to the digital or information age, what exactly are we talking about? Matt Riley, Idea Bounty guy and Senior brand planner at Quirk. I sought out the perspectives of people smarter than me – Mr. Matt’s view is that ‘the digital age’ just refers to the presence of digital tools that have made it easier for people to engage with your message. “Branding is about creating a persona and positioning it in a way that allows people to engage with it and fulfill a goal that you have.” Also Check Out:
Class 2 Notes Essay Peter Thiel’s CS183: Startup - Class 2 Notes Essay Here is an essay version of my class notes from Class 2 of CS183: Startup. Errors and omissions are my own. Credit for good stuff is Peter’s entirely. CS183: Startup—Notes Essay—Party Like It’s 1999? I. History is driven by each generation’s experience. Take someone born in the late 1960s, for instance. There is a keen analogue between the cultural intensity of the ‘60s and the technological intensity of the 1990s. History is a strange thing in that it often turns out to be quite different than what people who lived through it thought it was. II. Most of the 1990s was not the dot com bubble. The 1990s could be said to have started in November of ’89. So from 1992 through the end of 1994, it still felt like the U.S. was mired in recession. To be sure, technological development was going on in Silicon Valley. The Internet would change all that. So Netscape comes along in ’93 and things start to take off. III. A. B. So that’s what they did.
How to Define Your Brand This is the first step in the process of developing your brand strategy. By defining who your brand is you create the foundation for all other components to build on. Your brand definition will serve as your measuring stick in evaluating any and all marketing materials and strategies. You will begin this process by answering the questions below. Difficulty: Average Time Required: 2 hours Here's How: What products and/or services do you offer? Tips: Post Questions, Comments, and Answers to these Question in the Marketing Forum.Focus on your target audience when answering each question. What You Need Brand Journal or NotebookPen or PencilUninterrupted Time