startup tips Archives - Page 6 of 26

5 Easy Steps to Define Your Sales Funnel

salesfunnel

Most business owners want to grow as quickly as possible. While there is no one-size-fits-all acceleration model, having a clearly defined sales funnel early can help. In fact, behind every decision our company makes today is the original white-boarded funnel from our early days.

The purchase funnel is essentially what the industry commonly refers to as a ‘customer journey’ – which starts with the moment when a customer first makes contact with your brand. It includes each subsequent step and eventually leads to an end goal, purchase and monetization. In general, this journey is composed of a process around awareness, education, trial, adoption, and sharing. Putting the customer first provides the focus and prioritization needed to move every company to the next level.

Here are five tips for defining your customer funnel for success:

Determine your industry funnel. The top of the funnel is where a customer first enters into your experience. I run a web company, Porch, so most people enter from other places online. The first step in determining your industry funnel is to look across the board and outline what valuable user actions (VUA) your competitors care about. For example, on Twitter, these actions might be creating an account, uploading a profile picture, tweeting, re-tweeting, creating a group – or other measurable representations of end-user engagement. This exercise will give you a general benchmark for what the industry competition is doing, so you can start prioritizing your business growth strategy.
Choose where to focus marketing efforts. You can wrap your business and marketing around a number of places in the funnel. The most common are the top and the bottom of the funnel, but they have different problems. For example, the top of our industry funnel is all about inspiration – beautiful pictures that attract and retain customers on the website. Inspiration has a lower customer acquisition cost and better engagement. But it’s also difficult to monetize. If you start marketing at the bottom of the funnel, you monetize more easily, but it is often a challenge to acquire customers inexpensively. Assess the tradeoffs and pick a starting point to focus your business on.
Minimize your risk. When you are building a business, you are bringing financial and Excel models to life. Focus on proving out the risks in your model first. This starting point will help clarify your thinking about where the challenges lie. For example, if you start at the bottom, focus on how you acquire consumers in a cost-effective way to create an arbitrage opportunity (where you can repeatedly acquire customers for less than the revenue you produce).
Limit upward movements. Move customers down the funnel and limit moving them back up. For example, if a consumer is almost through your funnel and about to transact, limit the noise around them on the page (advertisements, pop-ups) so they finish. You will have time to cross-link them later. Retaining a paid user is much more valuable than entertaining a free user. This philosophy needs to be intentionally built into your product. Focus on user experience and prioritize building feature sets that guide customers down the funnel at a raw level. Everything else is a nice-to-have.
Build defensible differentiators. After you pick your marketing poison and define your priorities, put the pedal to the metal. Build out features or strategies to ensure your key funnel positions are completely defensible through intellectual property. Figure out what you want to be the best at and optimize and test different consumer acquisition tactics that meet your business goals. This is where the fun starts!

In the long term, you should turn your funnel into a sphere – create circular revenue streams with emphasis on retention and viral coefficients. But that is only after you have nailed your funnel fundamentals.

Matt Ehrlichman is the CEO of Porch, where you can get inspired by the best home projects your neighbors have completed, see what any home project will cost, and find the best service professional your neighbors and friends recommend. Previous to Porch, Matt was a founder and CEO of Thriva (acquired by Active Network) and Chief Strategy Officer of Active Network (2011 IPO). Matt lives in Seattle, WA.

The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only organization comprised of the world’s most promising young entrepreneurs. In partnership with Citi, YEC recently launched StartupCollective, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses.

14 Pitch Pointers for New Entrepreneurs

Question: What’s your best piece of advice for a very young entrepreneur with little to no experience about to pitch their idea for the first time?

Pitch the Problem

“The worst thing you can do is pitch a solution for something no one cares about. Instead, home in on the problem you plan to solve, and who you are solving it for. ”

Wade Foster, Zapier

Research

“Thoroughly research the organization that you’re pitching to ensure your idea is in line with the company’s needs. Throughout this research, it’s also important to make sure you’re pitching the idea to someone who can actually do something with it.”

Andrew Schrage, Money Crashers Personal Finance

Get Ready to Be Told You’re Crazy

“The best possible response you can hope for when first pitching your idea is that people think you are crazy, that the idea won’t work and that you shouldn’t pursue it any further. That’s how all good ideas start. While there are plenty of horrible ideas that you actually SHOULD heed that advice for, the best ones tend to start that way.”

Todd Garland, BuySellAds

Believe

“If you don’t wholeheartedly believe in yourself and your idea, why would anyone else be expected to? Do your research and understand your market with confidence. Don’t let these sharks sense a taste of fear or uncertainty, otherwise they will chew you alive.”

Shahzil (Shaz) Amin, Blue Track Media

Pitch With Passion

“The absolute best piece of advice I could offer a young entrepreneur before a big pitch is to let his or her passion shine through. The excitement, drive, and motivation that drives young entrepreneurs is impossible to fake or replicate. Passion is contagious. No amount of money can buy passion. It trumps experience, and smart partners or investors will sense that excitement to succeed.”

Brittany Hodak, ZinePak

Earn Your Second Meeting With a Story

“One of the best business books I have read is “Made to Stick” by Dan and Chip Heath. They focus on the value of telling great stories — and teach readers how. Your goal in a first pitch is not to get money — it’s to earn a second meeting. The best way to gain interest is to leave your listeners with a compelling story that resonates with them long after you have left. ”

Aaron, Schwartz, Modify Watches

Go for It!

“Show your passion, detail it out as best you can — and then, listen to advice from experienced entrepreneurs. Often, eager young entrepreneurs pitch their ideas and think they’re the best things ever, so they don’t listen to any constructive criticism — and learn the hard way. That’s fine, but it’s better to listen and learn from other entrepreneurs who have already been there and done that. ”

Joe Barton, Barton Publishing

Be Receptive to Feedback

“In addition to the general nerves that accompany an idea pitch, the most frightening thought is the chance that your audience won’t like your idea. It can be tough to listen to criticism about your brainchild, but it is imperative that you filter the feedback in the most constructive way possible. If you do, the negative feedback will undoubtedly help you the most to build a stronger business.”

Charles Bogoian, Kenai Sports, LLC

Sell First, Then Pitch

“Even if you do not yet have a working product, try selling it to your target customer in person if possible. (Phone works too if you can’t in person). Sound crazy? Your potential prospect is going to give you very direct feedback on your pitch. Do they want to buy it? Why or why not? I believe the key to pitching an investor is understanding and clearly communicating your value proposition first.”

Sarah Schupp, UniversityParent

Ditch Those Slides

“TechStars taught me to start with the story. If you start with the Powerpoint, you’ll waste hours formatting slides (that you’ll likely delete later) and will box yourself into a half-baked story. Write your main value propositions on 10 notecards. Answer the standard questions about market size, revenues, and projections on another 10. Rearrange and combine the points to find your story. Voila!”

Heidi Allstop, Spill

Be Different

“Ultimately, most people won’t pay a bit of attention to the idea you are pitching. However, what they will pay very close attention to is you. The way to grab their attention and stand out from the crowd is simply to be different. Pitch in a way they’ve never seen before, even if the content is the same, and they will surely remember you.”

James Simpson, GoldFire Studios

Read Successful Blogs

“Read blogs from successful entrepreneurs who have written about raising money and pitching their ideas. I have written about raising our $2.7 million. I would not suggest reading business professors’ blogs. Instead, read about people in your business and in your space — people who go to pitches. Find someone who is recent and understands the experience and its challenges.” (Editor’s Note: Try these entrepreneur blogs.)

Jordan Fliegel, CoachUp

Relax

“Many young entrepreneurs feel very tense and second-guess themselves during pitches. You’ll be okay, even if you don’t land this investment. Relax and be confident; you will do so much better.”

Yosef Martin, Merchandize Liquidators LLC

Have the Answers

“Sit down with your team (or a friend), find any potential weak spots in your idea and figure out how to solve them. Investors always ask the “unexpected” question, so do your best to anticipate them in advance. The best feeling is walking away from your first pitch knowing that you had a good answer for everything they asked — and, as a bonus, it leaves a good impression.”

Benish Shah, Before the Label

How You Can Put a Dent in the Universe

From Bijan Sabet

We often hear about new products that promise to beat the current market leader by being the “blah blah blah on steroids” NibzNotes20

I’m not a big fan of this strategy

That doesn’t mean that the market leader isn’t vulnerable but it’s a question of the approach.

Apple didn’t put a hurt on Microsoft desktop business by a better version of macos. They put the hurt by nailing a new category altogether with the iPad.

By contrast Microsoft has adopted the “on steroid” strategy in many of their products.

The Surface tablet is an attempt to be an “iPad on steroids”. It has a keyboard, it shipped with a pro and consumer model. It can do split screen. The list goes on.

You know how well the Surface did.

37 Tips for Motivating Your Startup’s Employees

A good job is hard to find, but every entrepreneur knows a good employee is even harder to keep. As an entrepreneur, one must ensure his or her company is staffed with people who look forward to coming to work every day for more than a paycheck.

Through the years, I found that it was easy to keep employees motivated – all I had to do was provide them with a leader worth following and tasks worth fulfilling. But after almost seven years in business, I still find myself searching for new ways to maintain productivity while providing each individual with the drive they need to perform to the best of their ability.

Here’s how I do it:

Support new ideas. When employees come to you with an idea or a solution to a problem they believe is for the betterment of the company, it’s a sign that they care. Supporting new ideas and giving an individual the chance to ‘run with it’ is motivating, whether or not it works out in the end.
Empower each individual. Every single individual contributes to the bottom line. Empowering them to excel in their role, no matter how large or small, creates a sense of ownership that will lead to meeting and exceeding expectations.
Don’t let them become bored. I get bored easily, so I assume my employees also have a short attention span. Host a cupcake bake-off, plan a happy hour, start a push-up contest in the middle of the office on a Wednesday, or allow a different person to run the weekly meetings to break up the monotony.
Celebrate personal milestones. About seven years ago, as a company of fewer than 10 people, we celebrated each employee’s birthday, work anniversary, engagement, and even personal milestones. Today, as a company of over 100, we still celebrate these milestones. It never gets old.
Acknowledge professional achievement. Everyone wants to be recognized. The acknowledgement of a job well done coming from upper management or the owner of the company will mean more to an employee than you think.
Listen. This is probably the easiest thing you can do for an employee; yet, it can also be the most difficult. Carving out some time each day to listen to anything from concerns to ideas will not only make your employees happy, it will also provide you with much-needed insight on your business from the people who help keep it running.
Encourage friendly competition. A competitive environment is a productive environment. Encouraging employees to participate in competitions or challenges is healthy and may actually lead to increased camaraderie.
Allow pets at work. My two dogs come to the office every day, and all of my employees are welcome to bring their pets to work. Pets make people happy and bring a sense of companionship to the office.
Reward accomplishments. When a pat on the back or a high five just won’t do, monetary incentives always seem to hit the spot.
Create attainable goals. Setting goals are important, but ensuring they aren’t set too loftily by the employer or employee will help determine whether or not the goal is achieved come year-end evaluations.
Be clear with expectations. Don’t leave too much to be determined. Set clear expectations so you can plan for specific results.
Encourage individuality. Everyone is different. Encouraging individual personalities to shine through will not only help create a diverse and dynamic culture, it will also foster an open and accepting work environment. We have a lot of characters here at JBC – the more the merrier.
Be a leader worth following. This point falls in my lap alone. If my employees don’t perceive me as a worthy leader, how can I expect them to believe in our mission and help to achieve it?
Set an example. Or two or three. I can’t expect my employees to do anything that I wouldn’t do. I always ask myself if the expectations that I set for my employees are comparable to the expectations that I would set for myself.
Make things interesting. Shaking things up every now and then is a good way to break up the day-to-day routine of the work schedule.
Encourage learning new skills. Times are changing. Ensuring that every willing employee has the opportunity to learn a new skill or brush up on an old skill will benefit everyone involved.
Foster creativity. A creative environment is a thriving one. Encourage creativity and watch your business flourish as thinking outside of the box becomes the norm.
Give credit where credit is due. Although employees come to work to complete their appointed tasks, it’s still an accomplishment if they do it well. Recognize their hard work by shouting them out to the entire company.
Create a career path. Having an idea of what lies ahead is the ultimate motivation. Employees who have a path set before them that may lead to promotion can work towards a goal. This will lead to increased commitment to their current employer.
Start a tradition. Our annual Thanksgiving potluck is so greatly anticipated that some employees hold off on vacation to participate and attend the event with their work family. Every holiday season, we host a toy drive for a school in the Bronx. Employees from across the U.S. fly in to partake. Start a tradition and keep it going.
Get personal. This one is tricky because there is a fine line that cannot be crossed. However, showing concern and interest in the lives of each employee goes a long way.
Keep an open mind. I’m always open to new ideas and new methods. Anything new is worth exploration and consideration.
Encourage laughter. Laughter is contagious, so help spread the joy.
Embrace change. Fighting change is harder than embracing change. I have practiced this more recently in regards to social media and living in the digital age. I also encourage my employees to do the same.
Stir the pot. It’s not easy to keep things interesting every single day. Every now and then, stirring the pot can help to liven things up. We recently switched from every-other summer Fridays to weekly summer Fridays after a company-wide challenge set earlier in the year. Employees were so elated at the opportunity to start their summer weekends a day early that productivity has risen ever since.
Recognize strengths. Bringing out the best in people is a talent every entrepreneur should strive to master.
Be available. It’s easy to get sucked into a CEO schedule, but it’s just as easy to take a few minutes out of each day to talk to an employee who may not be on your calendar.
Manage everyone individually. Everyone is different, but some are so different that they may require a personalized management style. Knowing your employees on an individual basis is the only way to know how to manage them effectively.
Encourage ownership. The success of a business lies in ownership. When employees feel invested in a company, productivity increases.
Promote unity. As much as each employee needs to be able to stand on his own two feet, he must also be able to work in a team. Promoting unity will help achieve individual and team goals.
Have patience. Entrepreneurs tend only to be interested in results. Patience will prevent you from expecting too much too soon and will allow employees to complete tasks properly.
Be flexible. Things don’t always happen as planned; when employees see that you are open to going with the flow every once in a while, tensions ease up and productivity remains constant.
Offer incentives. Knowing ahead of time that there’s a $500 prize on the line or extra vacation days to be given away will make achieving goals that much more worthwhile.
Provide balance. A lively work environment promises a good time, but balance is just as important to maintain levels of productivity — and the sanity of coworkers.
Welcome new methods. The digital age is changing life as we know it. Embracing, rather than avoiding, new methods will ensure your business and employees stay ahead of the competition.
Cultivate a positive work environment. There is no place for negativity if success is to be achieved. A positive work environment is the result of positive leaders.
Give them a reason to come to work – every day. Showing up to work five days a week, ready to exceed expectations, requires a level of loyalty that can only be achieved if morale is high.

An employee who enjoys coming to work is a worthy investment.

Bryan J. Zaslow is a 38 year-old philanthropist, athlete, lawyer and serial entrepreneur residing in New York City. Bryan is the founder of a family of companies within JBCHoldings NY LLC inclusive of JBCStyle, JBCPlatform, JBCconnect, Project Soulmate, and recently acquired Janou Pakter.

Don’t Want to Fail? Get Naked

In my experience in studying and advising early-stage startups, it has become obvious that startups primarily fail because of inadvertent mistakes made by the founder(s). External forces are seldom the reason for the death of the startup. The success of the startup therefore primarily depends on the success of the founder.

How can you, as the founder, prevent slowly killing your startup? Get naked! Figuratively, of course…

Strip Assumptions

Do not assume anything. Anything you accept as truth must be backed by proof. Analytics should back all major decisions.

Strip Biases

Do not be biased. Biases are built into our psyche, so they are especially difficult to strip. Have an inner circle of friends, peers, advisors and mentors who can help you identify and remove biases.

Strip Failures

Forget your failures. Learning from failure is overrated. It is often better not to analyze major failures, move on, and let the lessons incubate naturally.

Stripping assumptions, biases and failures may seem obvious, but it is counter to most founders’ nature. Founders are superheroes; they are out to save the world. How can you be a superhero without the costume? The founder must consciously strip layers off of the costume. Otherwise, the startup will suffer a slow death.

But do not fret, you do not always have to be naked. After some experience, both success and failure, you can start putting layers of your costume back on (a developed assumption that is based on experience may prove true in most cases). With time, you will become the superhero you were always meant to be.

A version of this post originally appeared on Medium.

Naveed Lalani is a product and business strategist advising early to mid-stage startups. Previously, Naveed was Chief Strategy Officer at DonorNation.org, and Co-Founder at Rally.org. Naveed gives back by advising the Thiel Fellowship and leading entrepreneurship initiatives at the Ismaili Professionals Network.

13 Jobs Aspiring Entrepreneurs Should Consider

Question: What’s one suggestion you’d give an aspiring entrepreneur in terms of prior work experience? Should they freelance? Work at a startup first? Go corporate? All of the above?

Work at a Startup First

“I think it is most beneficial to work at a startup first. You will get to see the ins and outs of how a new business operates from all levels. You can gain valuable insight as to what works and what doesn’t work. This would closely mimic starting your own company. “

JEFF TESTERMAN BROKERHUNTER.com

Commit to What You Want to Do

“Many people will tell you that if you have never done something before, you will never be able to do it. They are giving you this advice because they don’t know a way it can be done. Entrepreneurs are the ones who find a way or make the way. Sure, freelancing or working at a startup or corporation is great, but you should get clear on what you want, and go after it like your life depends on it. “

LOUIS LAUTMAN Supreme Outsourcing Follow @louislautman

Get Work Experience

“One of the biggest things that would have helped me with my business is having prior work experience with an established company. I would have examined their day-to-day and multiple departments to see what different parts are needed for a successful business. I learned later that a successful business requires more than revenues coming in or out — it requires a stable foundation.”

SHAHZIL (SHAZ) AMIN Blue Track Media

Freelance

“If you’re thinking about starting your own company, freelancing is the first step! First of all, a one-person business IS a business — many freelancers fail because they aren’t thinking entrepreneurially. I maxed out my solo freelance business before I moved on to building my team. It taught me the basics of business: making clients happy and managing cash flow. “

LAURA ROEDER LKR Social Media Follow @lkr

Build Your Tool Kit, No Matter Where You Go

“Entrepreneurs need to be proficient with customer service, product development, strategy, finance, team-building and, well, everything. Thus, any work experience is incredibly valuable. As a management consultant, I learned how to communicate clearly, work on a team and work hard. Every role in every industry will teach you — just pay attention to the success stories and develop your skills.”

AARON SCHWARTZ Modify Watches Follow @ModifyWatches

Take the Plunge

“Dive in. Being an entrepreneur means constantly meeting new and unexpected challenges head-on. You’re the master of your own destiny and must learn to overcome all obstacles. Take the plunge, and you’ll hopefully rise to the top. “

NICOLAS GREMION Free-eBooks.net

Just Don’t Lose Your Spirit

“Prior work experience can be helpful. Working at a startup can be great experience, but be careful signing contracts, as a non-compete may limit your options after working there. Freelancing can bind you to similar restraints, but you’ll gain good experience. Going corporate can also be beneficial to learn how the best of the best companies run things. Just don’t lose your entrepreneurial spirit!”

JOE BARTON Barton Publishing

Start Corporate

“There is a lot of value in spending some time at a big corporation. You will be trained by industry experts and get a glimpse of what makes a big corporation successful. I spent some time at an investment bank prior to founding my company, and I consider the experience invaluable.”

JOSH WEISS Bluegala

Learn an Industry

“It is really important to have experience in the workplace first, but not a lot of work. Go to grad school, gain some experience and learn some skills in the industry. When raising money, it is not enough to have a great idea. Most people will want someone with experience who can control the business. The CEO needs to be hireable for the business. Experience is important. “

JORDAN FLIEGEL CoachUp

Learn From Others’ Mistakes and Experiences

“Work with a successful entrepreneur first so you learn from his or her experience. Once you are confident that you have learned all that you can, then it’s time to leave and start off on your own or jump to another startup. “

JOHN HALL Influence & Co.

Shut Up and Start Up

“There’s no role or course that can teach you enough of what you need to know when you’re starting up on your own. What you will learn from starting up will be far more than any entrepreneurship books and startup jobs put together. If you want to start your own company, just do it. Do not wait for the tide to come and sweep you away when you’re standing miles away from the shore.”

RAHUL VARSHNEYA Arkenea LLC

Know the Industry

“Working in a corporation gives you good connections, but it also limits your understanding to a world where funds are not an issue, and problem solving a business issue without a large budget is often unnecessary. The key is working in the industry you want to be in — that’s where startups are often born. Your experiences show you what that industry needs, and you can create it for them. “

BENISH SHAH Before the Label

Get on a Founding Team

“For the best bang for your buck, I wouldn’t just work at a startup, but work on a founding team. Being the first to fifth hire will enable you to learn basically what it takes to run a company, from top to bottom. Those first hires have to wear many hats, and you can learn how to be an entrepreneur on other people’s time and money.”

LIAM MARTIN Staff.com

How Casual is Too Casual for Entrepreneurs?

I love dressing informally, maybe too much. My wife frequently reprimands me for dressing down. I recently met with a US Senator in slacks and a collar shirt (which I thought was being respectfully dressy!) and he wryly cracked that I looked awfully comfortable. I sometime teach my HBS class in jeans (please don’t tell the dean).

But lately, I have been wondering if entrepreneurs have taken informality too far. I don’t mean dress code. I don’t care how they dress. I mean their thinking and approach.

You probably see it all the time – hipster entrepreneurs with the cool affect walking into meetings carrying nothing but their smart phone. When asked to present their story, they ramble informally without a cogent direction. When a substantive discussion ensues, and good ideas and follow-up items are generated, they take no notes. And when the meeting wraps up, there are no action items that are reviewed, no closure regarding next steps.

– See more at: http://bostonvcblog.typepad.com/vc/2014/02/have-entrepreneurs-become-too-informal.html#sthash.Lilw7HsU.dpuf

Entrepreneurship Lessons from the Front Lines

2013 was one of the hardest years of my life. It wasn’t the hardest but it was challenging. The hardest, was 1 year as a kid when my dad got Parkinson’s, my mom got sick, NibzNotes17 my mom’s best friend died, and the grandparent who helped raise me withered away like ash with cancer right in front of my eyes.

That’s a different kind of hard. This year was not hard in that way. I’ve been humbled more times than years I’ll live and I’ve been fortunate just as many times. This image of Forrest Gump seems to incapsulate my life countless times this year.

I meet someone I don’t know. They’re telling me nice things and I’m confused about what I’m doing there and I just have to pee. I realize I drank too much water and then look over and realize that’s a Clinton at the other table and everyone seems to have a story that starts with MIT, Harvard, or Stanford. This is life in 2013. It was a weird one.

How One Phrase Can Change Your Business Completely

handshake22

My first job out of college was an inside sales associate position, in which I was tasked with cold-calling busy professionals all day and kindly explaining to them why they

NibzNotes16

should spend their company’s money on a service they truly didn’t need.

To say I was unqualified was a gross understatement (and should have been evident in my interview, when I casually mentioned I enjoyed ordering food online because I’m scared of the phone).

For those who don’t know, sales is a sink or swim position. You either hit your quota and keep your job, or you don’t. For me, not even the Coast Guard could have kept me afloat in my first couple months on the job. I sucked. While the cohort I was hired with excelled, I floundered. I couldn’t keep someone on the phone for more than 15 seconds.

Knowing the end was near, I asked (well, begged) our top performing sales guy for help. I probably looked pathetic enough that he said okay. And it was then that he explained to me a secret to business that totally changed my career (not to mention saved my job).

Do You Have This ONE Thing Every Startup Needs?

From First Round Review

Justin Rosenstein wasn’t sure what had happened. One of his company’s highest performing engineers seemed to have lost his enthusiasm for the work. “He had gone from super dedicated to detached,” says the co-founder of Asana, an app that powers teamwork without email. “Something wasn’t right. He seemed to be in an existential funk.”

So he took him for a walk and asked one simple question: “What’s wrong?” NibzNotes12

At first, the engineer couldn’t pinpoint the source of his malaise. Then he said, “I’m not sure what I’m doing here. I wonder, should I even be writing software?” Rosenstein was struck. Sure, the company had grown, but what had changed?

Instead of reciting a normal pep talk, he started asking questions. “When you go back to your desk, what’s the next line of code you’ll write?” he asked. The engineer explained he was repairing a chunk of old code. “Why?” Rosenstein asked. And with every answer he asked again, “Why?” Finally the engineer said, “It will make the site faster, which will let people communicate with their teammates more quickly.”

This was the breakthrough. “So it will allow more people to accomplish their goals?” Rosenstein asked. “I looked at him, and he looked at me, and it was just like, okay, he was ready to get back to work.”

He had stumbled upon that one, critical missing ingredient — an ingredient that Rosenstein and Asana’s leadership have accepted as key to their success: Clarity.

The Secret to Changing the Future

From Chris Devore

Last week I spoke on a panel at a World Financial Symposium event in Seattle. I arrived a little early and was rewarded with a great talk by Brian David Johnson, a

NibzNotes13

“futurist” at Intel.

Johnson had interesting things to say about both the process of “futurecasting” and a few of his specific predictions, but the idea that stuck with me was his closer (I took a photo of the slide to make sure I got it right):

Q: How do we change the future?

A: Change the story people tell themselves about the future they will live in.

This deceptively simple statement captures a fundamental truth about leadership — whether as a parent, as a manager, or as a community advocate:

Consistent, positive actions spring from a coherent sense of identity — a self-reinforcing set of internal narratives about how people like this behave in circumstances like that.

How Long Does It Take–Really–To Know if You MIGHT Succeed?

5 Ways Tech Entrepreneurship is Impacting Politics

From Tawheed Kader

It takes 3 years. NibzNotes14

The end of 2013 marks roughly the three-year mark for my company. As I reflect on where we are today, from initial product, to an advisory round, to seed funding and then to raising our Series A in December 2013, one thing that I’ve always perceived from came true: it takes roughly 3 years for you to truly figure out if what you’re working on can be a business.

Once you hit that 3-year mark, and you’ve figured out a way to stay alive, some magical things do happen. Now, just to be clear, after the first 3, it’ll take you 2 to 7 more years after that to make it a wildly successful business; that is if you want to come along for the ride. But at least you feel just a tad bit like this guy.

3 Ways to “Hack” Your Product-Based Startup

How do you hack offline as rapidly and as effectively as you hack online?

Web startups can iterate a product and get it back on the market in a matter of seconds. But as product companies, we’re faced with manufacturing lead times that create a much longer development cycle. Luckily, Ministry of Supply’s co-founders also went to MIT, where we learned the importance of hacking — i.e., moving fast, iterating quickly and using customer insights to educate design.

To that end, I want to share some creative ways that MoS brought some of the best online practices offline, and applied them to our product company:

A/B testing isn’t only for web companies.

When A/B testing, companies randomly test two variants and determine which one better achieves the company’s goals (e.g., click-through rate or conversion). Web startups are notorious for doing this often and well — and then optimizing based on the results.

When we started Ministry of Supply, we wondered if we could take this same principle and apply it to the offline world. Here’s how we did it: When we created our first batch of shirts, we used a different proprietary fabric for our white, blue and black Apollo shirts. This way, we could test three variants at the same time, gather customer feedback, and understand which fabric we should move forward with.

Any product business can design a simple, offline A/B test to determine what customers really want (or want more of) and make better business decisions as a result.

Small batches and world-class partners allow for rapid iteration.

When we first started out, we were forced to manufacturer in small batches, because we had cash constraints and uncertain demand. In short order, we learned what an advantage this supposed constraint actually was. Namely, it enabled us to iterate extremely quickly, and get a new product on the market in about three weeks.

As we’ve grown, we’ve made a decision to continue to work with partners who allow us to do smaller batches so that this mindset can become a part of our manufacturing DNA. So far, it’s paid off handsomely. When we shipped 8,000 shirts as part of our Kickstarter campaign, we started to get feedback that customers thought they were running too small. So we adjusted the pattern, trained our manufacturers, and had new shirts on the market — in just three short weeks; a timeframe completely unheard of in most product companies.

When customer relationships come offline, real relationships can develop.

Most web companies are obsessive about understanding their customers’ online behavior (what they’ve bought before, other websites they’ve visited, etc.). At MoS, we’re obsessive about understanding customers’ offline behavior. This includes who they are, what makes them tick, what they love and what they hate.

By getting to know our customers’ values and personalities (not just their online behavior) we’re able to form deep and meaningful relationships with them. We communicate with our customers in every way that we would communicate with friends: we’ve gone running with our customers, we Snapchat with them, we go out drinking with them, and we invite them into our office and homes. In short, we get to know who they are, not just what they do.

And, because our customers are some of the most badass people in the country, these relationships are, simply, what makes us tick.

Kit Hickey is the co-founder of Ministry of Supply, a brand which is inventing the future of men’s professional wear. The company has been featured in NYT, TechCrunch, Inc., Forbes and Elle Magazine. In addition, Kit is a lover of mountain sports and has half an MBA from MIT. Follow her: @kit_hickey

How One Little Change Will Solve Your Startup’s Tech Problems

I remember the day very clearly. It was a cold winter day in late ’12; my co-founder and I were having coffee with John Wark, proprietor of the Nashville Software School. John was graciously listening to our plea (begging actually) for my-founder Zach to attend the upcoming 6 month software development training program. The upcoming cohort was already full, actually over booked to be more accurate, and there simply were no available slots.

At that time, our startup GreenPal was building the first version of our product with a local development shop. None of us knew how to code, but we didn’t let that get in the way of attempting to bring our idea to life. Very quickly in the journey of attempting to develop a “shop built” product, we realized that we were naive to think we could build a technology company while relying heavily on outsourced tech talent.

Ultimately, there was a huge gap between what they ended up building and our product vision. Begrudgingly, we launched the shop-built product, which had taken 13 months to build, had come in over budget, and quickly became an embarrassment to show to friends and family. The thing was barely useable. Talking with early adopters of our product, we heard the same major problems over and over again. Although we had a visually pretty product, it was difficult to use, confusing, and bounced users like a basketball.

Our collective backs were against the wall. We had to build an entirely new product, from scratch. No one on our team had ever written a line of code, and the cold, hard reality set in that if we were to pursue our vision, we would have develop ourselves to become a dynamic self-reliant team. Shortly thereafter, Zach stepped up to make the pilgrimage to learn software development. This brings us to where this story began—at Starbucks asking John Wark to create a seat in the training program for Zach.

John was kind enough to hear us out, listen to our story, our vision, and the tight spot we were in. After a two hour discussion, he agreed to grant us the slot if another student dropped out. Luckily, three days later, one did, and Zach was in. Six months later and after going through Hell and back—as well as countless headaches I’m sure—Zach graduated from software school with a junior level understanding of front end and back end development languages. He pushed himself firmly outside of his comfort zone, and the reward was the acquiring of skillsets we desperately needed. His impressive and expedient grasp of the programing languages inspired our fellow co-founder, Ross, to begin learning Java Script for front end development, all self-taught with online courses and trial and error, as we soon realized that we would need specialists in both front end and back end languages.

Up until that point we had been delusional to think that we had a shot at building a successful company with solely outsourced tech talent. For the first time, now our team is actually in the startup game.

Without the in-house skills to quickly make iterations and execute on our product roadmap, our startup had been dead before it ever got started. The ability to move rapidly with agility all while controlling costs are all that matters in a startup. Our newest investment in training ourselves will prove to be invaluable.

So, if your startup needs a tech co-founder, consider becoming one. Does your team want success badly enough to consider life changing decisions like dedicating the hours needed to learn programming? I am lucky my co-founders did; we are now well on our way building version two of our product all in house.

It feels good to have a self-sufficient dynamic team, as we can chart our destiny with our own skill sets.

Bryan Clayton is a serial entrepreneur and cofounder of GreenPal. Follow him on Twitter @bryanmclayton