This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 30, 2015

'Are we in a bubble? And if so, when will it burst? Everyone likes to debate it, and statistically, almost no one gets it right. Not only is it notoriously difficult to time the market, but even if you did, you''d miss out on individual winners. Sam Altman of YC recently pointed out that pulling back during the downturn in 2008 would result in several big misses: In October of 2008, Sequoia Capital—arguably the best-ever in the business—gave the famous “RIP Good Times” presentation (I was there)

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Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 23, 2015

'Last week Fred Wilson and I sat down in Santa Monica for an hour+ discussion with the video cameras rolling. One of the questions we discussed is, “How much capital should a startup raise?” Fred & I are both in agreement that there is a tension between capital constraints and creativity. In his words, [in some instances] “because lots of capital is available, the company takes on the capital and that ends up resulting in no constraints on decision making and so the company

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Onevest

MARCH 31, 2015

By Michael Whitehouse. Photo credit: huffpost.com. As we tell our founders at 1000 Angels , the private investor network that connects startups with investors, time management is an important component of any business, but when it comes to launching a startup it is even more critical. Excitement and passion alone won't fuel your project – you need structure to determine how and when to achieve a goal.

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startup founder founder startup innovation 189

Berkonomics

MARCH 19, 2015

'Here’s one for executives of technology companies, or any company with next generation products in mind. As your business grows more complex and there are more employees to manage and more customers to care for, slowly you will notice that more and more time of your chief innovation officer or system architect or R&D department is spent focused upon enhancements in response to needs of the user base.

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innovation peer-to-peer creativity networking 79

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strategy

Guy Kawasaki

MARCH 5, 2015

I am evangelizing the 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint. It’s quite simple: a pitch should have ten slides , last no more than twenty minutes , and contain no font smaller than thirty points. This rule is applicable for any presentation to reach agreement: for example, raising capital, making a sale, forming a partnership, etc. Ten slides. Ten is the optimal number of slides in a PowerPoint presentation because a normal human being cannot comprehend more than ten concepts in a meeting—and venture capi

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This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 2, 2015

'Working out of the Townhouse has been an interesting experience in that I''m working side by side with a lot of non-startup people. It''s a co-working space full of creatives and freelancers, most of whom who have never pitched an investor, and probably never seen a startup pitch either. Their reaction to what I do day in and day out is very telling about how a lot of people, including VCs themselves, think of the job.

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pitching peer-to-peer venture capital creativity 368

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 14, 2015

'*. I love Twitter. I’m loving Meerkat so far. It’s brand new but the enthusiasm we’ve seen for such an early product is truly awesome. I ran a VC AMA (ask me anything) last Monday on Meerkat and had > 1,000 simultaneous people asking me questions. The energy was election so I’m going to do it again this coming week. You may have read that Twitter has now made it harder for Meerkat to operate.

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energy networking VC innovation 325

Onevest

MARCH 19, 2015

By John Lion. Photo credit: Getty Images. Waiting on Title III of the JOBS Act? Join the rest of the nation including equity crowdfunding platforms like 1000 Angels , the private investor network that connects startups with investors, where currently only accredited investors are allowed to invest. Accredited investors are only 1% of the US population.

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Berkonomics

MARCH 5, 2015

'Negotiating an agreement, especially one that involves personal gain, is tough for the person personally involved. There is too much to lose to be objective, to be willing to walk when terms go upside down. It is my experience that you should have an expert negotiator with you or even in your place, whether from your board or an employee or outside professional such as an attorney – when the issue is personal.

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board advice entrepreneurs founder 89

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startup

Guy Kawasaki

MARCH 9, 2015

Forget “I think, therefore I am.” For entrepreneurs, the operative phrase is, “I pitch, therefore I am.” Pitching isn’t only for raising money—it’s for reaching agreement, and agreement can yield many good outcomes including sales, partnerships, and new hires. Here are the key elements of a great pitch. Prepare. Before you get to the meeting, study the bios and social-media accounts of everyone who will be in the room.

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pitching entrepreneurs media investment 59

Tomasz Tunguz

MARCH 2, 2015

A few weeks ago, I joined Mike Volpe, CMO of Hubspot, on the Growth Show where we had a great time talking about a few SaaS topics. A few listeners to the podcast picked a line from that podcast that I think is a really important point for content marketing. I said, “Content is one of the few forms of marketing that has a compounding return.” Like a bank account that starts out small and earns incremental gains, but over time becomes quite large, content marketing efforts require con

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SaaS strategy advice investing 61

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 23, 2015

'About a year ago, I started hearing about the existence of a "pre-seed" round. At first, it sounded ridiculous. Actually, it still sounds ridiculous to me. The term "seed" implies the very beginning to me. If you can''t go to "seed" investors for your very first investment because you''re too early, that just seems weird to me. At Brooklyn Bridge Ventures , I want to be part of the first money to go into a company, no matter what you call it.

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Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2015

'*. If you are a 20-something tech entrepreneur you could be forgiven for thinking that seed-stage investors, Angellist Syndicates and widely available angel money always existed. It is, of course, a very recent phenomenon. Let me take you back just 10 years ago to 2005 in Silicon Valley where I returned after 11 years of living in Europe. I was out to raise my first seed money in my second startup of $500,000.

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financing

Onevest

MARCH 25, 2015

By Tim Houghten. What does it take to be a successful angel investor today? This is the question that we get asked all the time at 1000 Angels , the private investor network that connects startups with investors. Becoming an angel investor has the potential for being insanely profitable, personally rewarding, and even bringing about essential world change.

energy 189

energy investment investing opportunity 189

Berkonomics

MARCH 12, 2015

'When a new CEO or manager is hired into a company, for a while lots of energy flows from the top and new ideas seem to be generated daily. It is one reason not to fear the unknown when upper level management long in place turns over, often leaving most everyone worried about the future of the company and for their own prospects. Even the best of us fall into a routine in our jobs.

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consulting energy 81

Guy Kawasaki

MARCH 3, 2015

There is a myth that successful companies begin with grandiose ambitions. The implication is that entrepreneurs should start with megalomaniac goals in order to succeed. To the contrary, my observation is that great companies began by wondering about simple things, and this leads to asking simple questions that beget companies: Therefore, what? This question arises when you spot or predict a trend and wonder about its consequences.

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innovation pitching entrepreneurs entrepreneurship 55

Tomasz Tunguz

MARCH 29, 2015

Like most things in a startup, a sales commission plan should evolve as the company scales. For example, as Mark Roberge, CRO of Hubspot, wrote in The Sales Acceleration Formula , Hubspot adopted three different sales compensation plans throughout its early evolution which embody the three key ingredients of a sales compensation plan. Hubspot’s first sales plan paid $2 of commission for every $1 of MRR an account executive booked.

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accelerator sustainability education startup 40

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technology

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 16, 2015

'It''s very easy to think of an ask as a negative--of a burden on someone. When it comes to startups, however, especially when you''ve built up a great reputation and done a lot of good work for others, people are not only eager to help you, but they take great pride in being asked. Working with you is an opportunity. Getting a chance to take a leap with you is an opportunity.

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opportunity innovation startup 349

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 10, 2015

'I write about sales often both because it’s the lifeblood of any organization and because in my experience it is the area in which more startups are least experienced or inclined. I also write and talk about it frequently because raising capital is a part of sales and this is important for entrepreneurs to understand. To make it simple and easy to remember – there are three basic rules of sales: 1.

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Onevest

MARCH 27, 2015

Q&A with Sam Guzik. Photo credit: huffpost.com. At 1000 Angels , the private investor network that connects startups with investors, we have been monitoring closely the new regulatory landscape for startup fundraising. The following is intended to provide basic information about the new Regulation A+, adopted by the SEC on March 25, 2015, which is expected to become effective in early June 2015.

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Berkonomics

MARCH 26, 2015

'This is the tale of two CEOs, one of them unfortunately….me. It’s a story of how people handle unusual situations when selling to the top – an executive of a prospective customer. And the stories couldn’t be more different. Recently a CEO friend told me her story of a dinner with her director of business development and an executive of a major company, a candidate for a large sale.

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hospitality entrepreneurs development 71

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opportunity

Guy Kawasaki

MARCH 23, 2015

Some aspiring entrepreneurs are already working for a big company. Like external entrepreneurs, they dream of creating innovative products. They, too, must prototype, position, pitch, bootstrap, recruit, fund, partner, sell, and support. The purpose of this minichapter is to explain how to do all this when you’re employed by a large business. Ironically, many entrepreneurs envy the employees of major companies—they think that these lucky souls have humongous financial resources, large sales forc

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Tomasz Tunguz

MARCH 23, 2015

If you want to understand how to build a great SaaS sales organization, you should read Mark Roberge’s The Sales Acceleration Formula. It’s the single best book on the topic. Mark is the Chief Revenue Office at Hubspot, a company which has created tremendous success by perfecting the inbound marketing plus sales model. The book is invaluable for every founder, CEO and member of the management team because it not only explains how the Hubspot sales team is structured, but why the stru

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SaaS frameworks construction accelerator 40

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 5, 2015

'Downloaded Meerkat yet? It''s the new new thing. The app is five days old and getting in with all the right names in the Valley. (The company has been around for a few years, but this is a new product for them.). It''s so new, we don''t even know if people are using it a second time, yet already it''s been in the Wall Street Journal. (PS. Yuliya is really becoming an asset to the WSJ''s tech coversage.

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Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 7, 2015

'*. Ok. If you work in tech this week you’ve no doubt heard much of this new app called Meerkat. In case you’ve spent the week living under a rock, Meerkat is an app integrated (currently) with Twitter in which if you click on the link of somebody who shares a “Meerkat Stream” you will be transported into a live session of their phone streaming.

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transportation VC board innovation 363

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