Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 7, 2013

When I first started writing this blog several years ago I had less followers than you have right now. But the realist in me knew I couldn’t write daily nor could I convince you to think to check out my blog with regularity. In Gabe’s post he explained why TechMeme was having editors write headlines. I should know.

Writing 326

Writing Buzzfeed Social Media Blogging 326

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2010

I’m very pleased today to announce that I invested, on behalf of GRP Partners, in Burstly alongside Rincon Venture Partners , an early stage VC in Southern California whith whom we love to work (and were our co-investors on RingRevenue ). Naturally I’m excited about this investment or I wouldn’t have done it.

Mobile 282

Mobile Invest Company Companies 282

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

They often create the biggest tensions between investors who are investing at different stages in the business. Prorata investments rights given investors the right to invest in your future fund-raising rounds and maintain their ownership % in your company as your company grows and raises more capital. return (on paper).

Guide 336

Guide Venture Capital Startup Writing 336

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 2, 2010

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. And the only way to do that is to help them calculate the ROI (return on investment) of using your product.

Sales 289

Sales Startup Training Pricing 289

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 27, 2011

But should you actually write one if you’re a startup, an industry figure (lawyer, banker) or VC? This is a post to help you figure out why you should write and what you should talk about. I know that I have not yet earned these kudos based on investment returns (although my partners have. By definition, you read blogs.

Blogging 373

Blogging Startup Writing Venture Capital 373

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

AngelList 101 : As you know, AngelList is a platform where angels can invest in semi-screened tech deals. As an angel you can look for the social proof in deals “Dave Morin is investing …” to make your decision. AngelList Syndicate leads don’t take any fees on the investment, which should help with returns.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2: As expected at least one person accused me of writing this post because I want to see lower valuations. If you invested in the first angel round of a startup company it is usually very hard to sell your stock – usually for many years if ever at all. I acknowledged this in the article. I’m just making the commentary.

Startup 336

Startup Pricing Technical Review Marketing 336

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)? Do I have data or facts to present so the story has legs? Final example.

Marketing 389

Marketing Press Blogging Startup 389

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

The VC market has right-sized (returned back to mid 90′s levels & less competition). Limited Partners or LPs (the people who invest into VC funds) have taken notice as 2014 is by all accounts the busiest year for LPs since the Great Recession began. We’re all socially connected (so great businesses spread faster).

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2011

The short answer is that by knowing the key members of the management team the VC firm can quickly identify strengths on your time and know whether you have some competitive advantage in your chose field relative to other people with whom you will compete. I know it’s incredibly important to me in my investment decisions.

Slides 296

Slides GRP Partners Venture Capital Writing 296

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 18, 2014

Sometimes those motives are positive (they really want the chance to work with you, they think you have unique skills) and sometimes they are less positive (their first-tier of “go to” referrals passed on the deal, they don’t want to write another check themselves, etc.). I seek out great entrepreneurs.

Venture Capital 337

Venture Capital Invest Ideas Entrepreneur 337

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 30, 2019

In addition, the discipline of producing it, like writing a business plan, will help you immensely in understanding the key elements that drive you and your business. I often hear the excuse that writing a book takes precious time away from building and running your business, which you cannot afford.

Writing 19

Writing Technical Review Entrepreneur Advertising 19

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2013

The reason for this is that the executives who founded the company have so much tacit knowledge of how to position their product relative to the competition that they can easily win campaigns when they’re involved. So I often work with teams to get them to codify the key things they do well that the competition does not.

Sales 336

Sales Startup Competition Customer 336

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 3, 2013

Let me start by saying that Clayton is one of the most influential people on my thoughts about markets that led to both the concept behind my first startup and my main theses in investing. In many ways I think general purpose writing & thinking skills are as valuable as math skills. Some money out of every investment.

Venture Capital 403

Venture Capital Education Offshore Outsource Development 403

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 30, 2018

I thought I’d write a post about how to talk about valuation at a startup and give you some sense of what might be on the mind of the person considering funding you. If you’re talking with a typical Seed/A/B round firm they often have ownership targets in the company in which they invest. some might even want slightly more.

Venture Capital 324

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Invest 324

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2014

For all the things he’s likely known for, he probably hasn’t yet built a strong relationship as an early stage venture investor (he invests often in later-stage deals where he is very respected). “… for any good investment, from Series A on, there is at least one firm to compete with. Competition is fierce.

Venture Capital 333

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Email 333

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 9, 2017

You’ll have less competition. You’ll wonder: ‘’Is this a worthy investment with probable payback in revenues? Competition is good, but – if there are hundreds of businesses out there that already have gotten to and penetrated this niche – you’re going to find it hard to get through the marketing noise.

Marketing 266

Marketing Advertising Resource Social Media 266

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2014

It’s building a product that is substantially differentiated, and, as Bill Gross, one of the most prolific tech entrepreneurs of our era says, “ It needs to be 10x better than the competition ” (because if you shoot for that then in competitive markets you might achieve 3x. Simply write a great book?

Marketing 379

Marketing Startup SEM SEO 379

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

It’s why my investment philosophy is called, “ the entrepreneur thesis.&#. He listed all of the product releases that were up coming, the customers that were in the pipeline and where he saw his competition moving. I don’t write about LA but I write from LA. Imagine Apple without Steve Jobs.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

I find it amusing when a journalist writes an article about a prominent startup (either privately held or preparing for an IPO) and decries that, “They’re not even profitable!” If you have a market lead then raising capital and making investments now will help you as others enter the market. ” The Details.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 26, 2014

It’s why in this article I advise that people “market today not futures” because you don’t want your playbook in the hands of the competition. The reality is that a journalist who’s writing a story about you – a relatively unknown entity – wants to hear directly from the founders and/or the CEO.

Press 319

Press Startup Writing Training 319

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 19, 2010

I’m writing this post as part of my series with Advice on Raising Venture Capital but will file it under Sales Tips as well since it applies equally to both scenarios. My partner, Brian McLoughlin , attends almost all Financial Services conference, makes a number of investments in the space and has relationships across the sector.

Venture Capital 318

Venture Capital Startup Sales Writing 318

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

So I thought I’d write about out with what I would look for in a VC knowing what I know now and why. It’s insanely competitive to get into our industry so most have degrees from institutions like Stanford, Harvard, Wharton and University of Chicago (blatant plug ;-). VCs, how to select a VC, etc.) Most VCs are book smart.

Venture Capital 364

Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 31, 2012

Many MBA programs still cater too much to the needs of large, corporate management jobs or prepare students to enter big consulting companies or investments banks. The idea that the course asks students to write public blog posts is a testament to its more modern teaching style.

Startup 319

Startup Sales Course Competition 319

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. They’re competitive. Last year I lost a deal in a company that I wanted to invest in and that I thought I should have won. Write things down. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it.

Outsource Development 333

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 333

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 22, 2010

Due to competitive markets we ended up with a pretty good term sheet until we needed to raise money in April 2001 and then we got completely screwed. I’m not sure I really even need to write this at length because Nivi absolutely nailed the topic in his article “ The Option Pool Shuffle.&#.

Venture Capital 405

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Funding 405

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 14, 2018

Whenever you write your deck and send it out I think you should actually think to yourself, “my competitors are probably going to read this one day and this will be forwarded widely” and if your response isn’t “so what!” Because I invest in “ lines, not dots ” it’s actually the delta that I’m investing in. A deck is a deck.

Funding 239

Funding Venture Capital IP Email 239

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. They’re competitive. Last year I lost a deal in a company that I wanted to invest in and that I thought I should have won. Write things down. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it.

Outsource Development 328

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 328

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

Chris Dixon is one of my favorite people in tech and writes one of the few blogs I read religiously. 3. We then addressed competition in the context of SiteAdvisor and how it is important for journalists, customers, and the companies themselves. If you don’t read it and you care about tech & entrepreneurship, you should.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

InfoChachkie

MAY 16, 2011

5) Allow Partners To Write Your Agreements. Thus, I will let my Big Dumb Company (BDC) partner write our agreement. In addition to paying the consultant, you must invest time to educate them. Even benevolent BDCs lose interest in your solution once this competitive risk is eliminated. 6) Rely On A Public Relations Agency.

Startup 242

Startup Outsource Development Outsource Sales 242

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 16, 2010

We talked with Noah about how the company grew out of a business plan competition at the University of Southern California, his recent funding from the Maverick Angels, as well as how the firm hopes to stand out among a crowded list of comparison shopping sites. Noah Auerhahn: We just had too much free time at USC.

USC 207

USC CPC Sites Startup 207

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 12, 2010

Spark Capital is relatively new to VC (founded in 2005) yet has become one of the hottest new VCs having invested in Twitter, Tumblr, AdMeld, Boxee, KickApps and many more companies. We both felt that the critical reasoning skills and writing skills were critical to our career development. Our guest was Mo Koyfman of Spark Capital.

Venture Capital 217

Venture Capital Capital Metrics Competition 217

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2010

I’m writing this post to make sure you’re all on that same playing field. One of our core tasks was “market analysis,&# which consistent of: market sizing, market forecasts, competitive analysis and then instructing customers on which direction to take. So, where is this all coming from, Mark? What are you on about?

Statistics 415

Statistics Startup Report Research 415

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 30, 2014

It’s true the some VCs have started writing so many checks that they resemble stock pickers but the majority of us still have less than 10 board seats at any time and tend to go pretty deep so the result is that we care deeply about where we commit our time. Would they build a world class team. It was impressive.

Technical Review 418

Technical Review Software Review CTO Hire IP 418

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

When I described to people why I initially invested my calls went something like this, “He’s taken kicks to the face for nearly 2 years and is still standing. EcoMom’s metrics improved throughout this process and that’s when I decided to invest. It soon became difficult to manage the many new investment leads.

Startup 292

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Summary 292

Berkonomics

MARCH 15, 2012

Professional investors will probe these five risk areas and make the decision to invest based upon comfort with each. This risk can be mitigated by finding a customer willing to purchase as soon as a proven model is completed, and willing to state this in writing. And fifth: Competitive risk.

Outsource Development 200

Outsource Development Ideas Resource Patents 200

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 15, 2010

In my next post I will write about one of the five companies. I think most great angel investing is done at a local level. We don’t need competition – we need more overall organizations like Jason’s to helping young entrepreneurs more easily reach angel investors with no payola.

Angel 254

Angel Startup Tech Coast Angels MyShape 254