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Jas P

Elad Blog: Signs A VC Is Just Not That Into You - 0 views

  • A VC who is interested in your company will usually define specific next steps at the end of the meeting.  E.g. "Why don't I get you together with 2-3 of my other partners later this week?" or "I will follow up with you quickly by Wednesday and we can discuss the data I need and next steps".
  • An uninterested VC will not suggest anything tangible to happen but will talk more in generalities.  E.g. "We should definitely keep in touch on this - I love you guys and your model".  This is a no, even though it sounds sort of like a yes.  Vague, positive-sounding generalities from VCs are almost always nos.
  • The most ambiguous situation is the data request without any further in person meetings.  In some cases, this is a legitimate request so the VC can quote data to get their partners interested in investing in your company.
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  • Some firms use associates to screen their deals before a partner meets with your company.   If you can get to a partner directly from day one, you should.  If you are passed on to an associate and never hear from a partner again after meeting with the associate, the VC just isn't that into you.
  • If a VC is into you she will prioritize your emails for reply.  This means you should hear back on many emails within the same day, and the rest of the emails within at worst about a week if they are e.g. travelling.  If it takes a VC more then a week to reply to most of your emails, she just isn't that into you.
  • If the VC does not spend the last 5 minutes trying to sell you on her firm, or offer introductions or help, she may not be that into you.
Jas P

Must-read for founders: A VC explains how to build a killer value proposition | Venture... - 0 views

  • In its simplest terms, a value proposition is a positioning statement that describes for whom you do what uniquely well. It describes your target buyer, the problem you solve, and why you’re distinctly better than the alternatives. One of the classic mistakes of building a value proposition is diving headlong into the solution definition phase before really understanding the problem you’re looking to solve. To understand whether it’s a problem worth solving, I recommend exercising four U’s: Is the problem unworkable? Does your solution fix a broken business process where there are real, measureable consequences to inaction? Is fixing the problem unavoidable? Is it driven by a mandate with implications associated with governance or regulatory control? For example, is it driven by a fundamental requirement for accounting or compliance? Is the problem urgent? Is it one of the top three priorities? In selling to enterprises, you’ll find it hard to command the attention and resources to get a deal done if you fall below this line. Is the problem underserved? Is there a conspicuous absence of valid solutions to the problem you’re looking to solve? Focus where there’s whitespace, not scorched earth.
Jas P

Vinod Khosla: "I Feel Sad Sometimes For Y Combinator Companies That Get So Much Hype" |... - 0 views

  • Khosla wasn’t trying to defame Y Combinator, noting “There’s plenty of smart teams out of YC that we fund.” But he stressed that heavily prepared presentations can backfire. “Too much of the polish of the five slide deck” distracts a team and can repel mentors like him. For a startup that believes it has a great idea, the next thing they need is great execution, and that requires an all-star team and savvy strategy — elements that the right angel or VC firm can offer. A pumped-up valuation might help the founders retain more equity, but that doesn’t matter without success.
  • If your idea is risky, but with a huge upside that isn’t valued too high, you can gain the support of people like Vinod and his Khosla Ventures. ”I spend most of my time recruiting for my companies. Once you hire the wrong people… it’s really hard to get a company back on track.”
Jas P

Vinod Khosla Of Khosla Ventures: It's Not About Funding The Company, It's About Helping... - 0 views

  • Khosla is very passionate about assisting his companies with recruiting, even suggesting that talented folks send him their resume.
  • Khosla went on to discuss what happens when you hire the wrong people, and he says that it’s hard to get a team back on track once those mistakes are made early on. I spend most of my time recruiting for my companies. You hire the first 15 people and they hire the rest.
  • Not only is it about hiring the “right” people, but as Khosla has said here on TechCrunch before, you don’t have to be a jerk to be successful. Finding the right spot for someone in a company is key: If people aren’t performing, put them in the another job where they can perform or fire them.
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  • Disruption is key as well, as some of Khosla’s portfolio companies have taken on the biggest and most difficult problems in the world. On Khosla’s investment on payment service Square: If you said to someone three years ago that you could compete against PayPal, most people would say that’s a crazy idea, payments are done.
  • Some of the new things that Khosla’s firm is getting into is the consumerization of healthcare, and he has discussed some of the new companies he’s investing in, including smart chips and apps that help you track your vital signs. At the end of the day, Vinod Khosla doesn’t even like to refer to himself as a venture capitalist: I don’t consider myself a VC, I consider myself a mentor.
Jas P

How Canadian Entrepreneurs Finance Their Startups - Techvibes.com - 0 views

  • What do entrepreneurs use to fund their startup in its earliest stages? Themselves. According to Profit, 98% of those behind Canada's hottest startups fund their startup with their own capital. 62% continue to do this post-launch for growth capital (check out their infographic after the jump).
Jas P

The Genius of Starting a Company Without Outside Capital - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • The first question owners need to ask — and challenge themselves on — is how much money they really need. My experience is that most entrepreneurs think they need much more money than they really do. There is almost always a cheaper way to get things done.
  • Every month that they are on the hunt for money instead of developing and marketing their product or service, they are wasting valuable time.
  • Q.What were your start-up costs?A.We started this business with less than $35,000.Q.Did you get any loans or take any equity from anyone?A.No, we took no equity partners and the start-up capital for the business was contributed by the three owners.
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  • Q.How long did it take before you were generating cash flow?A.Because we’re a contract brewery we were able to be cash-flow positive in a very short amount of time minus the initial outlay for packaging and ingredient costs, which were obviously funded by the start-up capital that we put in. We were able to really be cash-flow positive within the first six to eight weeks of operation and have been profitable on paper since our second or third batch of beer.
Jas P

Ten million users is the new one million users - Chris Dixon - 0 views

  • - For consumer startups with non-transactional models (ad-based or unknown business models), you need something closer to 10 million users versus 1 million users to get Series A funded.
Jas P

The Truth about a Failing Startup | Hacker News - 0 views

  • "investors are in a sense "buying" your time, not much different than consulting"Brilliant. I've never heard the concept of investing in a startup phrased so well.
  • My company has a really good chance of succeeding, but I still face these doubts every day. Here are some of the things that make the game worth the candle for me, even if we end up failing: * I'm proud of the product we've built. Even if it doesn't take off, nobody can take that away from me. * I'm incredibly proud of my engineering team. We're "a bunch of kids" who've built something incredible. Even if the company ultimately doesn't survive, we will have done really well. * I love my work and I love the people I work with. There are conflicts, sometimes I have to deliver bad news, deal with stress and monotonous work, firefight problems, etc. but in aggregate the work I do and the people I do it with bring me joy. I will always remember this time fondly. * When I started, I was a good engineer and a terrible product manager. Now I'm a good engineer and a good product manager, which makes me 100x more valuable. There is a bazillion other things I've learned, but this alone makes everything worthwhile.
  • * Facing doubt every day made me face the darkest corners of my soul. I stopped being an obnoxious cynical windbag and started appreciating the nuances of life, people, art, poetry, strength of human spirit and true magnitude of human dignity. * We're taking a real shot at building hard, sustainable technology that has a good chance to change the world. Even if we fail, I'll never regret taking the chance. * I met hundreds of people on my path. I dismissed some of them, but in retrospect I've learned from them all. I appreciate humanity a lot more now, and I understand where the dark parts of it come from much better. * Perspective is worth 80 IQ points. If you start a company you gain a lot of perspective. I could keep going, but I hope I've made my point. I'm not trying to sugar-coat anything -- failing may very well be the worst thing you've ever experienced emotionally to date. But keep everything in perspective and don't get cynical. You might still change the world in a big way. You might still change it in a small way. It doesn't matter. Enjoy the people around you. Get into adventures. Try to do something meaningful. Do the best you can -- things may not turn out how you wanted them to, but they'll probably turn out ok.
Jas P

Lessons Learned the Hard Way: Canadian Angel Investor Reveals His Million-dollar Mistak... - 0 views

  • 1. Good copywriting is underrated: Compelling copy is key to conversions and also making your brand human, friendly and fuzzy. Developers can’t write copy that well, that’s what marketers are for. Lesson: Great copy is a huge differentiator. It connects your audience to your brand and it has a direct impact on retention and engagement. “Copy is so important because it communicates your vision and helps you solve your products,” said Isenberg. “If you can’t do that right you’ll have little conversion rates and your not going to have a consistent brand image.”
  • 2. Influencers are a big deal: Scale users quickly by onboarding communities. Isenberg worked with schools, trading rooms and blogs. Influencers hold the key to these communities. Lesson: The best way to onboard influencers is the old school way by building a real relationship. Pick up a phone, email them or best yet, take them out for drinks. “I love sitting behind a computer because it’s my safe haven, but the truth is that relationships is key to getting these people involved,” he said.
  • 5. Distribution, distribution, distribution: Strategic alliances with partners helps create value-add for their user base and helps you get traffic (and SEO juice). Lesson: Embeddable widgets that allow users to distribute content across the web are particularly powerful when it’s the strategic partner’s content. “Find your most compelling feature that can be embeddable and do deals.”
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  • 6. Create exclusivity, urgency and scarcity: Who says fear of missing out doesn’t exist on the web? Invite-only increases hype and word of mouth and people like to be a part of an exclusive club. Lesson: Emulate a land grab by providing users the ability to claim "land" on a first-come-first-serve basis (ex: About.me's vanity URL registration before launch).
Jas P

Entrepreneurs Shouldn't Pitch Their Ideas To Venture Capitalists - Forbes - 0 views

  • Ideas are infinite, and in the absence of competent execution, they are worth nothing. Nada. Zip. Zero. Conversely, money in pursuit of outsized returns is plentiful. Thus, if both ideas and money are abundant, what is the scarce constraint in the fundraising equation?
  • Skilled entrepreneurs bring ideas and money together by building a bridge of trust.
  • Unless an investor specifically asks you to educate them regarding your space, focus your pitch on why you and your team are uniquely qualified to exploit the opportunity and turn the idea into a lucrative, self-sustaining business.
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  • No matter how much trust an entrepreneur builds during our interactions, I always verify the veracity of their claims and prior accomplishments by speaking to people with whom they previously worked. Confirmation from people whom the entrepreneur did not cite as a reference is vital.
  • No B.S. – A firm handshake, coupled with direct eye contact, was often the only contract underlying a Grubstake deal. As such, communication had to be clear, open and direct. I have no interest partnering with an entrepreneur who only communicates positive information, while obfuscating negative issues. As such, part of our diligence process includes assessing how clearly and honestly the entrepreneur communicates.
Jas P

The value of short term thinking by Ilya Lichtenstein - 0 views

  • In technology, long term thinking is impossible, because everything changes so fast, and the pace of change is quickening. The rules are changing too fast. Nobody knows when a sudden shift in technology will open up new markets and business models.
  • All we can do as entrepreneurs is take it step by step, and adapt quickly when we sense the market shifting.
  • The best companies are not built on a single, infallible grand vision. They’re built piece by piece, making one user or customer at a time, getting to the next milestone and waiting for the next major opportunity to reveal itself.
Jas P

Paul Graham's Checklist, Would You Make The Cut? [Video] | TechCrunch - 0 views

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    founder traits
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