Category: Making it Happen

July 2, 2013

Important for New Business Founders

Its tough being a founder…

How do you learn the lessons you need to start, grow and get funding for your new business?

Sure there are thousands of blogs, education sites like Udemy and speakers on the Ted circuit but me..personally…I like watching and sometime modeling what other, successful entrepreneurs and founders do.

Take the Video Genesis launch for example…

Andy Jenkins and Mike Filsaime have successfully launched products making millions of dollars…

Why is that relevant?

Because if there are two people you should watch…in action…and learn from when it comes to launching a new product, service or company online. Its Andy and Mike…

So, I recommend you take a look at this launch. Sign up, take a step back and keep a careful watch of all the moving pieces. See how they do it. And when it comes to using video as part of a launch (which is what Video Genesis is all about…you’ll also lear some valuable lessons about that too…)

Sure you could go watch some really smart person on a Ted stage talking about product launch…or you could jump into one, and make sure you watch all the levers, the psychological triggers, the moving pieces and see it done for real.

Its you call. Video Genesis Launch.

All the best

Andrew

http://www.TheFundingGuru.com

PS – Video Genesis Launch Link

August 13, 2007

Startup Techniques: Understand Yourself and What the Business Needs (3)

This is the third ‘Startup Techniques’ blog posting on creating and moving your own Winning Startup Idea into the real world. The first posting “Startup Techniques: Creating Your New Business Idea” included techniques to create your own winning startup idea and the second post “Startup Techniques: Qualifying Your New Business Idea (2)” gave some tips on how to qualify the idea to make sure it’s really the one that you should be investing your heart, soul and time on.

So what do I do next when moving a Winning Startup idea forward? If the idea has really grabbed me my temptation is to start figuring out all of the pieces that are needed to move it from idea to real business. To start thinking about the people I’ll need to find, figuring out how to test the idea, how much money it’s going to need and the 101 other elements. It’s at about this time when you need to figure out a few things before you start getting carried away.

Normally at the top of my list is how do I fit in with this idea?

For a product let’s consider just a few of the different steps in the process from idea to real product:

Developing product drawings (Engineering Skills)
Developing a prototype (Engineering)
Prototype testing (Engineering)
Determining how to produce it in larger quantities (Engineering)
Testing the Market (Marketing)
Determining Price Point considering the margins required by the sales channel (Marketing)
Sanity checking the numbers (Production costs vs. price point to sales channel) (Finance)
Understanding and selling the product into the sales channel (Sales)
Marketing the product to retailers and the end consumer (Marketing)
Managing the invoicing, customer service, tracking cash (Finance etc)

These are just a few broad steps on the road to making a product idea real. This list is by no means all inclusive. The point here is that there are multiple component parts necessary to build a business whether it’s a product, service or website. When you are sure this idea is the one, begin to map out what the idea needs and to overlay that with your own strengths and capabilities. This will act as a pointer for you ~ it should help make obvious who you will need to find to join the team either actually or virtually.

Thankfully whether your winning startup idea is a product, service or website there are some relatively fixed ‘categories’ that need to be considered whatever the business. Here are some of the key categories and a few thought jogging questions, there are many more:

The Customer:

What are their needs?
What are they prepared to pay for? How Much?
How do they buy products like this? A store / website / telephone / television?

Competition:

Where do customers currently buy or go to use products like this?
What products or services do they offer?
How much do they charge?
How do they sell and market their products?
How many competitors are there?

The Product:

What does it need to do?
How will it be much better than what the competition offer?
Who can prototype and build it?
How much does it cost to produce?
What is necessary to produce it?
Who will produce it?

Sales:

Where will you sell this product?
Who will sell it for you?
How will you pay them? Salary or commission or both? Yes, there are sales people who will work for just commission (Blog Post to come)

Marketing:

How does it meet the customer need?
How is it better than what the competition offers?
How much can we reasonably charge?
Are we looking for volume of customers or a select group of customers?
What do customers need to know that will make them want to buy it?
What are the ways to tell potential customers about the product?
How much do they cost?
Are there any ways of telling potential customers about the products cheaply?

Some of these questions may not work for your idea but most should. As you go through them more questions should pop up. And don’t worry if you don’t know all of the answers, you won’t. Fact. But you will probably be able to make some really educated guesses in the areas that relate to your personal strengths and won’t have a clue in those areas that are too far out of your own skills and experiences ~ another good pointer the types of people you will need to flesh out the idea and really start the tactical planning of “How to Launch Your Winning Startup Idea”. But again, that is the subject of another blog posting.

I hope this posting helps. Again, questions, comments, relevant rude remarks always welcome and ‘Yes’ this posting could have included much more, in fact, it could have gone on for at least another 50,000 words but like most entrepreneurs I have a tendency towards ADD. Let me know where I should dive deeper and I’ll do my best!

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

NOTE: I grant permission for every reader to reproduce on your website or blog the article you are now reading. But copy this article ONLY, without any alteration and please Include the copyright statement. (NOTE: I am giving permission to host on your website this article AND NO OTHERS. Reprinting or hosting my articles without express written permission is illegal, immoral, and a violation of my copyright.)“Copyright © 2007, Advisor Garage LLC. Advisor Garage Blog. All rights reserved. Permission granted to reprint this article on your website without alteration if you include this copyright statement and leave the hyperlinks live and in place.”

August 13, 2007

Startup Techniques: Creating Your New Business Idea (1)

I’ve have never tried to get this very personal process down in one place before. From idea through to a real business step by step with as many of my own personal techniques and suggestions thrown in as we go. There are rainforest amounts of books printed about people’s startup experiences – what I’d like to try here is to write about the real techniques and steps I have been through many times before when taking a new business idea and working to move it through to a real product or service. Hopefully a more grounded approach than some of those ‘How to’ or ‘My experience as an Entrepreneur’ books. Well, we’ll see. Questions and comments very welcome!

So, want to start a business? Have the necessary passion to start a new business but are unsure where to start? Looking for that new, innovative, winning new business idea? Or perhaps you’re waiting for divine inspiration to serve up that winning idea like money from heaven before you actually get up off that sofa and GO FOR IT. Sorry to burst your bubble – waiting won’t make it happen. You have to ‘create’ it yourself. But maybe it’s closer and easier to get than you think, maybe you can come up with that idea today.

Here are a few ways that work for me – so much so that they’ve become almost unconscious processes that happen on autopilot and better yet, their easy. Give them a try.

When asked where my ideas for new business come from I often joke that it’s a ‘disease’, something which is uncontrolled, being delivered in the grey matter between my ears without conscious thought or a process. That’s close, but not exactly how it happens.

During my first interview for a role at Procter & Gamble fresh out university one interview question still sticks with me. The interviewer passed a glass across the table and asked me to name ten uses for it. Use number 1 was…a glass, she was unimpressed. Use number 2 was a paper weight, (better but still no cigar), number 3 was a lens to read small print in a document and before I knew what had happened, ten different and increasingly creative (read – crazy) uses had spilled out in the interview room. That process is not too dissimilar from the process you could try. This redeployment of one product idea (in my case stackable Pringles) into another product category (Fire Escape Ladders) helped me come up with the idea for my first company, X-IT Products to produce an idea I’d had for the world’s smallest, safest, strongest fire escape ladder.

A refinement on that creative free thinking is what we’ll call ‘What if’. Find a product, web service or business that is in the space that you are passionate about and really impresses you. Thought of it?

What’s great about that business? What do you really like about it? Now think about what would make it even better? That would take it from being a great business and make it a world class business. Write down every idea that comes to you….when you feel yourself drying up, read through the list and see if that squeezes any more ideas out of you. Take a read through that list and see if any light bulbs go off in your head – any really obvious improvements or refinements to that already great business?

The third approach that might work even better for you is what I’ll call the ‘Pissed Off’ brainstorm. Has a product, service or business failed to live up to it’s promise? Maybe they over sold you or your expectations were mis-aligned with the reality of the business. Maybe they screwed up or the product was faulty. Perhaps they don’t exactly meet your need. But who cares? You do, because this is an opportunity to figure out what the business or product needed to do to deliver on it’s promise, to meet and exceed your expectations. And if they aren’t meeting your needs because of some flaw, figure out what needs to happen to solve it.

Let’s try an example, I’m driving from New York to Philadelphia – it’s lunch time and I’m hungry. Watching the signs as I travel, what are my options? Ah, here we are – McDonalds, Wendy’s, Dunkin Donuts and a few no-brand obscure Italian restaurants. More often than not if I’m hungry enough, I’ll drive through and buy something. But just once, wouldn’t it be good if I could get something that was healthier. It’s true that most of these places sell salads but then the light bulb goes off! Before Whole Foods selling organic and more ‘wholesome’ food, most supermarkets were similar. Whole Foods changed the supermarket ‘game’ – what about a motor way food joint that changes the game in the same way as Whole Foods? A quick, drive through that offers freshly prepared, all organic, non-greasy, non-salad food? As of today, at least on the routes I drive, they would be the only food chain of its type. Talk about cornering an underserved market. Surely not everyone want’s a burger or a slice of pizza? Is this a winning idea? Who know’s but it could make someone a lot of money if it takes off. Don’t forget my percentage if you make this one a reality!

So, there are other ways that these ideas are created but hopefully these few are good as a start, so:

Product Design New Application: Think of how one product or design can be re-deployed to solve other problems
What If?: How could a great product or business be a ‘world class’ business? How does it need to change or improve?
The Pissed Off Brainstorm: If only X did it this way….why couldn’t they just do Y?

Try these approaches and see where they take you. Feel free to come back and post how you get on. Maybe then I can write an article on some ‘what to do next’ steps for your new winning idea. When you find your winning idea then you are already further along than most ‘would be’ entrepreneurs, now to go an make it a reality. Let me know if there’s any interest in those thoughts.

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

August 9, 2007

You’ve Created Your Winning Startup Idea ~ First Steps (2)

Hopefully you read the previous post “Create that Winning Startup Idea” and tried one of the following suggestions for coming up with your personal ‘Winning Startup Idea’.

Just as a reminder:

Product Design New Application: Think of how one product or design can be re-deployed to solve other problems
What If?: How could a great product or business be a ‘world class’ business? How does it need to change or improve?
The Pissed Off Brainstorm: If only X did it this way….why couldn’t they just do Y?

Great! Have you found that idea that makes sleep near impossible? THE idea that is now starting to bloom and grow in your brain whether you want to think about it or not? If you are reading this and even now the idea is demanding attention then maybe you’ve found your own ‘Winning Startup Idea’. Is that all there is too it? Of course not. This is just the beginning but it is one of the most challenging elements…

The frank reality is that the idea you’ve just conceived is at the start of it’s life and I can promise you that as you move it forward, it will shift and change to the point where when it becomes ‘real’ you probably won’t even recognize it as the same idea. That’s OK. Every winning startup idea grows up eventually when it hits the real world and spends some time with it’s initial customers. These initial steps are what this post is about. Initial steps to take a fantastic and very personal winning startup and make it ready to be shared and experienced by it’s customers.

So here it is, your very own winning startup idea – what’s next?

At this stage I normally take a look at myself and examine whether I’m passionate enough about the idea to really grab a hold of it with both hands and push it forward no matter what. No matter what! Any obstacle, any person telling me that it won’t or can’t happen. There are always people who will tell you 101 reasons why your idea will fail. If I’m only half hearted about it now then sooner or later I’ll run out of steam and waste time. My own time (forgivable) and other people’s time (unforgivable). So this is usually the point where I decide to sleep on it.

OK, so I’ve slept on it and the first thought that pops into my head when I wake up is my winning startup idea…even while mentally sweeping out the cobwebs of sleep my brain starts to turn over the idea and look at it from different directions. As I mull it over I start to see how it can be made better, how it could be not just a winning idea but Great one. Yippee, this is one of those ideas – one of the one’s that even if I wanted to, I can’t push side. That mental shot of near caffeine has happened again. Isn’t life great?

Next, I write the idea down and I don’t worry if its rough…I’m not going to use this document to raise money…just as a tool to develop the idea and test it out. After getting every part of the idea down on paper I promise to give myself 24 hours before coming back to it. I cheat…I can’t help it, a few really interesting elements come to my mind an hour or two later and I have to add them to the document in case I lose them. OK. That’s it. 24 hours. Right. So next day I read it through and see what other refinements or ideas come to mind.

Yep, the document makes sense. So who do I know that has expertise relating to this type of business or perhaps know someone who does? Let’s take the drive through whole food deli idea from the previous post. Who do I know that has some business experience in restaurants? Scratching my head the honest answer in my case is ‘no one’. Damn!

Lucky for me the internet has websites and forums such as Advisor Garage (http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community) with advisors with experiences across multiple industries. So, my next step is to find someone that really understands this space and connect with them. Keep your own reach out at a high level, give them enough information that they can get the gist of the idea without giving away the crown jewels. Remember, not everyone is ethical out there. But likewise, without some risk, this idea will remain in your head and will never become a reality.

OK, now it’s your turn – you’ve run your winning startup idea by someone who understands the space and if you’re lucky, they’ve given you some more ideas, some contacts, told you about potential competitors and if there aren’t any, have probably told you you’re mad. Don’t sweat ‘mad’, so was Thomas Edison and Marconi in their early days. These are your early entrepreneurial days, take pride in mad…mad is better than bored and boring while watching TV. Sorry NBC!

If there was chemistry between you and your advisor, start cultivating that person as your mentor. Be appreciative of their experience, let them know that they could be the key to your success – they actually might be. If they have helped you identified similar business models or competitors, make it your first business to know everything about them. What do they do, how do they do it, what do they charge and most important, what do their customers think of their product or service? See any chinks in their armor? If so great! This tells you what you’ll need to do better to start pleasing your customers, making money and building your market.

But one person, a winning startup idea and a rough idea draft is not a business. You’ll need some critical elements and no surprises for what they are:

People
Money
Product
Initial Customers
Business infrastructure

But securing those elements is material for the next few posts…if you have thoughts, questions, comments or rude remarks about the above, let me know.

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

NOTE: I grant permission for every reader to reproduce on your website or blog the article you are now reading. But copy this article ONLY, without any alteration and please Include the copyright statement. (NOTE: I am giving permission to host on your website this article AND NO OTHERS. Reprinting or hosting my articles without express written permission is illegal, immoral, and a violation of my copyright.)“Copyright © 2007, Advisor Garage LLC. Advisor Garage Blog. All rights reserved. Permission granted to reprint this article on your website without alteration if you include this copyright statement and leave the hyperlinks live and in place.”

August 8, 2007

Create that Winning Startup Idea (1)

Want to start a business? Have the necessary passion to start a new business but are unsure where to start? Looking for that new, innovative, winning new business idea? Or perhaps you’re waiting for divine inspiration to serve up that winning idea like money from heaven before you actually get up off that sofa and GO FOR IT. Sorry to burst your bubble – waiting won’t make it happen. You have to ‘create’ it yourself. But maybe it’s closer and easier to get than you think, maybe you can come up with that idea today.

Here are a few ways that work for me – so much so that they’ve become almost unconscious processes that happen on autopilot and better yet, their easy. Give them a try.

So, there are other ways that these ideas are created but hopefully these few are good as a start, so:

Product Design New Application: Think of how one product or design can be re-deployed to solve other problems
What If?: How could a great product or business be a ‘world class’ business? How does it need to change or improve?
The Pissed Off Brainstorm: If only X did it this way….why couldn’t they just do Y?

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

August 6, 2007

Sorry Guy It’s Not So Easy: The Flip Side of Entrepreneurship

This is a guest posting by Glenn Kelman, CEO of Redfin, a company that enables people to buy homes online. He offers a counterpoint to my posting about how easy it is to make millions of dollars with “user-generated, long-tail, Web 2.0, social-networking, open-source content.”

Last month, Guy called James Hong and Markus Frind heroes for running multi-million dollar websites like Hot or Not and Plenty of Fish in their underwear. Their stats are jaw-dropping: twelve billion page views, 380 hits per second, two hours of work a day.

Lately I’ve been thinking how hard, not how easy, it is to build a new company. Hard has gone out of fashion. Like college students bragging about how they barely studied, start-ups today take care to project a sense of ease. Wherever I’ve worked, we’ve secretly felt just the opposite. We’re assailed by doubts, mortified by our own shortcomings, surrounded by freaks, testy over silly details. Trying to be like James or Markus has only been counterproductive.

And now, having been through a few startups, I’m not even sure I’d want it to be that easy. Working two hours a day on my own wasn’t my goal when I came to Silicon Valley. Does anybody remember the old video of Steve Jobs launching the Mac? He had tears in his eyes. And even though Jobs is Jobs and I am nobody, I knew how he felt. I’d had the same reaction–absurdly–to portal software and more recently to a Redfin, a fledgling real estate website.

“The megalomaniac pleasure of creation,” the psychoanalyst Edmund Berger wrote, “produces a type of elation which cannot be compared with that experienced by other mortals.” Jobs wasn’t just crying from simple happiness but from all the tinkering, kvetching, nitpicking, wholesale reworking, and spasms of self-loathing that go into a beautiful product. It was all being paid back in a rush.

Like the souls in Dostoevsky who are admitted to heaven because they never thought themselves worthy of it, successful entrepreneurs can’t be convinced that any other startup has their troubles, because they constantly compare the triumphant launch parties and revisionist histories of successful companies to their own daily struggles. Just so you know you’re not alone, here’s a top-ten list of the ways a startup can feel deeply screwed up without really being that screwed up at all.

True believers go nuts at the slightest provocation. The best people at a start-up care too much. They stay up late writing Jerry Maguire memos, eavesdropping on support calls, snapping at bureaucracy, citing Joel Spolsky on Aerons, and Paul Graham on cubes. They are your heart and bones, so you have to give them what they need, which is a lot. The only way to get them on your side is to put them in charge.
Big projects attract good people. If you aren’t doing something worthwhile, you can’t get anyone worthwhile to work on it. I often think about what Ezra Pound once said of his epic poem, that “if it’s a failure, it’s a failure worth all the successes of its age.” We’re not writing poetry, but it matters to us that we’re trying to compete with real estate agents rather than just running their ads. You need a big mission to recruit people who care about what you’re doing.
Start-ups are freak-catchers. You have to be fundamentally unhappy with the way things are to leave Microsoft, and yet unrealistic enough to believe the world can change to join a start-up. This is a volatile combination which can result in group mood swings and a somewhat motley crew. Thus, don’t worry if your start-up seems to have more than its fair share of oddballs.
Good code takes time. One great engineer can do more than ten mediocre ones especially when starting a project. But great engineers still need time: whenever we’ve thought our talent, sprinkled with the fairy dust of some new engineering paradigm, would free us from having to schedule time for design and testing, we’ve paid for it. To make something elegant takes time, and the cult of speed sometimes works against that. “Make haste slowly.”
Everybody has to re-build. The short-cuts you have to take and the problems you couldn’t anticipate when building version 1.0 of your product always mean you’ll have to rebuild some of it in version 2.0 or 3.0. Don’t get discouraged or short-sighted. Just rebuild it. This is just how things work.
Fearless leaders are often terrified. The CEO of the most promising start-up I know of recently used Hikkup to anonymously ask his Facebook friends if we thought his idea was any good. Just because you’re worried doesn’t mean you have a bad idea; the best ideas are often the ones that scare you the most. And for sure don’t believe the after-the-fact statements from entrepreneurs about how they “knew” what to do.
It’ll always be hard work. Most start-ups find an interesting problem to solve, then just keep working on it. At a recent awards ceremony, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer tried to think of the secret to Microsoft’s success and could only come up with “hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, work.” This is an obvious cliche, but most entrepreneurs remain fixated on the Eureka! moment. If you don’t believe you have any reliable competitive advantage, you’re the kind of insecure person who will work your competition into the ground, so keep working.
It isn’t going to get better–it already is. In the early days, start-ups focus on how great it’s going to be when they succeed; but the moment they do, they start talking about how great it was before they did. Whenever I get this way, I remember the Venerable Bede’s complaint that his eighth century contemporaries had lost the fervor of seventh century monks. Even in the darkest of the Dark Ages, people were nostalgic for…the Dark Ages. Start-ups are like medieval monasteries: always convinced that paradise is just ahead or that things only recently got worse. If you can begin to enjoy the process of building a start-up rather than the outcome, you’ll be a better leader.
Truth is our only currency. At lunch last week, an engineer said the only thing he remembered from his interview was our saying the most likely outcome for Redfin–or any startup–was bankruptcy, but that he should join us anyway. It’s odd but the more we’ve tried to warn people about the risks, the more they seem to ignore them. And since you have to keep taking risks, you have to keep telling people about them. You don’t want to be like Saddam Hussein, who never prepared his generals for invasion because he couldn’t admit he didn’t have nuclear weapons.
Competition starts at $100 million. A Sequoia partner once told me that competition only starts when you hit $100 million in revenues. Maybe that number is lower now. But if you do something worthwhile, someone else will do it too. Since you can’t see what’s going on behind a competitor’s pretty website, it’s natural to assume that all the challenges we just went over only apply to your company. They don’t, so keep the faith.

read more | digg story

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

August 2, 2007

PlanHQ: A $750K Virtual Investment

PlanHQ.com is an online Business Planning and startup development tool. Doesn’t sound very sexy does it but you’d be wrong. Having been crazy enough to start three different businesses, I can painfully testify that writing and even more challenging…sticking to the thinking within a good Business Plan is extremely tough. Plan HQ is an innovative web application that helps entrepreneurs and startups not only create a business plan, but allocate tasks and track progress across the key players. If Plan HQ gets the kind of traction it should then Plan HQ will be a great little business with any number of service and product extensions for the entrepreneur. Move over 37Signals!

Business Model:
Plan HQ has a nice and simple business model…all elements of the application are hosted by Plan HQ. No downloads, no maintenance, no hosting, no contracts – If Plan HQ does work out for you or you stop needing their service, just leave. Think ‘Salesforce.com’ for business planning. Plan HQ offers a 30 day free trial (http://www.planhq.com/signup/) and then the fees are based on number of users on a monthly basis. So membership types and prices:

Mini = $9 month / 3 users / 5 active goals
Small = $24 month / 5 users / 10 active goals
Professional = $49 month / Unlimited Users / 10 active goals

Some Core Functionality:
The Plan HQ Product is sub-divided into some management categories that are usually ‘key’ for most startups and early stage companies and of course there’s a ‘Dashboard’ so you can manage and track the imperative tasks. Management ‘uber’ categories include:

The Dashboard – Covering main tasks, actions, upcoming goals, financials
The Market – Your Markets, the Competition, Customers and basic market and customer analytics
Goals – Actual Goals, Add new goals, confidence of achievement and more
Financials – Performance, Indicators, graphs
The Business Plan Document itself
Team – Who have you got, who do you need

Likes:
I really like the Plan HQ business model and the product itself, it’s especially relevant for those businesses that are focused on moving towards significant growth and the Venture Capital route.

The Product seems to cover the key elements of what a young company needs to focus on and allows enough configuration that the users are not ‘locked in’ to Plan HQ already good business management methodology
I hate to put it like this but for those ‘new’ to building businesses from just a plan, the product can really help ensuring the key team members focus on what’s important to any business but especially the ‘young’ business…Customers, revenues, the team and fund raising.
As its a web ap, this product is especially helpful for a distributed or virtual team and also for bringing angels, other investors and advisors easily into the key decision making process. It could actually help get Advisors pulling their weight by locking them into real trackable actions. Wow! Could this product really do this?

Dislikes:
Not so much dislikes as potential questions and ‘like to sees’:

Paypal as a form of payment. As a small business owner I don’t like adding my credit card to ongoing online services.
The positioning is ‘Create, update, track and collaborate around your business plan’. Business Plans eventually fall by the wayside as the business scales and grows beyond a certain stage or size. As a ‘virtual’ investor, I’d like to see how all the data captured through initial usage and the service ’scales’ with the business. i.e. beyond the business plan and becoming an ongoing discipline and tool for managing the business ongoing.
I’d like to see a referral program and a ‘Reseller’ model. For example, a startup I’m involved with ‘Advisor Garage’ (http://www.AdvisorGarage.com) has 1000+ entrepreneurs, angels and VCs onboard. This is a service many of our members would probably like to use – can our company ’subscribe’ and offer the Plan HQ service to our members for a fee? I hope so! Let me know if any Plan HQ folks read this…

What’s unclear:

how the data exports or integrates with other systems – i.e. quickbooks etc
Are the ‘Permissions’ configurable? Will all signees be able to access all data? Would a CEO want that?

My Virtual Investment:
With my virtual $1M, I would ask PlanHQ to include me in their ‘Virtual Investment’ plans to the tune of $750K. Once they establish this market, their are so many obvious product extensions that driving great revenues will be easy and hey…they have the tool to manage those new businesses. Great job Plan HQ!

http://www.planhq.com/

Andrew – Founder
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

read more | digg story

July 30, 2007

40 Marketing Methods for Frugal Entrepreneurs and Startups

A list of 40 different ways for a startup or a person to get branded, all with relatively zero cost.

read more | digg story

July 16, 2007

37signals profiled in Time Magazine

At 37signals, a company with just eight employees whose Web-based collaboration software is used by thousands of small businesses, there isn’t time to sit around a conference room sipping latte and deconstructing memos. Come to think of it, there isn’t even a company conference room. There are just a couple of cubicles, loads of brainpower and three simple goals: make useful business software, make it easy to run, make money selling it. Repeat.

An article with some great ideas and lessons for entrepreneurs. Worth a read!

http://www.advisorgarage.com/community/node/128

Andrew – Founder
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com/community

June 27, 2007

My First Startup. What Did I Do Wrong? What Would You Do Different?

When the founders of X-It Products saw a billion-dollar rival imitate the design of their popular new fire-escape ladder, they didn’t have much hope that their tiny start-up could survive. Amazingly, it has. Andrew couldn’t sleep one night in his dorm at Harvard Business School. The smoke alarms were blaring again. Andrew assumed that the alarm

read more | digg story

June 21, 2007

Softlaunch of Advisor Garage Community

So, after lots of hard work the Advisor Garage Community site is now live! http://www.advisorgarage.com/community/

The Advisor Garage community site has taken us quite some time to create and there will be little bugs here and there so please don’t go too crazy with us as we continue to improve it.

The Community site includes a significant amount of tools for Advisor Garage members such as:

Groups:
The ability to create a group for members with similar interests, locations and so on. Group members can create Group specific content such as email, private messages, events, blogs, image galleries and so on. As a member of Advisor Garage you might want to consider creating your own Advisor Garage ‘Group’. Perhaps based on your location, area of interest or expertise, or relating to your Startup.

Groups can create their own personal network, invite others, create member only forums, blogs, events, private message and email each other, share videos, stories, experiences, and a whole lot more – creating a focused network for all members.

Anyone can be a moderator of a new group. Start one today!

Build your Personal Network:
Start building your own personal network by reaching out to other members and requesting they become a ‘Buddy’. Buddies can private message each other, keep track of buddies recent posts and more.

Blogs:
Why not create your oww Advisor Garage blog today and begin to get your thoughts and contributions ‘out there’.

Forums:
You know what forums are – so just go join in! Or be one of the first and start the topic discussion.

Events:
Know about or want to create an event for others to attend? You can do that now from your Advisor Garage community navigation bar for all members or perhaps specific members of your Group.

Polls:
Interested in how members would vote on any particular question? Create a poll today and see what the Community think.

Private Messaging:
Contact a community member via Advisor Garage Private Messaging.

NOTICE: Advisor Garage Core Site Members Will Also Need to Create a Community Site Account as well as regular folks.

Although Advisor Garage core site members may already have a user name and password for the core site, those members will also need to create an Advisor Garage Community Site account. Why?

Because we would like to keep the data between the two sites separate given the more ‘viral’ nature of a community site. We came to the decision that it would be better for user privacy if the main Advisor Garage site and the Advisor Garage Community were linked but not sharing the same user information. That’s why you’ll need a separate account for both – by all means use the same login and password for both if you wish.

The downside is that all new members of the community will need to create a user account. The upside is your personal information is even more secure AND it only takes a short time to create an account with a lot less user information as ‘required’.

We hope you enjoy the Advisor Garage Community site – its taken a lot of late sleepless nights. Its still early days so there may be a few teething troubles…let us know if you experience any and we’ll jump right on them.

So – Check it out! http://www.advisorgarage.com/community/

Andrew
Founder

June 16, 2007

606Tech.com: Interview with Advisor Garage by Kristen Nicole

606Tech.com were nice enough to ask for an interview about Advisor Garage, here’s the article:

Advisor Garage is a company that was founded for Entreprenuers by Entreprenuers with the hopes of growing opportunity for both ends of the business spectrum–the experienced and the start-ups. With Advisor Garage, those looking for advice, funding, capital and mentorship can find the resources they need to guide them in the right direction when it comes to starting their own company from the ground up, or taking their fledgling company to the next level. Advisor Garage also grants those that have been sucessfull participants in the industry a chance to help others, stay abreast of what’s going on in the business world, and invest in ideas they believe are worthwhile.

I recently had the opportunity to meet with Andrew Makunas, founder of Advisor Garage.

What’s the story behind Advisor Garage? How did it come to be?
Advisor Garage came about through one of those typical ‘Aha’ moments that most Entrepreneurs experience. Having already started two companies, I well and truly had the bug! There really is nothing like starting a start-up. The one hesitation from company number three wasn’t an idea…they pop along like buses at a bus stop– it was ‘Do I really have to pull all those resources together again, all those different people that can help me find the cash, develop the product, those first few customers, set up the company and so on. Wouldn’t it be great if there was an online service that connected me to those people in minutes rather than months?” Aha, Company number three – Advisor Garage.

What is the purpose of Advisor Garage? What problem does it solve?
The purpose of Advisor Garage is to bring entrepreneurs and young businesses together with great business advisors who have significant experience in getting VC and angel funding, closing customers across different verticals, marketing on a shoestring (or even a big) budget, the IPO track, you name it. From day 1 we were focused on creating a secure and confidential service so Advisors could meet, evaluate and engage with Entrepreneurs with some anonymity and decide to get involved based upon the real value of the concept or young business.

Let’s face it; experienced and successful business people don’t like to get ‘out there’ too much because they have limited time and don’t like to be harassed. Advisor Garage gives them the ability to find and evaluate great ideas, and as all communications are private and through the system, they can commit when they are ready. Advisors can search for a range of great opportunities in the market, without exposing them so they can gain equity in hot companies, share some of the lessons learnt over a successful career with the next generation while maintaining their privacy from the crazier, irrelevant ideas.

Likewise, Entrepreneurs can search Advisor Garage for the ideal advisors for today’s need or problem and likewise, Advisor Garage will be there for them for tomorrow’s need or problem too.

For example, Advisors & Entrepreneurs have a ‘My Advisor Garage’ which includes a one click ‘Not Interested’ or ‘Interested’. If the person reaching out to them is not interesting, click the ‘Not Interested’ and Advisor Garage send a polite but firm email telling them so.

The advisors that participate in your program; how do you find and gather them?
Advisors come from multiple sources: our founder attended Harvard Business School and we have some pretty fantastic alumni across multiple industries, for example, something like 60 – 70% of the Fortune 500 include Harvard alumni on the Exec team. We have reached out to many of them and asked them to join Advisor Garage, and quite a few have.

Another big source of referrals are Advisor recommendations encouraging other quality advisors to Advisor Garage. It also helps that the Advisor Garage team has been through multiple start-ups, so they already have a pretty good network of contacts across the venture capital community, angel investors, business people, and so on.

Lastly, we encourage our 250+ entrepreneurs to refer others – its amazing how powerful our own network can be–and Advisor Garage helps people leverage their own network because as more people sign up and refer others, it bring more great people into the community. Much easier than the coffee shop referral drive by meetings most entrepreneurs are used too…

How would an advice seeker best utilize your service?
That’s easy…Sign up, create an elevator pitch and go searching for an Advisor that can help you with today’s need – Funding? Customers? Sales Plan?

How are the relationships developed between advisors and advice seekers?
Entrepreneurs can search for through Advisor’s pitches across multiple categories (Fundraising / Sales / Technology / Operations / and so on)

Advisors can also search through Entrepreneur’s elevator pitches.

If either side see a pitch that looks interesting, they can reach out to that person via Advisor Garage.

How will Advisor Garage grow?
Advisor Garage will grow if it continues to add increasing value to Entrepreneurs and Advisors. We have an aggressive development plan which means we will be bringing more and more tools and functionality to members so Entrepreneurs can speed up the launch of the startup and Advisors can find more and more exciting companies to work with and perhaps gain equity in.

Seeing as growth is somewhat dependant on the willingness of users to refer others to Advisor Garage’s services, could it be considered a necessary viral growth of a different nature?
Being viral is something we actually worry about…we want ‘word of mouth’ rather than viral. Advisor Garage is all about quality rather than quantity – for us, the value of the site is the quality of the candidates so do we want viral? No. Do we want referrals? No, we NEED referrals. We are three people who want to make something happen for other entrepreneurs and for Advisor Garage. We have no, and I mean ‘NO,’ marketing budget so it has to be all about the customer experience and members realizing that they get value if they bring other quality people like themselves to Advisor Garage. We are actually discussing with our members if, at some point in the future, we should cap membership, so we only bring onboard recommended Advisor & Entrepreneurs when someone resigns from Advisor Garage. The decision isn’t close to being made yet but it really is all about quality – the right Advisors and the right Entrepreneurs who will change over time rather than everyone on the planet. So Advisor Garage is the about the right entrepreneurs and Advisors working together to create the next generations of world class startups. ”

Interview by Kristen Nicole, 606Tech.com
For the Article: http://www.606tech.com/fullarticle.php?artid=344

June 7, 2007

Micro Loans for Startups and Entrepreneurs

We have created the Advisor Garage Prosper Group for entrepreneurs and startups. For those that have not come across Prosper – its an online marketplace for people to people lending.

This Prosper group gives people the opportunity to give micro-loans to people and perhaps make a better return than they can putting the money in a CD or bank account. Worth checking out as you can lend as little as $50!

Our purpose for establishing this group is to help Advisors connect with entrepreneurs looking for micro loans before they get to the angel or venture capital stage. To join the Advisor Garage Prosper Group – click here:

https://www.prosper.com/groups/group_home.aspx?group_short_name=advisorgarage

We will reach out to Advisors first to offer them the opportunity to sign up – as Advisors join, we will communicate this additional Advisor Garage service to our 400+ entrepreneur members.

If you would like more information Time Magazine wrote an article about Prosper here…

(http://www.time.com/time/topten/2006/websites/01.html)

Any thoughts or feedback? Let us know – we would be glad to hear it.

Andrew
Founder

http://www.AdvisorGarage.com

June 1, 2007

To VC or Not to VC? That is the Question…

I have been fortunate enough…or perhaps crazy enough, to have started three companies. The first was funded by angels, the second by Venture Capitalists (VCs) and the third with no funding at all, just a few friends and duct tape.

Having tried each funding route, thought I would dig a little deeper into VC funding.

1) How We Found VCs:
a) Friends in other startups recommended specific people who worked as VCs
b) Two of us had been to business school, so we emailed VC alumni
c) We looked at young companies in our space determining which VCs backed them, and more specifically, which VCs sat on their boards.
d) Researched specific VCs using the National Association of Venture Capitalists (http://www.nvca-e-series.org/scriptcontent/membersites.cfm) and Google.

With a list of potential VCs, we talked to other entrepreneurs to understand the differences. We ultimately divided them into three categories:

i) High Profile VCs or ‘VC Brand Names’ e.g.:
Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers: http://www.kpcb.com/
Sequoia Capital: http://www.sequoiacap.com/?
Draper Fisher: http://www.dfj.com/

ii) Smaller, Younger, Boutiques with Strong Individuals (e.g.)
Red Rock Ventures (Laura Brege): http://www.redrockventures.com/
Shasta Ventures (Ravi Mohan): http://www.shastaventures.com/
WoodSide Fund (Dan Ahn / Tom Shields): http://www.woodsidefund.com

iii) More Obscure: No examples to protect the innocent…
+
Having determined which VCs we wanted to contact, we ranked them and put our least favorite at the top of the list. Those would be the ones we contacted first. This was absolutely the way to approach it as raising VC funds is a skill like any other…and in the beginning, we couldn’t have been much worse.

2) How We got Them Interested:
We created:
a) A short summary of the business concept
b) An overview of the founder’s experiences
c) The problem we wanted to solve
d) A one pager on what differentiated our company from the competition

Having pulled these together, we ran them by an Advisor that had previously raised VC capital and had them ‘sanity’ check it. Then, we gave emailed, faxed and posted until our fingers were raw.

Did we send a few out and saw what happened? No, we sent out as many as we could figuring it was a bit of a numbers game…That was the beginning of a twelve month process to raise $6M.

3) What Were the VC’s Looking For?
The obvious answer is ‘well that depends on the VC’…this is true, to a degree. We probably met 25 different VC firms and they all seemed, at least initially, to want very different things. But after a time, a pattern seemed to emerge…they all seemed to be interested in nearly the same things but the weightings they placed on each differed.

What were they?

i) The Team
The strength of the team was almost everything! Even the best business model with customers clambering for the product can still fail if the wrong team is at the helm. Likewise, the right team can take a mediocre business and make it shine.
ii) The Opportunity
How big could this business be? Will it be a $10M or a $100M business in five years? How defensible is it? Who are the Competitors? Who are the potential customers?VCs are trying to determine – Risk VS. Reward. VCs need to deliver a return on their investor’s money…as a certain number of companies fail, they need a 3 or 5 or 6 X of their original investment. The actual number obviously depends on a number of factors.
iii) The Differentiator/Uniqueness:
Why is this business different? What does it have that other companies do not? What will make customer buy from this company?
iv) Exit Strategy:
How can we (as VCs) realize our investment? Read – How can we get our multiple back? Will this company be acquired? Can it be a candidate for an IPO? Or will it bumble along for many years make a steady but unexciting profit? Guess which ones the VCs will invest in…

4) Doing the Deal:
VCs can have their own internal preferences as far as ‘the deal’ is concern. Examples:
i) Some prefer to be sole investors – they are taking all the risk
ii) Some like to share the deal with certain other VC firms i.e. they will make investments alongside other VCs firms they have worked alongside in the past. Note: If you have your minds set on one VC firm, look at their previous investments and see who they have invested alongside. You may need to get onboard two or three firms to get the deal done.
iii) Some like to lead a deal (i.e. set the terms) but want other VCs to share the risk with them.…and what do they want for their Investment? E.g.:

a) Equity:
A certain percentage of the company often with the knowledge that if the company goes through additional rounds of funding, their investment will decline…therefore they may want a percentage within a given range…say 30-40%.
b) A Board Seat:
If the VC has invested a large sum, they will likely want at least one board seat so they can help move the company in the ‘right’ direction.
c) The Right to Re-Invest or Purchase More Equity at a Given Price
d) Etc

5) The Question of Management:
What are founders of startups good at? The reality is that most founders are good at exactly that…starting and growing a young company.

Unfortunately, the skills necessary to successfully start a company, get the first few customers and take it to 30 employees are not necessarily the same skills to manage a company when it has multiple customers and has 200 people onboard.

Even the best startup stars can make lousy corporate executives. Attention Deficit Disorder just being one entrepreneurial strength that soon becomes an executive liability. Sorry folks, but its true!

So as a startup founder, what can you do?

1) Recognize that you have started something great, something that has a real chance of success but it may be better served by someone else as the big enchilada. The reality may be that your ‘baby’ will reach it full potential best if you hand it over to someone with a skill set that you may not have. Also, those people you see around you, they bought into your dream and it’s now paying for their homes, the kid’s schools and braces, they trusted you to do the best thing for the company. That may mean handing the CEO role on…
2) Learn How to Be a Great Exec – This means focus, discipline and developing a skill set that you may not naturally have. Work on these skills fast…otherwise, if the board feels you are jeopardizing their investment, they may make this decision for you.
3) Start Company No.2 and enjoy the buzz all over again…

So, having raised $21M through the venture capital community with company No.2 (Series A & B), what route did we take with No.3 i.e. http://www.AdvisorGarage.com ?

We decided to bootstrap it, so no angels and no VCs. Why?

http://www.AdvisorGarage.com began not as a means of taking over the world but because a few friends came together to do what they could to fix a problem…i.e. we wanted to help other entrepreneurs get their business started fast and with less pain. That meant helping them ‘connect the dots’ in days and weeks, not months or perhaps years.

For us, the time consuming part of starting a business was pulling the various resources together… http://www.AdvisorGarage.com was our answer to speeding up that process for other startup geeks like us.

Advisor Garage was started by three people, almost two years ago, while we all did other things too…family (me), tried living in a new country (MM) and made music (H).

Are we trying to be the next YouTube…No…are we hoping to make a difference…maybe a little.

Any questions or thoughts? Love to hear from you ‘cos otherwise I’m just talking (or writing) to myself…and if that the case, it won’t be long until the white coats arrive.

PS. Please tell your friends about Advisor Garage…the more people on the site, the more value for all!

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com
https://advisorgarage.wordpress.com

May 16, 2007

Help Penetrating the Japanese Market: IT, Mobile, Oil / Gas, Chemical, Plastics, Agriculture, Food

Having launched new products into new markets I can honestly say that it is always more challenging and takes more time and resources than you can ever imagine – especially if you are not ingrained in the business culture of the new countries.

Inc.com (http://www.inc.com) included a number of articles in their April 2007 edition focused on “Going Global”. One of my takeouts from those articles was that you really need someone who has been through the creation and development of new businesses in your target market if you want to optimize your chances of success.

Within Advisor Garage we have advisors from pretty much every country you can think of and covering every continent across the globe – combine this location presence with a broad array of experiences and the Advisors within Advisor Garage could be critical for any company wanting to take their strong national foundations and begin to expand their business foot print abroad. So, if you are looking at penetrating new markets and have Japan in your sights – you should probably reach out to one of the most recent Advisors to sign up to Advisor Garage…

Username :	Paulownia
City:	Tokyo
State:
Country:	Japan

Advisory Pitch	Advisor
	Entry strategy for Japanese market.	Paulownia

Role Offered:	Short term
Service:	Other
Industry:	Services
Experience:	More than 20 years
Remuneration Sought:	Fee

Interested? Click here to reach out to this advisor…Advisor Garage is a free resource for entrepreneurs and advisors – helping them connect so young businesses can move their businesses forward. Come along and take a look…

Andrew
Founder
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com

May 14, 2007

Are You Ready for Venture Capital Investment?

Is your company ready for a VC investment? Perhaps you have already been through a round of angel funding, have locked in your first customers, have some key members of the management team onboard and begun to see your business grow.

As the founder of your company you already know what other pieces of the successful business puzzle are needed before your business is ready for the significant growth that it should and could achieve. Part of that equation may be securing a financial backer that will be with you for the long haul…if that’s the case, it might be time to consider venture capital investment.

What Are VC’s Looking For?
The obvious answer is ‘well that depends on the VC’…this is true, to a degree. We probably met 25 different VC firms and they all seemed, at least initially, to want very different things. But after a time, a pattern seemed to emerge…they all seemed to be interested in nearly the same things but the weightings they placed on each differed.

What were they?

i) The Team
The strength of the team was almost everything! Even the best business model with customers clambering for the product can still fail if the wrong team is at the helm. Likewise, the right team can take a mediocre business and make it shine.
ii) The Opportunity
How big could this business be? Will it be a $10M or a $100M business in five years? How defensible is it? Who are the Competitors? Who are the potential customers? VCs are trying to determine – Risk VS. Reward. VCs need to deliver a return on their investor’s money…as a certain number of companies fail, they need a 3 or 5 or 6 X of their original investment. The actual number obviously depends on a number of factors.
iii) The Differentiator/Uniqueness:
Why is this business different? What does it have that other companies do not? What will make customer buy from this company?
iv) Exit Strategy:
How can we (as VCs) realize our investment? Read – How can we get our multiple back? Will this company be acquired? Can it be a candidate for an IPO? Or will it bumble along for many years make a steady but unexciting profit? Guess which ones the VCs will invest in…

After working through the above, part of the equation for success is to be ready to take a VC through the business opportunity that your company represents as impactfully and as compelling a presentation as possible. Sometimes even the best businesses fail to get funding or even interest from the first few VC meetings because they are not ready to present…perhaps they have not refined the message enough, or realistically thought through the real world challenges of the business…or perhaps that just don’t present well.

When we went through the VC process, we made sure we met with the VCs we were less enthusiastic about first…we almost considered them practice before the big date with the VCs we wanted. This helped us refine our thinking, messaging and presentations skills.

Another route to consider is getting together with an Advisor that can prepare you for those critical meetings that could means a million dollars or more being invested in your business. Considering how critical this cash could be to the success of your startup, your employees and you, that would be really worth considering…

If you are interested in connecting with an Advisor that can improve your chances of locking in that big money…consider reaching out to:

Advisory Pitch

Advisor

“You never get a second chance to make a first impression” applies to pitching investors and your “slide deck” is not your presentation, you are. Before approaching your most likely investors prepare, focus, practice, polish, your pitch so that your passion comes through credibly and confidently. You wouldn’t give them a draft of your business plan, don’t give them a draft of your presentation either.

Role Offered:	Ongoing
Service:	Fundraising
Industry:	Technology
Experience:	15-20 years
Remuneration Sought:	TBD

An Associated Press award-winning broadcaster and Certified Management Consultant by The Institute of Management Consultants, since 1992 Tom has been a communications coach/consultant to senior executives in presentation, public speaking and media skills. He has more than 20 years of on-air media experience and over 16 years’ strategic-communications consulting experience with entrepreneurs to officers and senior executives of international companies including IBM, Roche, MIT, Millipore, Bosch, and others. His clients successfully develop and deliver focused, effective, and memorable messages, internally and externally, including effective use of the Web, print, and broadcast media. He delivers regular presentations at the Harvard School of Public Health, Institute of Management Consultants, Society of Professional Consultants and numerous national and international organizations.

tom@kennedygroupboston.com

Interested? Click here to reach out to this advisor…

If you are considering raising a significant amount of cash for your early stage company, being ready for Venture Capital meetings will take time and if there is one piece of advice we were given that really helped throughout “Make sure you seem in demand and do not appear desperate or needy” – meeting with VCs is almost like a first date…confidence and excitement are critical for success.

Good luck!

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com

March 29, 2007

Top 10 Tips for What Can Make or Break Your Startup

Three startups later and I have made more than my share of mistakes. Some of them real whoppers. Maybe if I had read this beforehand I’d have made fewer…perhaps not!

Getting Started:
The worst way of having your startup fail is never starting it. Its guaranteed to fail then. If you are reading this and do not have a startup – why not? Still waiting for that unique idea? It doesn’t exist! It really is all about executing better than the next startup down the street – that’s one way your business will be unique. How you deliver the value to the customer is how you will differ from all the other ‘me too’s’.

The Right Funds:
All cash is the same right? Wrong! When you accept someone’s money, then you have a responsibility to the investor – even Aunty Cathy. You need to take onboard their likes and dislikes, their suggestions and manage their expectations. It becomes part of your full time job. Be careful who you accept cash from – and try to get more than just cash – so always be on the look out for ‘smart money’ – so called because they add more than just the green stuff.

Keep the Cash Burn Down:
Whatever it is you probably don’t need it! Or if you really do need it, perhaps you don’t need to own it…beg, borrow, haggle perhaps go to eBay but whatever it is – don’t be tempted to pay full retail. Having it does not mean you are a real company – every cent spent before real revenue is another second off of the life of your startup. If you really, really, really need it – perhaps get it next week instead of today. If you got to where you are without it – give yourselves a few more days – you’ll be that much closer to revenue.

Meet the Milestones
Meet the milestones. Not just for your investors (if you have any) but for your employees, your fellow founders, yourself and perhaps even your customers. Make sure you have some small milestones too – ones that track the progress and growth of your wonderful idea. Have huge hairy milestones too but don’t gamble your reputation on achieving them – make those the ‘let’s get their soon people’ rather than ‘ we’ll get there next Tuesday’.

The Right Team:
Not just people that can do the job today but people who can do the next job next month and next year. People who won’t drive each other crazy – picking their feet over the workstation may be cute during your early tie die days but won’t help you if Kleiner Perkins comes calling. Think about the now and the tomorrow when picking the team – try not to be too relieved that someone else is just as crazy as you and wants to join – they’ll need more than that to make the cut as a valuable team member.

The Right First Customers:
The right first customer sees you for what you are and still wants to be your partner. Stop. A partner…not just a customer. The best and worst day for my first business was winning the big elephant deal – they were the most challenging customer we ever had! Certainly NOT a good first customer!

Infrastructure:
Don’t build it unless you absolutely and positively need it yesterday. Back to cash burn. But when you become a real engine propelled company, make sure you recognize when you need to take the company to the next level – they’ll come a point where the old, cute, cheap ways hack off the employees and even worse – the customers.

Discipline:
Introduce it from day 1. Especially from a financial perspective and its nice to be a ‘friend’ to everyone as the founder and CEO but the buck still stops with you. Make sure its respectful friendship because when the brown stuff starts to flow (and it will) – you need to be able to quickly and efficiently guide all the people in the business.

Focus:
Focus everything on one perhaps two things – each new idea should not be pursued but saved for when the top 1 or 2 priorities come to fruition. Avoid flip flopping in your focus if something doesn’t immediately come through. Figure out why it hasn’t and try again. Save those great ideas – don’t chase them.

Marketing:
Publicity is king. Its almost free and people believe it a lot more than a one page ad in your magazine of choice. Don’t spend the cash on lots of marketing – but do invest in ‘looking’ like a big and real company through inexpensive means such as your website.

Just a few thoughts. Let me know your list!

Andrew
Founder
Http://www.AdvisorGarage.com

February 26, 2007

Advisor Garage: New Functionality & Improvements

Every few days we’ve received emails from Advisor Garage members. Thanks and keep them coming! Some of these emails suggest improvements and additional functionality that members would like to see. We have recently added additional functionality to Advisor Garage based on these emails.

Latest Advisors & Locations:
1) Our home page (http://www.advisorgarage.com/index.htm) on the bottom left side now includes a dynamic list of new Advisors. This section includes the Advisors usernames which you can click through to the Advisor’s profile and their location.

It has been facinating to see the breadth of Advisors signing up and where they are located, last week for example, I looked down the new Advisors list and saw they were from New York, San Francisco, London, Shanghai, Singapore, Australia and quite a few other places. Given we have zero advertising budget it blows my mind that word of mouth about Advisor Garage’s value and services is reaching countries that are thousands of miles apart. If I wasn’t focused on delivering more and more improvements to Advisor Garage, it would be interesting to map the power of word of mouth in terms of reaching people across continents.

Angels and Venture Capital Role & Search:
2) We have just added the capability for Advisors to create Profile’s and Advisor Pitches as Angels and Venture Capitalists. In turn, Advice seekers can search on these categories and also look for Advisors that wish to provide funds to Entrepreneurs as either Angels or Venture Capitalists.

This was one piece of functionality that a number of members have requested and Michael, our Advisor Garage technical Magic Maker delivered and squeezed out this weekend.

So, if you are an Advisor who has an interest in being an investor in a hot new company, either create a profile as an Angel or create an Angel ‘pitch’ by clicking here (http://www.advisorgarage.com/offerAdvice.htm)

If you are a Venture Capitalist and would like to create a profile or Advisory pitch offering your services as a VC, click here: (http://www.advisorgarage.com/offerAdvice.htm)

How is it Going?
We launched Advisor Garage about in December and have never spent a dime on Advertising. Not because we don’t want to…we just don’t have the cash to spend on ads yet. However, over the last twelve weeks approximately 300+ Advisors and 300+ advice seekers have signed up to Advisor Garage.

Why Can’t You see them All?
Everyone whether members or not, can search through Advisor Garage and see what Advisors are onboard. However, to protect their confidentiality and contact details, only Advisors who have created Advisor Pitches are ‘visible’ and can be found. That means you can probably see 60-70% of all Advisors within Advisor Garage at this point. If you are an Advisor within Advisor Garage and would like to create a 30 second pitch, click here: (http://www.advisorgarage.com/offerAdvice.htm)

Only Advisors can see and search the entrepreneurs within Advisor Garage. AG has been created this way as most entrepreneurs would probably prefer it if their new business ideas are not visible to all. But if they have not created an elevator pitch then seekers are also ‘invisible’. If you are an Advisor Garage advice seeker, create a new pitch by clicking here: (http://www.advisorgarage.com/seekAdvice.htm)

What’s Are we working on now?
We are focused on a significant range of additional functions and services that will be included within Advisor Garage and made available in the April timeframe. Fingers crossed! These elements with significantly enhance the benefits to all Advisor Garage members and should be central to helping entrepreneurs in their efforts to build their businesses and for Advisors to help find and help hot new companies. More details? We’ll raise the cloak on the day of launch…stay tuned!

What would you like to see next on Advisor Garage?
We want to hear about improvements and additional services you want to see and use. Let us know by contacting us via the Advisor Garage website. http://www.AdvisorGarage.com

Andrew
Founder
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com
http://AdvisorGarage.wordpress.com (Blog)

February 4, 2007

The Starfish & The Spider: A Social Networking Experiment

Amazon.com did it’s thing on Thursday and delivered a book I had been waiting for with some excitment. Opening the small brown box, I pulled the book out…here it was “The Starfish & the Spider; The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations. Jumping in, I was soon engrossed.

Taking a two day step back in time, Michael, Hemant and I were working on what additional tools and functions to add to Advisor Garage(http://www.AdvisorGarage.com). We were looking at useful, valueable features without ‘going viral’.

Somehow these two activities became blended on Saturday, so I thought I would try an experiment…I took some of the tools and functionality we were looking at for Advisor Garage and create a ‘leaderless’ experiment. i.e. a place where people can brainstorm ideas, work with others on them, knock them around a bit and leverage online tools to move them forward. If people ‘got into it’ them maybe the ideas behind “Starfish & the Spider” could actually be right.

So let’s see….take a look at my weekend experiment, the only rule is, do whatever you want with it…anything, no boss, no ‘can’ or ‘can’ts’, it’s all about to the people that try it out…

http://www.IdeaSplicing.com – A place for Great Ideas people to splice their ideas with others and move them forward however they want. An Open Source approach to ideas if you like… That’s the experiment. Let’s see if people try it out…

Let me know…

Andrew
http://www.AdvisorGarage.com
http://AdvisorGarage.wordpress.com

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