MVP: Are You Building a Death Star?
Empires build Death Stars, rebels build X-Wing fighters. If your startup’s minimum viable product is a Death Star you are doing it wrong.
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Podcast with Pete Tormey: Bootstrapper’s Delegation Checklist
Pete Tormey and I did a short podcast on a delegation checklist. We wanted to help bootstrapping entrepreneurs decide what tasks it made the most sense to delegate in an early stage startup.
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Before You Can Score You Must Have A Goal
Before you can score you must have a goal. If you haven’t set your goals for the next six months now is a good time to write them down.
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Byron Wien’s Lessons Learned in 80 Years: Seven for Entrepreneurs
7 Tips for Entrepreneurs from “Lessons Learned in 80 Years” by Byron Wien. The best is “Don’t try to be better than your competitors, try to be different.”
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Tips for Choosing a Logo
Tips for Choosing a Logo We get a number of questions about logos, here are three tips for designing or choosing a logo when you are bootstrapping or just getting started: Text Treatments: text logos are simple, the company name is always right there. Most high tech logos are text treatments, they are clear and
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Dean Kamen on Good Design and Where to Begin
An excerpt from an interview with Dean Kamen in “Imagine Design Create” by Tom Wujec. Kamen suggests entrepreneurs look for outmoded perspectives preventing the use of technologies that are “available, affordable, reliable, functional.”
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Making Adjustments at the Half for 2013
The four day 4th of July weekend is a good excuse to take a break from the day to day pressures of bootstrapping, reflect on your goals for the year and what you have accomplished and learned so far…and perhaps make some “adjustments at the half.”
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Quotes For Entrepreneurs–June 2013
You can follow @skmurphy to get these hot off the mojo wire or wait until these quotes for entrepreneurs are collected in a blog post at the end of each month. Enter your E-mail if you would like new blog posts to your inbox.
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Upcoming MVP Clinics in July and August for Startup Entrepreneurs
Sean Murphy, CEO of SKMurphy Inc will be moderating two upcoming MVP Clinics. These are interactive roundtable discussions were entrepreneurs can present where they are with their MVP and hypotheses about customer, problem, solution, and value. The roundtable will explore issues that founders are having in defining and evaluating their MVP. Bootstrappers Breakfast on July
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Validating Your MVP For B2B Startups at SF Lean Startup Circle Tue-Jun-4
We have been invited back the SF Lean Startup Circle to present our “Validating Your MVP and Value Proposition for B2B Startups” workshop on June 4, starting 5:30pm. This interactive workshop will address: How a B2B startup should think about message, MVP, and launch. Understand who buys your product and how they calculate its value and
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Quotes For Entrepreneurs–May 2013
A collection of quotes of interest and use to entrepreneurs: these quotes for entrepreneurs were identified in May 2013. You can follow @skmurphy to get these hot off the mojo wire or wait until these quotes for entrepreneurs are collected in a blog post at the end of each month. Enter your E-mail if you would
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Paul Spaan Offers 3D Printing Show & Tell Fri-May-24 at Mountain View BB
Join other entrepreneurs for serious conversations about growing a business based on internal cash flow and organic profit at a Bootstrappers Breakfast®. Paul Spaan, CEO of Spaan Enterprises, will offer a seven minute briefing on “3D Printing For Bootstrappers” and circulate examples of prototype products he has printed. Paul’s briefing will be followed by our regular roundtable
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Founder Story: Ari Halberstadt of Catalee on Founder’s Dilemmas
Theresa Shafer met Ari Halberstadt at a Bootstrapper Breakfast in SF earlier this year and was very impressed with his approach to his new startup, Catalee. Ari volunteered to talk with me about Noam Wasserman‘s “The Founder’s Dilemmas” as well as Catalee.
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Reminder: Successful Consulting Engagements With Startups at IEEE-CNSV Tue-May-21
Quick reminder: I will be moderating a panel on “Successful Consulting Engagements with Startups” at the May 21 IEEE-CNSV meeting. I volunteered to pull this panel together after a long thread on the CNSV e-mail list June about the topic. I have been fortunate to attract three knowledgeable and experienced engineers to take part in the
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Holly DeVito on Basic Financial Controls for Bootstrappers Tue-May-21 BB in Sunnyvale
Holly DeVito presents basic financial controls that need to be in place early for bootstrappers to manage their business and ensure profitable growth.
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For New Products Prospect Objections Are Valuable Data
If your prospect keep raising the same stupid objections and asking the same dumb questions it’s likely that your presentation is lacking or you are frequently talking to the wrong people. For new products, prospect objections are valuable data. Explore the implications and adjust your presentation and demo accordingly.
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Learning the Right Lessons From Failure
John Finneran’s postmortem: “Fat startup: Learn the lessons of my failed Lean Startup” shows he did not learn the right lessons from failure.
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Due Diligence Checklist For Evaluating A Service Business for Acquisition
We recently advised a client on a possible acquisition of a small service business and developed this due diligence checklist.
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Podcast with Pete Tormey on Forming a Team, Dividing Equity, and Gaining Early Traction
A conversation with Pete Tormey on forming a team, dividing equity, and gaining early traction in a startup.
Podcast with Pete Tormey on Forming a Team, Dividing Equity, and Gaining Early Traction Read More »
They Screwed Up: They Followed Our Specification
A story from my engineering days at Cisco about how a lack of trust led to a default assumption that “they screwed up.”
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