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January 29th, 2011
We have seen a number of teams form or add co-founders as a result of discussions at or introductions from a conversation at a Bootstrappers Breakfast. The small group setting (8-16 folks around a table) doesn’t put introverts at as much of a disadvantage as having to speak to a group of 30-100 does. One facilitated conversation means that everyone gets a chance to be heard and to contribute, and the networking takes place after the event when everyone has some context from the prior discussion to be able to start a conversation.
While our primary purpose is to help entrepreneurs compare notes on common challenges related to organic growth, we have seen that these same discussions also foster a number of co-founder discussions and introductions. If you attend a breakfast in Silicon Valley we will allow you to post a brief (100-150 words) description of your startup and what you are looking for in a co-founder to our newsletter that is sent out to about 800 bootstrappers. There are a number of events in Silicon Valley that support co-founder matching in different ways: each has a different format that has its own strengths and weaknesses:
There is an even longer list of on-line only sites but I haven’t personally heard of much success from that approach. I think it’s because there is something about a face to face conversation–it communicates an order of magnitude more information that’s private and directed–that makes it hard to replicate on-line. See also last year’s “Round Up Of Co-Founding Events“
January 2nd, 2011
Hope you are enjoying your time with friends and family. Thank you for making 2010 a great year and we look forward to 2011.
Best Wishes for 2011
Sean, Theresa, Elaine, Disha & Kelly
December 26th, 2010
We have the last three Bootstrapper Breakfasts® of 2010 this week:
- Mon-Dec-27 Mountain View (Holiday) 9am register
- Wed-Dec-29 Chicago 7:30am register
- Thu-Dec-30 Sunnyvale (Holiday) 9am register
December 15th, 2010
At our last Bootstrappers Breakfast in San Francisco, we discussed having an advisory board for a startup. People had mixed opinions on how helpful it would be to have advisors.
Some felt that the advisor’s knowledge and connections helped further grow business while others felt that giving away a stake in the start-up did not outweigh benefits contributed by the advisor.
Some of our members have shared their opinion on this:
Darren Cox, Founder, M.IP.P Strategy
An excerpt from Marti Nyman’s ‘Bored of Advisors? Get a Board-of-Advisors’
One of the most underutilized assets in the world of entrepreneurship is other people’s experience. This is available in forms ranging from casual coffee interviews to customer “deep dive” discussions to formal Advisory Boards. I fear that an already overloaded work schedule all too often gets in the way of more entrepreneurs taking advantage of this valuable source of insight, guidance and ideas. It should be used a LOT more than it is today, so for would-be entrepreneurs out there, here’s a quick guide to Advisory Boards.
- Building a lasting company will invariably involve making mistakes–not lethal ones, but (hopefully) learning ones.
- Other people have made these mistakes and their willingness to share may speed your learning curve–where you can make other mistakes and learn and grow.
Read the rest here.
Lenny Greenberg, founder and Chief Technology Officer, Assistyx
I have been asked to be on advisory boards before. Unfortunately, in most cases they were form over substance. The entrepreneur was trying to show a list of experience to potential investors rather than actually take advantage of the experience.
On the flip side, I’ve seen entrepreneurs with great “kitchen cabinets;” i.e. an informal group of advisors that may or may not be investors that can be tapped when needed to fill a needed role.
Like partners, an advisory board should complement the skills of the entrepreneur and his team. An MBA and advisory board of other MBAs won’t get a product out the door. A “hands on” engineer and a board of technical advisors will likely miss markets and opportunity.
Francis Adanza, VP of Marketing & Alliances, eMobus
We have three advisory board members who we consult with individually as needed and once a quarter as a board meeting . Each advisor brings a complimentary skill set to our team. One brings fortune 50 C-Level experience, one advisor offers business, technology marketing and operational expertise to emerging technologies, and the third advisor is a recognized CTO in the cloud computing space.
They have been extremely helpful in negotiating big deals, assist with business and product planning, as well provide legal advice. Formulating an advisory board is like anything else, you need to do your due diligence in selecting individuals.
We welcome your comments as well
November 11th, 2010
Edward Tufte is the author of four beautiful and insightful books on presenting information:
He will be personally teaching a one day course three times in San Francisco and once in San Jose in December, that addresses the following topics:
- fundamental strategies of analytical design
- evaluating evidence used in presentations
- statistical data: tables, graphics, and semi-graphics
- business, scientific, research, and financial presentations
- complexity and clarity
- effective presentations: on paper and in person
- interface design
- use of PowerPoint, video, overheads, and handouts
- multi-media, internet, and websites
- credibility of presentations
- animation and scientific visualizations
- many practical examples
Fee for the one-day course is $380 per person. This fee includes all four books, Visual Explanations, Envisioning Information, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, and Beautiful Evidence.
Dates and Locations
- ?San Jose Holiday Inn December 6, 201o register
- San Francisc, Westin on Market Street
I took the course about a decade ago before he had written “Beautiful Evidence” and found it to be extremely useful. The books are great references as well.
November 2nd, 2010
At the Bootstrappers Breakfast at San Diego, Moe Arnaiz, founder of eMOBUS?, a fast growing leader in mobility management services and software shared his experiences bootstrapping his venture. Moe discussed the best ways to launch your new technology on a budget, tips on getting those early first customers and growing your business organically with cash flow. Here are notes of his remarks and the Q&A session.
1. How to launch a new technology on a budget?
- Keep in mind that people don’t buy software they buy results.
- Don’t build from scratch what you don’t have to (leverage PaaS àQuickbase)
- Canned Functionality (reporting, emails, security, export to CSV)
- Open source, ruby on rails, MySQL, hosted in Amazon’s EC2 environment
- Keep a prioritized road map, ask customers for feedback, tweak as needed. Will they pay for it?
- Build bells & whistles as your customers will pay for them
- Be creative with your deal making (PDF Scrubbing tool)
- Have people in place to fill technology gaps and drive adoption
- Keep investing
2. How to get your early customers on a budget?
- Start in the Mid Market
- Be vertical specific (eMOBUS was construction)
- Greatly support your customers/partners/etc.
- Tell your story. Get your customers to talk for you. Create press releases/case studies/whitepapers
- Partnerships – Find partners who will be able to fill a void or need. Expect them to take a long time to bring in business
- Build relationships and ask for referrals
3. How to grow a business organically via cash flow?
- Revenue then expenses. Easier to spend $, than make it.
- Pay yourself as low as bearable
- Keep Recurring Operational expenses low
- Leverage the cloud/web based apps to minimize IT support needs
- Rent
- Travel
- Track your spending, to see what your return is.
- People make your business, hire better than you, and don’t be cheap!
November 1st, 2010
Chip Conley, Founder & Executive Chairman, Joie de Vivre Hospitality spoke at the Enlightened Business Summit on “Leadership Lessons From Two Dozen Years as a CEO.” Here are some key points of his talk.
- The most neglected fact in business is we’re all humans.
- Great leaders are great humans.
- Employees have three needs from their work:
- Money
- Recognition
- Meaning
- When starting a small company, you’ll have to compete with big people.
- Go after a little niche that you can serve best.
- Make sure you measure the right things.
- There are many intangibles that can make a huge difference:
- culture,
- reputation,
- ability to motivate,
- customer loyalty,
- employee satisfaction.
- As Albert Einstein said,
“Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.”
- Your actions as a leader are magnified much more. What goes around comes around.
I would like to thank Matt Cameron, CEO, CorporateCatapult?, for suggesting the Enlightened Business Summit.
October 29th, 2010
At a recent Bootstrappers Breakfast in San Francisco Bootstrappers Breakfast we discussed mistakes that first time entrepreneurs often make and came up with this list:
- Don’t try to replicate processes of your former big employer. The chances are highly likely they will not suit your start-up.
- Don’t rush into a co-founder or employment relationship. Take time to find the right co-founder and hire the right people.
- If you start out working with friends, relatives, etc, have everything spelled out clearly in writing. Plain English is fine, but make sure everyone agrees.
- Looking for investment when you can bootstrap. First have paying customers who generate cash flow. Once VCs see that you have a business that you can scale, getting them to invest will be easier.
- Don’t just tell your friends about your ideas, they may be too polite to tell you about problems. Find out if you can get a real customer to agree to pay for it.
- Don’t try and buy the sale: make sure customers pay adequately for the services that they get.
- Don’t hire a salesperson until you know how the product can be sold. You need to be the salesperson initially as you would get to know prospect’s and customer feedback.
I sent this list to the Bootstrappers Breakfast Yahoo Group and and several folks offered additional suggestins.
Contributed by Eduardo Briceno, CEO, Mindset Works: I’d add the top 5 reasons why businesses fail according to Joel Peterson:
- Make wrong hire-fire decisions,
- Run out of cash,
- Culture (violate values, norms),
- Founder issues (founder can often not scale and lead the company), and
- Not adjusting what they need in order to serve the marketplace
From Leonard (Lenny) Greenberg is Founder and CTO of Assistyx LLC:
- Get your product out the door and into real (paying) users’ hands. Figure out the minimal set of features that will sell and get it done.
- Profile your buyer like an FBI profiler would. The more you understand your buyer the better you can market or sell to them.
- Don’t hire a sales person until you have a buyer profile, can clearly articulate the BENEFITS and attempted a few sales yourself.
Mary Beth Deans CEO of Palazzotech
Don’t get ahead of yourself…..don’t invest in expensive people, software or services you don’t need right away. As your business evolves, it will change. What you thought was critical at one time might be unnecessary 6 months later. And guaranteed you’ll have other things you need to use that money for….
October 20th, 2010
This is a free teleseminar (including recordings) from Oct 25th – Oct 29th on “The secrets to creating successful businesses that marry passion with profits”. The summit is hosted by Chip Conley, Founder and Executive Chairman, Joie de Vivre Hospitality.
The summit features 40 pioneers who are CEOs, academics, New York Times bestselling authors, TED speakers and provocateurs. A few of them include John Mackey, Co-CEO of WholeFoods, George Zimmer, CEO of Men’s Wearhouse, bestselling authors Tim Ferriss, Keith Ferrazzi, etc
You can register at http://enlightenedbusinesssummit.com/
October 19th, 2010
Mary Beth Deans, CEO of PalazzoTech, shared some tips on inspiring employee loyalty at a recent Bootstrappers Breakfast in San Francisco.
- Set clear expectations with employees and have everything in writing. Don’t be afraid to have them sign contracts. Make sure employee and company goals are aligned.
- Make sure that you as the employer mean what you say. Actions speak louder than words.
- Make sure employees are well taken care of and be accommodating within reason.
- Let them know that it is ok to vent their feelings as long as work isn’t affected
- Let employees know their opinion counts; listen to what they say and act on the best suggestions—then give them credit.
- Be open with them in sharing information about projects, company financials, again within reason. The more information your employees have, the better decisions they can make.
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