Topic

business plans

A collection of 31 issues

Are You Off With Startup Selling Plan Like This?

With experience throughout my career of being paid to research, shape, and write business plans - not to mention creating such for my own ambitions - I've long appreciated the crossover between them and new endeavour sales planning. Especially given my time in New Product Rescue. So I duly note

4 Word Business Plan Slide

I recently came across a start-up [http://mmhmm.app] in the ‘video communication’ space. In twelve months just past, going from idea through prototype, beta release and $100 a year subscription launch whilst securing $100m [https://techcrunch.com/2021/07/07/mmhmm-raises-100m-which-is-a-fun-thing-to-say-to-people-who-dont-follow-tech/] funding and a possible $400m valuation. It helps

3 Tips To Win Investment In Dragons Den

I haven’t watched this show for years. I was surprised to learn it was still going. Once a big fan, after a few seasons of much promise, caricatures, egos and arrogance took over from the charismatic pull of genuine invention against take-to-market tension. A previous ‘dragon’ (potential investor, aka

Another Ultimate Pitch Deck Template

[https://slidemodel.com/] Spoiler Alert: It Isn’t. The web is awash with such decks to download. All manner of downloadable imagery. Theoretically enabling the standard user access to the graphic design pro. There are many criticisms of slides so peddled. To use someone else’s framework that doesn’t

Another Inc Investor Pitch Piece

These recur with quite the frequency. Yet in this instance I was pleasantly surprised. For inc.com’s May ’19 print edition cover-trailed ‘what investors really want to hear’ (p94) offered something above the lazy rehash. 9 top venture capitalists [https://www.inc.com/magazine/201905/kimberly-weisul/pitching-investors-venture-capital-money-advice-tips.html?cid=

The Death Of The Business Plan And Your Sales Plans

I recently read the 2015 update to Art of the Start. Guy Kawasaki [http://guykawasaki.com/] (currently framing himself as Evangelist Author Speaker) preaches that the business plan is no more. In its place the business pitch now rules. This is happily bad news for expensive hired hands who thieve

Kawasaki's Top Ten Entrepreneur Lies

When lecturing at Cambridge University recently, my attention was happily re-drawn to venture capital guru Guy Kawasaki. Seven years ago he wrote this seminal [http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/01/the_top_ten_lie_1.html] blog on the delusions of people that pitch him their new business idea. These

5 Million Worth Of B-Plan Tips

[https://salespodder.com/content/images/wordpress/2013/03/anyonecandoit_cover.jpg] I enjoy the occasional blog on business plan elements. I feel good ones show many facets that can be beneficially applied to sales proposals. From their book, Anyone Can Do It, the founders of the Coffee Republic high street

Sequoia Capital Sustainability

[http://www.sequoiacap.com] There can be few more fabled venture capitalists than this crew. Check their CrunchBase [http://www.crunchbase.com/financial-organization/sequoia-capital] and Wikipedia [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequoia_Capital] profiles for evidence. As of now, their assertion estimating that “14% of the NASDAQ’s value is

Investor Red Flags

[http://www.startupsmart.com.au/planning/2010-11-22/10-reasons-investors-dont-invest-in-start-ups.html] Having been paid to write business plans, I’m always interested in the parallels between launching start-ups and selling new products. A young Aussie entrepreneur here provides his checklist of 10 reasons investors don’t invest in start-ups [http://www.startupsmart.