If you’re projecting more than 30% profits, you’re missing most of your costs When looking at financial projections of early-stage startups, ...

The only path to success for a startup is to become the leader in your market Most startup pitches I see have a similar story: the market for X ...

Keep your customers happy if you want to keep your customers A friend was complaining about how antiquated the apartment maintenance business ...

Before you start pitching, know what kind of investor you’re looking for and what kind of deal they want Startup founders: how many episodes of ...

What’s the point of a pitch deck? Hint — it’s not to get investment. It’s pitching season again and I’m drowning in bad pitch decks. Each one ...

Avoid these startup traps to ensure the best chance of success Over the past ten years, I’ve mentored all kinds of startups. And I’ve seen ...

Avoid getting over-excited at demo days and investor gatherings When I first started attending trade shows as a product vendor, I would get ...

Put the engineers in trade show booths and make them help with support calls The conventional wisdom is that developers’ time is too valuable ...

Why venture investors avoid service businesses and what to do about it Most small businesses are service businesses. Doctors and lawyers, ...

Focus on building products and serving customers instead of obsessing over raises and valuations At a recent startup gathering, while I was ...