Founder Weekly (Issue 333 - April 18 2018)

Founder Weekly - Issue 333Â Â

April 18, 2018

Founder Weekly

Welcome to issue 333 of Founder Weekly. Let's get straight to the links this week.

General

Even those who designed our digital world are aghast at what they created. A breakdown of what went wrong — from the architects who built it.

A well known, but often overlooked avenue of exploring potential businesses, is to look for problems to solve. Society, mankind and organizations have all sorts of problems they are more than willing to pay someone to solve. Here is the interesting thing though; Despite the staggering number of problems in this world, most entrepreneurs are still chasing ideas. I wanted to explore why and made a surprising conclusion.

Why did Ring succeed when the entire market kept saying that Nest was going to be the winner? Why did Ring become an enormous success when it produced a hardware product and the market keeps saying, “hardware is too difficult to scale?” Mark Suster shares his views.

Lisa Hawke and Steven Sinofsky break down the basics all about GDPR in this episode of the a16z Podcast — the why, the what, the how, the who — including the easy things startups can immediately do, and on their own. In fact, GDPR may give startups an edge over bigger companies and open up opportunities, argue Hawke and Sinofsky; even with fewer resources, startups have more organizational flexibility, if they’re willing to put in the work.

Entrepreneurs think they are better than their resumes show and realize they can make more money by going it alone.  And in most cases, they are right.

Books

What if you could get in front of millions of prospects with the avid endorsement of famous influencers--without spending a dime? It's happening right in front of you every day. Guest experts on TV, radio, podcasts, blogs, and live streaming are getting local and national exposure for their business and brand that they could never have afforded to reach with ads. In Make It Rain! Areva Martin breaks the silence to reveal what insiders know about the power of media appearances to revolutionize a business and brand and get your core message out to the people who need it most. 

Marketing, Sales and PR

This article is for entrepreneurs who want to learn how an extremely successful online businesses – VideoFruit – operates to attracts 1000s of customers, generates millions in revenue and became an international role model for many inspiring entrepreneurs. Interested? Let’s go!

15 Things I Wish I Knew About Selling Before Starting a Company.

Why is the trend toward long-form storytelling happening now in marketing? There are two key reasons.

Money and Finance

The mutual awareness of the importance of exit strategy should be present at the stage of negotiating the investment conditions. We advise startups to discuss thoroughly their own approach to building the business before holding talks with VCs, especially the horizon in which they want to associate their full and exclusive professional activity with. Founders should also choose investors basing on their divestment policy, exit transactions experiences and preferences. It is extremely important to build awareness of managers about the temporary role of VC in building the value of their company. Both parties should gradually prepare the inevitable exit process to make it comfortable and satisfying for founders as well as investors.

A startup CEO recently pinged me about an offer their company had received from a larger, fast growing, breakout company. He did not know how to assess the offer. Here are some of the components a founder should consider when receiving an offer from a breakout company.

Startups of the Week

The Wirefree Security Cam with 365-Day Battery Life. EverCam is designed from the ground up to offer wireless freedom. We eliminated power cables, wall outlets, and the need to drill holes, giving you freedom to install EverCam practically anywhere. Stick the mount onto any flat surface and EverCam’s ready to go—in less than a second; or just stick it directly onto most metallic surfaces.

Learn and cook your favorite cuisines from around the world.

One Step Software is the only software in the market that helps you manage your sober living efficiently, affordably and easily.

AI-powered 3D Avatars. Bring personalized avatars into your application with our advanced 3D avatar creation SDK from one selfie photo

PathSpot scans employee's hands to detect pathogens that cause food borne illness - all in under 2 seconds. We protect your patrons, your employees, and your bottom line with our trusted technology and reliable support.

Config is an easy-to-use SaaS for managing configuration files across all your systems, apps, modules, environments and instances.

Tips, Tools and Services

People often tell me they want to start a startup, but they don’t know what to build. “I’m not a person with ideas”, they’ll say. Stop that narrative. You are whatever you tell yourself you are. To quote Steve Jobs: “everything in the world was created by people no smarter than you”. You can do whatever you want, once you realize one secret: everything big starts small.

Analysing solely individual a/b tests is limiting. We now see the value of looking at multiple experiments instead. Using patterns in the way we have outlined in this post is one of many ways that makes this leap possible. 

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