I'll start out by saying this concept was not my idea. I give all credit to Dave Blanchard, a chicago based entrepreneur and business designer for IDEO who sparked this idea in my mind. He offered this simple nugget of wisdom on Twitter and I've been thinking about it ever since:

Read the rest of this post »

I get asked all the time how to get a web project started when the founder doesn't have a engineering background. The main questions are about how to find a solid developer and communicate the idea to them. I've been meaning to write some general guidelines down for this process, but yesterday I realized I no longer have to. Derek Sivers just did it.

For those that don't know him, Derek is the founder of CD Baby and an amazing engineer and writer. He's also been a friend and advisor to me throughout the past few years.

His post, titled How to hire a programmer to make your ideas happen, is a solid intro into getting a web project organized and started even if you don't have any programming background. He breaks it into eight steps:

1. Reduce your big idea to “Version 1.0.
2. Write a simple overview of what it does.
3. Write a detailed walk-through of every click.
4. Break it up into milestones.
5. Make your first milestone a stand-alone project.
6. Post it at elance, guru, odesk, vworker.
7. Hire one from each.
8. Continue with the one you like best.

Go check out the post. It's really well organized and well worth the read.

On Tuesday, I was invited to visit Excelerate Labs, Chicago's new startup incubator. They are just getting started with their first class, and I spent part of my day hanging with Sam Yagan and Brian Luerssen, who are overseeing the program, as well as with 5 teams. It was a joy and a privilege.

As most know, I recently left Chicago to move to San Francisco. I left for two main reasons. First, I didn't feel like the city offered me the type of opportunity I needed to move my entrepreneurial career forward. We also wanted to move to a city with nicer weather. I didn't find the Chicago winters "charming" enough.

That said, Chicago is still one of the most amazing places I ever lived and one of my favorite cities in the world. The food, architecture, community, parks, events, schools, and culture are some of the best on the planet. And the cost of living is incredibly reasonable.  

But it has always lacked an startup environment found in places like the Bay Area, Boston, Boulder, New York, and Seattle. But that's changing, and it's programs like Excelerate (and the recently launched Lightbank fund) that are going to make the startup community world class as well. And even though I've chosen a different home, I want to do anything I can to help it get there. Meeting with some teams to give advice was one small contribution.

I was blown away at the quality of the teams I met with at Excelerate. I knew they would be great because 10 teams were selected out of almost 400 who applied. But they were working on very compelling ideas ranging broadly in market and scale.

• FanGo is going to make ordering food at stadiums insanely convenient for sports fans, and more efficient and profitable for venue owners and concession companies. They already have proven that they can raise the average transaction value over 50%.
• GiveForward is going to help people who need to raise money from friends for medical bills and other personal costs simple. Over $1.5 million has already been raised in the first year.
• EduLender is going to help incoming college students shopping for student loans find the lowest interest rates and save tons of money. They've already built a compelling, "why wouldn't you use it" product.
• Noblivity is going to make it absurdly simple for boutique owners to find and buy from new and inspiring small designer brands that fit their boutiques' style and level of quality. They already have over 1000 boutiques signed up.
• MathZee is going to make compelling, educational games for kids that are more engaging for kids than anything on the market. They've already focus tested their alpha product and proven kids stay focused on learning through their software over 300% longer than market leading products.

These companies are going to accomplish these goals if they can execute well. And that's exactly why they're lucky to be part of an incubator that taps the brightest entrepreneurial minds in Chicago for advice. Programs like Excelerate Labs are the new graduate school, an insight i credit 100% to Dave Blanchard (another brilliant chicago entrepreneur). If they execute well, they'll get funded (if they want to be), and have a shot to change the world.

Go Chicago. Make all of us former residents regret ever leaving.

Brad Feld posted on his blog this morning a recommendation to watch Simon Sinek's TEDx talk on "Starting with Why" (embedded below). I watched it and feel like I need to pass along the recommendation. The topic is important.

In the talk, Simon discusses how even though Apple, MLK Jr, and the Wright Brothers had people and companies around them who were focusing on solving the same problems, they differentiated themselves by starting not with "what are we going to make/say to solve these problems" or "how are we going to make/say it", but "why are we trying to solve these problems in the first place."

His thesis: "People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it."

Read the rest of this post »

If there is one thing I've learned over the past year, and also confirmed with everyone else I know in the business of selling products and services to users, is that the customers who pay the least always account for the largest amount of customer service and handholding. It's amazing, but I have yet to hear when this isn't the case.

I'll use ArtistData as the example, because I have the most visibility into that business. We have many price points because most of our services are a-la-carte. Our users (who are musicians) can pay as little as $2/month for some services, and up to $25/month for our all-in package. We also have a free component to the site.

Part of the $25/month package is "Priority Support" that is, an exclusive way to contact ArtistData staff and get a response very very quickly. When we first launched it, we feared this guarantee could become an issue, because we'd need to be available all the time. But over the past three months, we've received TWO priority support messages. Yes, two.

Read the rest of this post »

Read the rest of this post »