The $50 startup toolkit


Book Description

Over the last decade, Internet has re-written every bit of the old business strategy and tactic we have ever known. Technology has opened the doors for everyone to do 'more with less' and that too 'faster and cheaper'. Now it takes much less time and cost to turn great ideas into profitable business opportunities. And that's because, technology has provided us great tools which can take care of so many of our operational issues, leaving us more time to focus on what is important to us, our passion. This book is a collection of hundreds of such online resources, tools and utilities that are being used by thousands of micro-business entrepreneurs world wide. Attempt has been made to ensure that most of these resources are free or affordable by small businesses or wannabe start-ups. You will be exposed to several resources across the below categories. I. Chapter I – Startup Ideas/Research (Massage your creativity) II. Chapter II – Getting off the ground (Preparations before you begin) III. Chapter III – Getting yourself funded (If you only had a bit more money) IV. Chapter IV – Brand & Identity (Who you are and why you exist) V. Chapter V – Operations setup (Backbone to your business) VI. Chapter VI – Engage and excel (Continuously) Appendix (Many more Utilities and Education resources)




The Startup Growth Book


Book Description

50+ Proven Ways to Scale Your Startup Without a Marketing Budget Marketing is consistently considered one of the main reasons that startups fail, and every year, tens of thousands of businesses close simply because they didn't prioritize marketing early enough. The problem is that many startup founders believe they cannot do any real marketing until they can afford it, and that's simply not true, because Marketing doesn't have to cost a dime! After 15 years handling growth for startups, Andrew Lee Miller, an accomplished, early-stage startup marketing expert, who's taken three young companies to multi-million dollar exits, found that there were tons of valuable growth strategies that could be implemented that don't cost anything. Bootstrapped Marketing, Growth Hacking, Organic Marketing and more, all refer to the lesser known ways of attaining scalable growth for your business without a large "war chest" for paid advertising, and Andrew has spent over a decade developing, testing, and proving out the best of the best strategies that actually work. The Startup Growth Book then is the culmination of Andrew's 15+ years of in-the-trenches startup growth experience and is the only business book out there that actually teaches entrepreneurs and marketers how to build sustainable, scalable growth, channel by channel, with zero advertising budget. Tried and tested by Andrew himself, this book directly draws from Andrew's experiences scaling over 100 startups in over a dozen nations and languages. This book is ideal for young marketers who want to learn cutting-edge tactics from a master, as well as new businesses that want to grow organically and prove traction without spending cash on Paid Advertising. For the first time ever, Andrew will show you how to scale organically using 10 different channels. Learn exactly how to launch and scale these channels without spending money: - Public Relations across all major media channels - Search Engine Optimization so people can discover you organically - Email Marketing to master the most effective means of marketing communication - Social Media Marketing and Influencer Marketing done right ... and more. After reading this book, you will be able to implement these lessons to drive growth in your business without needing to outsource to a Marketing agency, hire a marketing team, or even run any Facebook ads. Dozens of companies have already implemented Andrew's growth hacking tactics, and have scaled to millions of dollars in revenue.




Tech Startup Toolkit


Book Description

Essential advice for anyone aspiring to start up a technology company, based on decades of business experience. In Tech Startup Toolkit, you’ll discover the good, the bad, and the ugly of succeeding with a tech startup. Author Jothy Rosenberg reveals the insights he’s learned from an entrepreneurial career that’s seen both $100 million sales, dramatic failures, and everything in between. Tech Startup Toolkit gives you concrete, actionable advice on how to: • Succeed as a first-time CEO • Pitch and raise money from various types of investors • Develop a go-to-market strategy • Create a strong positive culture • Understand what makes a VC tick • Write an elevator pitch • Understand investment deal terms • Hone and align teams • Effectively downsize or wind down a company • Position a company to be acquired In Tech Startup Toolkit Jothy tells stories from his incredible career that will give guidance and inspiration to anyone who’s ever thought of creating or running a company. Every personal story teaches a vital lesson for any would-be startup founder, ensuring you avoid the pitfalls that end less-prepared companies. Foreword by Vivjan Myrto. Purchase of the print book includes a free eBook in PDF and ePub formats from Manning Publications. About the technology Why do eight out of ten tech startups fail? Is it inevitable? In Tech Startup Toolkit, nine-time tech startup founder Jothy Rosenberg tells you how to beat the odds. Part memoir and part survival guide, this book delivers battle-tested, unvarnished advice on capital, culture, boards, marketing, and management. About the book Tech Startup Toolkit covers everything a new founder needs to ensure a great idea can become a stable tech company that’s ripe for acquisition. In 31 short anecdotes from Jothy’s extensive experience, you’ll learn how to pitch investors, develop a go-to-market strategy, and build the leadership skills that really matter for a great startup CEO. And since forewarned is forearmed, you’ll also find strategies to handle challenges like funding loss, competition, and unpredictable crises like Covid-19 that break lesser startups. What's inside • Succeed as a first-time CEO • Create a strong positive culture • Understand what makes a VC tick • Position a company to be acquired About the reader For prospective founders, early-stage teams, and anyone interested in tech entrepreneurship. About the author Jothy Rosenberg has been an incorrigible entrepreneur since 1988. Formerly the VP of Borland’s developer division, Jothy has founded and run nine technology startups, two of which had $100 million exits. Table of Contents PART 1 1 Scratching the startup itch: How I became an incorrigible entrepreneur 2 What makes you think you are CEO material? 3 A venture-backed turnaround: A dangerous place to be 4 The founding team. Who’s in and who’s not? PART 2 5 Friends and family, angels, venture capital, or strategic? 6 Angels: Your bridge financing solution 7 The art of pitching to institutional investors 8 Investors aren’t your friends 9 Understand the VC business model. Raise money faster 10 Seed: The first priced round 11 Term sheets: An institutional investor wants to invest in you 12 Due Diligence: An exam you must pass PART 3 13 Your business model. The beating heart of your business 14 Getting to a minimum viable product with lighthouse customers 15 Product-Market Fit. Making sure the dogs will eat your dog food 16 Go-to-Market: How to make your business viable and grow 17 A formal business plan in ten steps 18 Burn rate and runway—or where is the edge of that cliff? 19 Achieving cash-flow positive: A startup’s Holy Grail 20 Your startup’s valuation: Up, up, up (hopefully) PART 4 21 Hire slowly—and correctly 22 Beyond foosball: Crafting a positive culture that retains your team 23 Does a startup need both a CEO and COO? 24 Marketing: Too often a startup’s afterthought 25 The right character for sales leader—and when to hire them PART 5 26 Startup boards: The good, (and how to prevent) the bad, and the ugly 27 Board observers: Observe only please 28 Investor communications. They needn’t be cod liver oil 29 Heaven forbid if you must downsize 30 Heaven forbid if you must wind it up 31 Acquisition: Your financial dream come true Appendix




Lean Analytics


Book Description

Whether you're a startup founder trying to disrupt an industry or an entrepreneur trying to provoke change from within, your biggest challenge is creating a product people actually want. Lean Analytics steers you in the right direction. This book shows you how to validate your initial idea, find the right customers, decide what to build, how to monetize your business, and how to spread the word. Packed with more than thirty case studies and insights from over a hundred business experts, Lean Analytics provides you with hard-won, real-world information no entrepreneur can afford to go without. Understand Lean Startup, analytics fundamentals, and the data-driven mindset Look at six sample business models and how they map to new ventures of all sizes Find the One Metric That Matters to you Learn how to draw a line in the sand, so you'll know it's time to move forward Apply Lean Analytics principles to large enterprises and established products




Agile Analytics For Startups


Book Description

While you work hard building your startup, one of the biggest challenges you’ll face will be around your product’s ability to solve a big enough problem and its success in the market. Agile Analytics for Startups will help you navigate the complexity of early-stage business analytics, performance measurement, and the metrics that matter to your company. You can use the proven frameworks in this book to validate your product idea and the product/market fit, and understand your customers more granularly while you scale your business for automation. You can test and use many tools and solutions provided in the book and interact with different features of those solutions as you engage with other users of those products. This book will provide you with a step-by-step framework, examples and powerful solutions, from ideation to growth and all the way to scaling your business as you build your company with the power of analytics. -Agility is your advantage over large companies -Understand business analytics essentials and define how you will measure the success of your business early -Once you define your solution for “the problem” you tackle, validate your customer -Keep a short list of KPIs for the success of your product -Engage your customers throughout the development cycle -Product/market fit should happen before you go to market big -Keep testing your product, reiterate continuously -Know when to pivot as you modify and optimize your roadmap Be ready to speed up and maximize your output before the significant funding milestone(s)




The Innovator's Toolkit


Book Description

An innovation guide for business leaders, managers, and new product developers. The Innovator's Toolkit explains all the fundamental tools and concepts anyone involved in innovation should be familiar with--especially methods and strategies for improving products and services and developing new ones. This book is written in an easy-to-use reference format that helps readers understand why, when, and how to apply each tool. The tools and techniques in this book are organized around a four-step innovation methodology--define, discover, develop, and demonstrate--that takes readers through problem identification, then flows into idea generation, idea selection, and, finally, idea implementation. Constant innovation is a necessity for business success today; The Innovator's Toolkit presents an effective plan for achieving it.




Jefa in Training


Book Description

Step-by-Step Toolkit to Turn Your Passion Project into a Successful Business “...a much-needed guide for all of us who need a blueprint to becoming a successful entrepreneur.” —Eva Longoria, award-winning actress, producer, director, activist, philanthropist and CEO of UnbeliEVAble Entertainment #1 New Release in Hispanic American Demographic Studies Women, now is the time to build your enterprise. Jefa in Training is the only Spanglish project-launching toolkit and female entrepreneur planner specially made for a new generation of boss women. A solopreneur and small business guide. A business startup planner and toolkit for women in leadership, business, and beyond, Jefa in Training offers women entrepreneurs the female empowerment needed to take a side hustle to the next level. Whether it’s learning to define your brand, set up a beta test group, or draft an LLC operating agreement, this compendium of lessons, anecdotes, worksheets, templates, and quotes teaches the next generation of women in business how to work for yourself and turn your ideas into something much bigger. A Latina book by Latinas, for Latinas. Solopreneurs and creatives, you are invited to let go of your fears and finally launch your blog, project, or platform. Jefa in Training isn’t your typical small business book. Part Latinx book, it is a conversation with a special tribe of Latina immigrants, Hispanic American generations, and women of color in financial, media, entrepreneurial, and creative spaces. Explore a more complex view of Latinidad, covering everything from imposter syndrome to micro-aggressions and bilingualism. Inside find: • Author's first-hand experiences • Guest stories from successful business-women in Latinx companies • Worksheets and more! If you’re looking for Hispanic books, women entrepreneur books, women leadership books, or women of color gifts―like Mind Your Business, The Memo, In the Company of Women, or De Colores Means All of Us―then you’ll love Jefa in Training.




The Innovator's Method


Book Description

Have you ever come up with an idea for a new product or service but didn’t take any action because you thought it would be too risky? Or at work, have you had what you thought could be a big idea for your company—perhaps changing the way you develop or distribute a product, provide customer service, or hire and train your employees? If you have, but you haven’t known how to take the next step, you need to understand what the authors call the innovator’s method—a set of tools emerging from lean start-up, design thinking, and agile software development that are revolutionizing how new ideas are created, refined, and brought to market. To date these tools have helped entrepreneurs, designers, and software developers manage uncertainty—through cheap and rapid experiments that systematically lower failure rates and risk. But many managers and leaders struggle to apply these powerful tools within their organizations, as they often run counter to traditional managerial thinking and practice. Authors Nathan Furr and Jeff Dyer wrote this book to address that very problem. Following the breakout success of The Innovator’s DNA—which Dyer wrote with Hal Gregersen and bestselling author Clay Christensen to provide a framework for generating ideas—this book shows how to make those ideas actually happen, to commercialize them for success. Based on their research inside corporations and successful start-ups, Furr and Dyer developed the innovator’s method, an end-to-end process for creating, refining, and bringing ideas to market. They show when and how to apply the tools of their method, how to adapt them to your business, and how to answer commonly asked questions about the method itself, including: How do we know if this idea is worth pursuing? Have we found the right solution? What is the best business model for this new offering? This book focuses on the “how”—how to test, how to validate, and how to commercialize ideas with the lean, design, and agile techniques successful start-ups use. Whether you’re launching a start-up, leading an established one, or simply working to get a new product off the ground in an existing company, this book is for you.




Get aHead for Business: Owning A Business Tool Kit


Book Description

Entrepreneurial youth who want to start and run their own business or improve their existing business, can build their skills and develop a business plan using this eight chapter guide.




The Startup Owner's Manual


Book Description

More than 100,000 entrepreneurs rely on this book. The National Science Foundation pays hundreds of startup teams each year to follow the process outlined in the book, and it's taught at Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia and more than 100 other leading universities worldwide. Why? The Startup Owner's Manual guides you, step-by-step, as you put the Customer Development process to work. This method was created by renowned Silicon Valley startup expert Steve Blank, co-creator with Eric Ries of the "Lean Startup" movement and tested and refined by him for more than a decade. This 608-page how-to guide includes over 100 charts, graphs, and diagrams, plus 77 valuable checklists that guide you as you drive your company toward profitability. It will help you: Avoid the 9 deadly sins that destroy startups' chances for success Use the Customer Development method to bring your business idea to life Incorporate the Business Model Canvas as the organizing principle for startup hypotheses Identify your customers and determine how to "get, keep and grow" customers profitably Compute how you'll drive your startup to repeatable, scalable profits. The Startup Owners Manual was originally published by K&S Ranch Publishing Inc. and is now available from Wiley. The cover, design, and content are the same as the prior release and should not be considered a new or updated product.