Startups DO NOT make the mistake of using Charles Schwab for your startup's 401(k). |
- DO NOT make the mistake of using Charles Schwab for your startup's 401(k).
- Evergreen marketing strategies we used to get to $5k MRR.
- Seed round dilemma’s
- I have an invention idea but i am not sure where to go or who to talk to so I came here to ask you guys for some help.
- Forming a Startup - How much is too much?
- Possible equity share in an app with two developers (co-founders)
- Testing/Quality checking imported health supplements?
| DO NOT make the mistake of using Charles Schwab for your startup's 401(k). Posted: 05 Jan 2018 12:22 PM PST They are seriously still in the 1970s regarding to this stuff. You have to go through this nightmare of a procedure EVERY payroll: 1) First you add up the total you're distributing to your employees, and/or withholding from your employees, and send that money to one account in Schwab - your "master" account. 2) Then you call them up on the phone. Usually, you have to wait 20-30 minutes on hold. 3) Then you talk to someone at their office to prove your identity with a series of questions for a few minutes. 4) Then you tell them to send money from the "master" account to each employee's individual account. You have to read off the account numbers, names, and values for each employee. And they confirm the account numbers, names, and values of each employee. Over the phone. 5) Then you ask them "Is this really how this works? Is there no web interface for this?" and they respond with "Yep that's really how it works. No, there's no alternative. I'm sorry! Have a nice day." And you have to do all this bullshit every 2 weeks Needless to say we're switching and really pissed off... [link] [comments]  |
| Evergreen marketing strategies we used to get to $5k MRR. Posted: 05 Jan 2018 02:29 AM PST Hey guys,
Last month I launched my startup and I thought I'd do a little write up of the acquisition strategies I used to get to $5k MRR and some further thoughts on the results we got and some concluding thoughts on how I manage acquisition (this is one of my three tasks basically and probably the one that takes me most of my time).
This post might help you know the following:
1. Direct salesIn all honesty, I did not know at all whether my productized service model would work. I started with a quick landing page (which is still the current one) and contacted all potential customers I could.
Examples of direct sales I did:
Results:
Lessons learned:
2. Content marketingI just started recently with this one so the results are still early. My strategy for content marketing is the following:
Examples of content I did:
Results:
3. ReferralsThe idea of referrals is simple: Use existing customers to get more customers. My thought process: : 1. I ask my customers if they are happy 2. Ask them if they know friends who would use our services and get 10% off their bill every month if they refer us one.
Examples of messaging I used:
Results:
4. Partnerships and affiliate salesThe idea behind partnership is the following: Make partnerships with well known brands / startups and leverage their reputation to get more customers. The second idea: finding influencers / bloggers that would be interested in doing affiliate sales and getting a commission if they refer us a customer. What we did so far:
Results:
Final thoughtsI always go through the following questions when running my acquisition strategy - it helps me prioritise what I want to do!
Which other acquisition channels are available for productized services / startups ?I think it is important to focus on a few channels at the beginning. Launching your product I would focus on the channels that are: a. Relatively inexpensive (or free) b. Help you get as close as possible to the customers and get feedbacks from them (example: Direct sales) c. Do not try too many channels until you have exhausted 1 or 2 channels -- you never know that some channels might take more time or investment to yield the results. Here are the channels I will try for my service in the coming months:
How about you guys? Which techniques have you used that proved to be succesful? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Jan 2018 06:21 AM PST Hello guys, So my three partners and I have a tech start-up. We're in the seed round and have a couple of very interested investors. We're in negotiations with one (investor 1) and he's come up with some (for us, at least) weird conditions. Let me elaborate;
Investor 1 now wants to first invest 1/5th alone (without investor 2), then later on invite investor 2. We feel like he's hiding information from investor 2. When we spoke with investor 1 and 2 together we agreed on a set valuation. Investor 1 later told us he dropped the valuation and wants to invest solo. When we told him it wouldn't meet our funding goals, Investor 1 then told us to first accept his small investment, so investor 2 can invest in a later round. We feel we're getting played on that front and investor 1 isn't being transparant. I'd love to hear your guys' advice. Thanks in advance. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Jan 2018 06:26 PM PST Hello resisters on the startups section, this may not be long because there's not much to it but here i go. I have an invention idea but I am not sure where to go or what to do with this idea. I'm not even sure if this is a good idea or even if it is possible to create but I would like to ask someone who is trusted and won't steal the idea (i don't know maybe it's something big) to help me start this thing up. Not really sure what else to say but please ask any questions or just help me in any way. THANK YOU! [link] [comments]  |
| Forming a Startup - How much is too much? Posted: 05 Jan 2018 06:15 PM PST Just looking for a sounding board on this. I own some software that is used in a yearly contract awarded last year. This software app, along with a complementary software app (explained later), were built on my own time and hosted on my own personal servers. In response to the contract, I formed an LLC with a partner, opened a bank account with the business, put some of my personal money (I guess it's seed capital?) in there, transferred my server bill to be paid out of that account, and got quickbooks to keep a track of the financials. All good. Our connections through the contract give us access to people who may be interested in the complementary software which I was going to offer SaaS. The contract itself is very low maintenance (about 50 hours a year) and the income reflects that. As I have a full time job, I'm more than ok with that. It is essentially extracurricular income. I don't have any delusions of grandeur and I doubt the secondary software will ever grow to enough market to support me and other employees in the LLC. This is where I get a little hung up. I've listened to countless entrepreneurs, talked to lawyers, and read hundreds of articles and books. All of them talk about getting capital (VCs, bank loans, etc.), hiring people, getting EULAs, patent searches, growing and marketing, and really trying to make a go of it. Things that are expensive (very little capital available as it is my spare cash) and time consuming (which is limited). So my question is, if you are trying to do this part time, what is next? What are the things I should actually do? Should I just invest in some marketing and use my connections to do demos? Are there other things I need to do before I start selling SaaS even at such a small scale? There doesn't seem to be good resources for "spare time" businesses in software (or I've missed them). I realize that I could sell/license the software to someone who could "re-sell" it and give it more love, and also some people have an "all or nothing" spirit about starting a business, but I am asking within the current constraints. Thoughts? [link] [comments]  |
| Possible equity share in an app with two developers (co-founders) Posted: 05 Jan 2018 12:51 PM PST I am a full stack developer with an app idea which I decided to build it, since I have a fill time job I decided to ask a friend to see if he would join me to do the backend now he agreed and we are building this. From logical point of view we should split 50/50 but I think considering that idea was mine and not just idea but I had sketched it out in details and even possible monetization ways, I work in a top startup which definitely will play a role in potential talks with investors and same goes with experience and I have more connections that would help us along the way. I am thinking more towards 60/40 or even 70/30. I kind of mentioned this in our initial talk but we didn't finalized this. I would like to hear your thoughts here or similar experiences. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Testing/Quality checking imported health supplements? Posted: 05 Jan 2018 09:10 AM PST Hows it going! I am researching importing food grade "supplements". This would not be a fitness supplement but something you would add to your daily routine as a healthy additive. This is extracted from a naturally existing plant.... not made in a lab. It seems like the best prices for bulk/wholesale are overseas and I am wondering if there is somewhere in the states that samples could be sent for testing. This way we could be sure what we are receiving is what we ordered and most importantly SAFE. I appreciate any input or direction to head. Thanks in advance! [link] [comments]  |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Startups - Finding problems and solving them!. To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |
No comments:
Post a Comment