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    Startups A Few Tips About Business Cards...

    February 24, 2018

    Startups A Few Tips About Business Cards...

    A Few Tips About Business Cards...

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 10:43 AM PST

    There is an argument these days that business cards are obsolete. You want people to get in touch with you? Be memorable! Connect on LinkedIN or via email! Be a social media-fly!!

    While there may be some truth to that, and depending on what business you are in (or about to be in), I mostly find myself talking to new and potential customers who ask for a card.

    If you find yourself in a similar situation with your startup - where you decide you need cards for you and/or your team - here are a few tips:

    • Set a budget. Cards are (in my world) a marketing expense. Treat them as such, and figure out how much you're willing to spend on marketing for work that you wouldn't otherwise get with no card. Pro tip: it's probably not a huge number.

    • Buy fewer cards than you think you need. Printing shops LOVE startups because your optimism helps you upsell yourself to get another 250 cards for ONLY another $30! Wow, that's so cheap!! Don't do it, you won't need them. Buy fewer, nicer cards. Get rounded corners, thick stock, embossing or foil, hell even get laser cut stainless steel cards if you are in a really high-end market (but be careful if you're not, they can also scream "I'm throwing money at everything"). 100 cards will likely last you for months.

    • Keep them as simple as possible. Unless your business is well-established, there is a VERY good chance you end up changing your logo, tagline, colors, branding, etc. So, make your card represent the simplest, cleanest, most core aspect of your brand and leave off all the other stuff. It can still happen that you end up with obsolete cards, but buying fewer at a time and keeping them simple makes them more user-friendly as well as protecting you from putting them in a landfill when you "refocus your branding."

    • Exchange cards whenever possible rather than "handing them out." When you hand a card out, try (within reason) to get one or at least some pertinent information in return that lets you follow up. If someone is hesitant to do so, they are probably just being polite. Honestly, having nicer cards helps with this because the cards feel more substantial and just that moment of "Wow, interesting card" can help solidify a memory in the recipient. Think about your cards as pieces of marketing - miniature commercials for your company. If nobody is watching your channel, don't spend your advertising dollars there.

    • If you're freaky, use a QR code with a landing page. No matter what startup you're working on, spending money is the enemy. You should be training yourself to question every dollar that goes out and how it's going to come back to you (with friends). I am a fan of QR codes on the back of a card that contain all the information listed on the card as well as your website with a landing page. This isn't hard to set up, and you will be able to directly measure at least traffic generated from the info that came off your card. It's not perfect, but if you NEVER see anything then you can think about whether or not they're even worth doing. If you see a decent amount of card-born traffic then keep up the good work!

    I hope that helps someone out there spend a little less on fewer, nicer cards and helps you think about them as not just a "thing you should have" but as a specific, purposeful part of your business that should be considered, evaluated, and tuned as needed.

    Good luck and may you turn your 100 starter cards into real revenue faster than expected!!

    EDIT: Punctuation

    submitted by /u/meshtron
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    Partnership / contract advise

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 09:09 PM PST

    To preface this I apologize for the long rambliness of this. This just came to a head earlier today I just needed to share this with someone and hopefully get some advice on how to deal with this.

    Me and a friend of mine built a website and we released it a little over a month ago it's hit a little under 1000 users a day.

    Given that it was just a pet project that we didn't expect to be particularly successful we didn't give much thought to things like a contract and writing up expected work divisions (also we both have zero experience with start ups so that's partly why too). Pretty quickly it became apparent that I was doing much more of the work so we had a talk and decided we should split the equity 70-30 (the work load was probably closer to 90-10 with me also having the essential skills and him being more of the "ideas" guy).

    So since this has taken off as fast as we can the general feeling is if we can put the work in we can turn this into something much much bigger. However, the work division is still quite uneven. And it's starting to feel like it's a bit of a "red flag" as to him being a bad business partner.

    Last week we agreed there were a couple Important tasks that needed to get done in the near feature (we divided the tasks based on the assumption I would do much more work). One of the tasks he was supposed to take the lead in he was struggling with so he called me into help him and together (mainly me with him watching) we got in done in a couple hours. There was one more task we discovered needed to be done for that change to properly worked so we knocked that out together the following day. Those were the only two things he got done the last two weeks. Meanwhile I finished everything wed assigned to me.

    I tried having a conversation about it with him basically trying to be like I need you to actually get the tasks we've laid out in a reasonable time frame. And he was basically just like no and then I tried to get him to explain to me how he wanted his contributions to be evaluated because he wasn't putting in bulk hours (put about 8 in total the past two weeks to my 70). He wouldn't give me a clear answer and the division of equity came up and I tried to get him to say if he felt like the work he'd done was what he felt was needed for him to "earn" (in the metaphorical personal sense) the 30%. And then he just completely shut done saying the 30% was what was agreed to and I couldn't take that from him and basically wouldn't talk with me about this anymore.

    submitted by /u/ForgotMyUserName15
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    Tech startup targeting the restaurant or hospitality industry?

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 11:37 PM PST

    I'm a developer with a side love for cooking and am obsessed with starting my own restaurant one day. Setting that aside, I'd like to channel that passion into developing a tech product that targets the restaurant or hospitality industry. As someone who's never worked in those industries personally, what's the best way to go about finding out about their needs? I thought about getting a part-time job on nights and weekends as a prep cook or something so I can learn where a tech company could disrupt, but since I have no experience, I don't foresee that going well.

    Would looking for a restaurateur as a cofounder work? If there's one thing Austin's got plenty of, it's small restaurants and their restaurateurs.

    Or, am I going about this all wrong, and should only focus on industries I've personally worked in? That sounds dandy, except, I've only ever worked in the tech industry, and that market seems a bit tapped out, you know?

    Anyway, I look forward to any advice you may have. Thanks!

    submitted by /u/ksoviero
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    Am I wasting my time?

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 07:33 PM PST

    I'm building a web app that will serve as an online video editing suite for people who don't know how or don't want to use video editing software. Features will include video collage creation, gif collage creation, video and gif cropping (subclipping), and creating videos from mp3+image. I'm also working on creating a feature that allows users to colorize grayscale photos (using machine learning) but this is about a month down the line. I am wondering if I am wasting my time. Is there a demand for any of this?

    Currently there are companies which allow some limited video editing but there are no web apps that allow the creation of video and gif collages (though there are mobile apps that do this). All of this will be free for some months until I develop a userbase, then I will start charging very low prices for the collages to pay the bills for the site (video hosting is not cheap).

    Colorization of grayscale photos will require payment as soon as it is implemented, but I'm wondering if there is even a demand for this. Please help me understand the demand for these features or help me find a way to measure the demand for these features.

    I don't want to spend 100 more hours finishing this app and it be a waste of time. It is fun building it but I need to profit.

    Thanks in advance.

    submitted by /u/theology_
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    Equity X Salary for a techinical lead (after we already built the product)

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 01:50 PM PST

    Hi all,

    We built an iOS and Android app with a dev shop and one of our co-founders designed the whole thing. We are preparing to go live and leave the dev shop and shift to an in-house team. We are trying to figure out how much we should offer. We received a grant and are looking at the situation right now as a 4-month window to earn traction and raise another round.

    We are preparing to offer a techinical lead (maintain the apps performance for the most part, some UX enhancements, and possibly 1 small feature) 4k a month, but we aren't sure what we should offer equity wise.

    Anybody been in our or similar shoes before with some advice? Much appreciated, thanks.

    submitted by /u/burgnotice
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    Confusing Options for Incorporating a Unique Startup

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 10:11 AM PST

    So I am involved with a group of writers. We have an informal group we created and we have a growing list of sponsors who are looking to actually give us backing (amazing!), but they all want the same thing. They want to be able to legally deduct the cost of the investment in us.

    To me, that seems to mean that we need to be a charitable organization. We do "qualify" as a 501(c)3 as we are part of "the arts", but then reading about how to set that up is a slog. It seems so daunting and we're all writers so this isn't in our wheelhouse of expertise.

    We do want to be able to pay out parts of what we bring in to the membership in return for their taking part (and time) in building up our organization (with podcasts, writing, etc).

    Is there a choice for such an organization that would allow our sponsors to get a write-off, allow us to pay (small) amounts to our participating members and possibly even not end up being a huge annoyance each tax year?

    As far as the 501(c)3, we can choose a director that wouldn't ever get paid. That's not a problem. The real problem is that apparently (especially in PA which is where the organization needs to be) I read that it can cost THOUSANDS of dollars to become one. We're talking a "pass the hat" kind of group here. Raising thousands before we can even collect sponsorship funding is just not feasible.

    Any guidance would be helpful. Thanks.

    submitted by /u/pcserenity
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    I'm considering launching my MVP as limited access. Could you give me advice?

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 09:31 AM PST

    I'm a starting an online service that provides a repair service for a specialized niche product. It's consumer targeted. My goal is to gather a small group of early adopters willing to jump on board, test the service, give feedback, and eventually spread the word.

    At this stage, I'm considering launching it as limited access, not only to build desire, but also for practical reasons: I don't want to be inundated with product while I'm trying to refine my systems. What are your recommendations for utilizing this strategy? What are some things I should consider as I'm weighing this decision?

    submitted by /u/kzul
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    If I want to launch on reddit, what should I do?

    Posted: 23 Feb 2018 05:30 AM PST

    The company I work for is launching a new template every week. We create no code web app templates build on a no code platform. I would like to share them on reddit, for feedback purposes, because we care for a fresh eye to look at it and send some constructive thoughts. Yet, I am afraid to get blocked as spam or advertising. Does anyone has experience in this? How do you guys launch on reddit? What did you do? Have any advice for newbie?

    submitted by /u/CaterinaRutter
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