Doing Business Data Form

Our in-house UX designer holds the Airbnb sign-up form up as an example of excellent UX design.These are his main reasons, which are all aspects that are easily transferrable (and that we always use on our forms!):Social media access - giving people the option to sign up with Google or Facebook allows them to choose an option that suits them (people love to feel in control - it’s the autonomy bias). They are also aware that signing up through social media may be a much speedier process which is always an attraction and, even better for you, it often allows you access to certain parts of their profile and details so can be an excellent source of invaluable data.Progressive disclosure - Instead of displaying the whole form on the first page, Airbnb uses progressive disclosure, only opening up the full form once the user clicks on “Sign up with Email” which keeps things clean, simple and doesn’t intimidate the user as they are being slowly introduced into the sign-up process.Column layout - There is just one column with each field listed one underneath the other. Again, this keeps it really clean and simple with ample space to fill out the fields.Icons used inside the fields - The icons bring a nice design element to it and also just add that extra ease of comprehension - you see the mail icon and you know that’s where your email address goes. The easier to understand quickly, the more likely it is that people will convert (this is because of Cognitive Ease).Password strength validation - This is always a reassuring tool to provide your customers. Security online (or lack thereof) can be a big factor in putting people off following through with a sign-up or purchase and so lending them this helping hand to show them how strong their password is will give a sense of safety and satisfaction.Overall field validation - When a field has been successfully completed, it is highlighted with a green outline to validate this clearly. It’s a nice way of giving the customer a sense of completion and closure for each step and letting them see their progress - this type of positive reinforcement can be useful in encouraging people to see through the sign-up process until the end.Clear indication of errors - Equally, it’s important to clearly notify customers when there is an issue with one of their completed fields. There’s nothing more frustrating than spending time filling out a form only for it to refuse to submit but with no clear identification of where the error is. Make it quick, obvious and easy for them to see and rectify any errors to ensure frustration doesn’t lead to a swift exit.At Convertize, we’ve compiled our neuromarketing and optimisation expertise into a list of 250 tactics - you can check them out here!

Bring in 20 completely random people (not friends/relatives that might be inclined to agree with one another) off the street and feed them. In exchange for the free food, ask them to fill out an anonymous survey rating each thing they ate. That will give you ‘some’ idea as to whether your food is awesomely tasty, horribly tasteless or somewhere in between.People return to restaurants over and over again, in part, because the enjoy eating the food. It’s not to fill their stomach. That they can do at home. Is your food worth people going out of their way to visit you?It’s an important question. If the result of your data is “the food is mediocre,” you’ve got some work and some tough decisions ahead of you. Identify your winners and losers. Eliminate the losers or figure out how to fix them. You may have to bring in some new blood (new chef). These kinds of decisions can be extremely difficult and stressful, particularly so for small companies, but you need to do whatever it takes for your business to survive.I live in LA where I can literally visit ten Mexican restaurants in ten minutes. The competition is fierce. If your market is like this, you really need to up your game to offer something that your competition is not.This may come in the form of offering unique menu items the others are not serving (mole, crab enchiladas, shrimp tacos, menudo, etc.), offering commonly served items at a price which creates a better value than the others, having a Taco Tuesday night (or something similar) when traffic is slowest, offering free chips and salsa (or other low-cost items), free drink refills, elaborate salsa/condiment bar, homemade or blue corn tortillas, special promotions (buy-one/get-one) and so forth.Be creative and offer what the others cannot/will not offer. That is what will give you a competitive advantage in the marketplace, making it more likely that people will come to you over your competitors.Good luck.

Excellent question!There are already signs of changes in the marketing practice caused by the growing adoption of smart technology. For instance, many software service providers have already equipped their products with AI applications that can be useful to marketing.And if you’re looking for a marketing breakthrough, you just have to go online and observe how Google seems to customize the ads you see based on your activity. That’s targeted advertising in digital marketing, and it’s a major development in syncing marketing goals and personalized customer experience.Aside from targeted marketing, AI is also improving the way marketers do their research.AI can collect and measure data from voice-based communications, gleaning information like customer preferences from calls or other voice-based interactions. Tenfold offers this voice-based marketing automation tool in our CTI solution, and we can do this for a wide range of telephony lines and data systems.AI also enhances the workflow through automation. Market segmentation and campaign management can be left to AI, while marketers use their time to develop creative marketing strategies.Another advantage of automating marketing processes is that it makes marketing more precise. You don’t have to worry about forgetting to update the campaign or leaving out important variables in segmentation—machines don’t forget, and they can track and activate multiple processes with higher efficiency.Data analytics, when coupled with a hardworking and highly creative team, can produce phenomenal results. At Tenfold, our marketing team staunchly supports AI and has used it wisely to grow our business.We’ve had better quality leads since our AI integration, thanks to automation and analytics. The insight generated through AI has also guided us in producing audience-specific content and distributing them accordingly.We’ve written several articles on AI and marketing at the Tenfold blog that expound on this topic. Do check them out if you want deeper insights on AI.

Thanks for the A2ATLDR:Bill Gates was a uniquely talented and ambitious person even as a child. At 14 he was able to write computer programs better than most adults such that several companies paid for him for his services. Now a days, it is easier to "start" an online business... but Bill Gates did it as a teenager when you had to do it all yourself. There was no internet (as we know it), no website building platforms, no online marketplaces, no online tutorials on "how to start a business". He mostly figured out how to do it himself, including filling out all the federal and state tax forms covering the revenue of his business himself by hand.Longer version:Largely paraphrased from Wikipedia (link Bill Gates)At a time (1968) when personal computer ownership was literally 0.00%, Bill Gates first encountered a computer when his school bought a terminal and a block of access time on a mainframe. Think of this of like having access to a web browser and an internet connection, except instead of being able to surf the web... you only could run really, really, really simple apps - like tic-tac-toe and you had to have the "internet" connection for run any apps.When that computer time ran out and he didn't have any more money. The 13 year old Bill Gates managed to hack into a PDP-10 owned by Computer Center Corporation (CCC) to give himself and his friends (including Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen) free computer time. When CCC found out, they banned him for the summer (it was a more innocent time back then).  After his ban was up, he (and his friends) offered to find bugs in CCC's software in exchange for free computer time. The next year, another software company called Information Systems, hired the group of friends to write a payroll program for more computer time and money. When his school found out about his skills, they had him write a computer program to schedule students in classes. When he was 17, Bill Gates started his own company (Traf-O-Data) which read the raw data from roadway traffic counters and create reports for traffic engineers. For that they built a machine to process the ticket automatically More stories about Bill Gates here:Bill Gates, Inside the Gates

Are you sure that the NRA is the problem?Oh, I know that the media and the talking heads are all making them out to be some 500 lb gorilla and the reason psychos shoot up school yards, but have you ever bothered to look into the matter beyond the headlines?I’ll give you an example. In 2017, the push was for a “Universal Background Check”. The idea was to be sure that people buying guns were not criminals. Believe it or not, the NRA wholly supports this and in fact was involved with creating the current NICS (National Instant Check System) that is used.But the bill that was proposed was not what you heard in the media. First, it would not plug any “Gunshow Loophole” because there is no such thing. The only sales at a gun show that the bill covered was private sales. Of course, private sales can occur anywhere, not just gun shows.But the bill didn’t make the NICS easier for private sales. They just required all private sales to be conducted through a licensed dealer. Had this actually passed, a gun show would be an ideal location for such sales as there would be access to many dealer. In effect, you would greatly increase the number of private sales at a gun show by this law.So, what is involved with a sale through a dealer? Well, the dealer would have to do the following:1) Record the transfer in their bound book. This is a book where all the transactions of a firearm is recorded via that dealer. The book is auditable by the BATF and many dealers have faced fines for poorly kept records, so many dealers go to great pains to keep their book neat and accurate.2) Fill out the federal form 4473. This is required by all dealer sales of both new and used guns. It asks for the buyer’s name, address, the make and model of the gun, serial number, and then asks a bunch of questions. The dealer can get fined if the person fills out the form wrong. For example, answering a question with “Y” or “N” instead of “Yes” or “No” is a BATF violation. So the dealer has to carefully examine the form for errors and have the person fill out another if errors are found.3) The dealer then calls into the NICS. NICS can come back with a “Proceed”, “Denied” or “Delay”. A delay can take up to 3 days. Typically this is a name that appears similar to a Prohibited Person and requires some research. If this happens, the transfer is on hold. The dealer has no idea when the result of the research is likely to finish. If you are at a gun show, the show could be over before the approval is made.4) All this paperwork, verification, etc takes time. Time is money. So dealers charge for this service. It is typical for a dealer to charge $25-$40 per gun, but sometimes multiple guns get a discount because the dealer can process up to 4 on a single form, but when more than one gun is transferred, the dealer has to fill out Form 3310 which is supposed to help with gun trafficking.All of this is well and good if you are buying a gun from someone you don’t know and many people will require sales be conducted at a dealer for the piece of mind such protections provide. But friends and family typically do not bother with the hassle and expense.One thing you need to realize is that to get a gun dealer license is not an easy process. Since the federal government cracked down on so called “kitchen table” dealers back in the 1980’s, you now must show a commercially zoned storefront with posted business hours to qualify. Many communities don’t want gun shops, and use zoning laws to make them difficult or unattractive. For example the city of Boston does not have any dealers. In fact, the nearest dealer is 3 towns away. Many rural areas don’t have the traffic to keep a dealer in business and you’ll find they are typically only open in the evening or on a Saturday as they work another full time job. Keep this in mind as we get into the next issue.But the bill didn’t stop at sales. It stated that ALL transfers had to be done in this manner. No exceptions. So, two friends out on a hunt would need to go through the whole process listed above just to swap guns for the afternoon. Oh, and they would have to do it all again to give the gun back. It is very common on a range to try out other people’s guns - such a thing would also require the full transfer and back process. Demo guns at a national event by manufacturers? Same thing.Basically any time a gun were to swap hands, the law would apply. There are private shooting clubs where guns are treated like library books and members take whatever they want. Families regularly swap guns. Heck, some shooting courses provide guns for students to use. All of these events would have been impacted by these new transfer requirements.The NRA balked at this. Essentially the rule would curtail many of the traditions and practices that are very common and virtually never result in any kind of criminal activity. In essence it would criminalize things that simply are not crimes.Not only would it create criminals where no criminal intent existed, but the cost to manage the volume of temporary transfers, the staffing needed to take the calls and do the checks would have cost millions each year. All money that would not go toward actually dealing with criminals.When the issue was brought up, many members of Congress agreed the requirements were too restrictive and the whole bill failed to pass. The supporters of the bill did not even attempt to listen to the complaints and work out a manageable fix.Did you hear any of that in the media?But what about catching criminals?Well, the bill didn’t change anything in regards to enforcing the rules to make sure the people who should not own guns were properly entered into NICS. In fact, other than maybe getting fired, there is NO PENALTY for failing to report a person. We have laws that will jail a teacher or coach that fail to report bullies. We have laws that put priests in prison who fail to report potential inappropriate behaviors in other clergy. But we do not have any laws that punish law enforcement agents that fail to do their job and make sure that dangerous people are reported to the background system. And this bill made no effort to change that.NICS is not open to anyone but federally licensed gun dealers. The left are so worried that the system might be used to check people for things other than guns that they refuse to create a means to allow people to verify someone they are selling a gun to. It would be easy to create an app that takes a photo of the buyer and seller’s ID (or just their faces and type in some data) and then return a simple “Proceed” or “Deny” with no other details. You’d have plenty of information to audit for illegal use. And if someone didn’t have an ID, they could then use a dealer. Heck, you can’t file taxes on-line without submitting some kind of ID, so this isn’t anything unique.And yet, the bill did nothing to address the issue of accessing the NICS for easier private sales.Here is the thing. We have 20,000 gun laws in this country. On the federal side, a prohibited person touching a gun could see them in prison for a minimum of 5 years. And yet, we still see cities with high violent crime rates that have virtually no federal cases. Why isn’t law enforcement using those stiff federal laws to get the violent people off the streets? Such a program called “Project Exile” worked wonders in Richmond, VA to reduce violent crime dramatically.OK, back to the “Universal Background Check” bill.I spent a lot of words above explaining what the bill would have required of people and why the situation would have been a nightmare. You never saw any of this in the news and the media pretty much ignored the issue.When the bill was defeated, it was never reported that a “terrible bill that would have cost millions and made criminals out of the innocent was defeated”, instead, all you ever heard was“The NRA used its influence to defeat the Universal Background Check bill that would have closed the gunshow loophole”Almost everything about that statement is false.So, be careful what you want to “Fight Against”. I suspect that most of what you think about the NRA is highly biased due to the way the organization is treated in the media. When you look at the actual facts, many times their concerns are quite valid. And, they have a lot of rank and file law enforcement on their side which helps them represent real world situations. I’ve found their positions in many cases very well presented. Most of the arguments you get on TV news are highly edited and taken out of context to promote an agenda, not facilitate a debate.Make sure you know what you are fighting for. You might be surprised.

Chatbots can help grow business easily with the latest technologies and keep customers happy. Chatbots are evolving quickly, and admittedly they’re still not as clever as we want them to be. Still, they already offer much potential for forward-thinking businesses.Here are 6 reasons why customers could prefer chatbots:Reason #1: People Want Fewer AppsАccording to recent statistics, downloading of new apps comes down. People already have apps almost for everything and don’t want to download new ones. Apps don’t always give the access to information as fast as customer needs. You should download all necessary apps and then switch among a bunch of them on your mobile device. But there is no need to download chatbots, and they can solve your problems with less hassle. Just search for a chatbot from within a messaging app and then start chatting.Reason #2: Apps Have Become a Tough BusinessIt takes quite a lot of time and money to compete with apps that are already popular with the help of advertising or optimization techniques. Another thing to keep in mind is updating to new OS versions, because if you don’t update your app it will become unsupported on the latest devices and people will leave it. Chatbots let you not to compete with the tops apps and set up business in a messenger app.Reason #3: People Use Messengers More Than Other Types of AppsAccording to statistics people are using messengers more than social networks. People are starting to use messaging apps not only to chat, but also to interact with brands such as CNN, Vine, Disney, Spring, and Uber that already rely on chatbots.Reason #4: With Chatbots Your Business Can ScaleWhat if 100 people message imaginary service company at the same time and each person has a unique question? This company could hire employees, but could build a chatbot to answer intelligently all customers. This automated solution allows your business to handle more customers that it could previously and scale your business while simultaneously looking out for the convenience of your customers.Reason #5: Cost EffectivenessTo develop an app you need to work with professional OS developers and strong UX designer. Then it has to be tested, refined, and submitted to app stores for approval. That takes time and money. With chatbots you don’t have to worry about app development, as messenger apps are built by third parties and updates can be done with continuous integration just to the backend.Reason #6: Better Marketing and More SalesChatbots can help: streamline business operations; improve marketing and sales; promote sales or new products by messaging emails to all clients; personalize responses to each customer.You can find more information in the article 6 Reasons Why Your Business Needs a Chatbot, Not an App on RubyGarage blog.

First, the insurance industry is going through a major upgrade where a lot of the past inefficiencies are being solved and ironed out.That being said, the customer experience during the insurance shopping process is horrible and confusing. A better experience and more transparency + education would drastically cut down on the confusing aspects of insurance:DistributionWhen you buy insurance, there are three main ways to buyDifficulty: Easy - Go to a lead generator online that shows you multiple quotes and then sells your information to insurance agents. The Problem: no one likes being cold called and having their information sold for a profit. You have to finish up your buying process over the phone and are often tossed around between lead generator, insurance agent, and insurance carrier. An example of a lead generator is EverQuote. This is the worst experience for the customer. Don’t believe me? Check their fb comments and customer testimonials…Difficulty: Medium - Go directly to a carrier website and fill out one application and get their quoted price.The Problem: First, the carrier you go to may not be a good fit and just outright deny you a quote after all your hard work. Second, if you want to check prices on 5 different carriers, you have to fill out five applications. This leads to entering a lot of information five times. You also don’t really have an easy way to compare what is offered in the policy and how the coverage in the five policies are different.Difficulty: Hard - Go directly to a brick & mortar independent insurance agency, speak with one of their agents in person or over the phone, and fill out one application and get many prices.The Problem: you may have to visit a physical office. Only open during business hours 9–5 M-F. You have to make one/multiple phone calls. That being said, this is your BEST option out of the three listed, because you get an experienced professional looking at what you need and shopping not just on price, but quality and value of your policy.So now we know there are three paths (already confusing). The BEST path for the customer requires the most work, while the EASY path gives the WORST customer experience as they get passed around from lead gen to agent to carrier with no real education and just a battle for price. Insurance is not a “one size fits all” policy. Everyone lives in a different neighborhood, with different risks, and owns different stuff. The independent agent is the BEST option for the customer to eliminate confusion, because:They are a licensed insurance professional that understands the different insurance terms, coverages, and policy types.They are independent and so are not going to just give you one offering. They have your best interests in mind.They understand value and priceBut then we should ask ourselves, can we make the independent agent easier to use?I’m trying to create a fourth path to make the insurance buying process more efficient while maintaining the service of an independent agent:An online insurance agency that allowed you to fill out a simple online form, you submit, and they do the shopping for you with multiple carriers, never sell your information, and send you multiple packages to compare on price AND coverage across carriers. The agency has tons of data on your home and where you live, so the policy can be crafted to your needs. (check your risk of flood, theft, high winds, or hail, all for free) It still requires some legwork up front, but it gets you to a policy you can understand with quotes you can actually compare on more than just price.It’s not an easy lift, but someone has to do it!— Young Alfred

I raised $500,000 at 19. I was on my way to change the world. Three years later everything burned down.This post is not about how to shoot for the stars or run a company. Others are better at that.This is about what not to do.I’ve made every mistake possible. But ironically, I’m constantly meeting teams doing the exact same things that caused my first startup to implode. Everything I’m writing about I’ve experienced first hand through my own startups as well as various businesses I’ve been involved in. It’s been all my fault and this is my story.Some of you will disagree with me. Others will have things to add. I’m happy to discuss in the comments.Here’s my attempt.ZUCKERBERG SYNDROMMy girlfriend didn’t know what I was working on for nine months. I slept with a chair blocking the front door. My phone was tapped. Corporate America and Uncle Sam were listening. Someone was going to kill me to steal the idea.I really believed this. So I did everything possible (literally) to avoid getting feedback out of the fear of having our idea stolen.Ultimately, secrecy and stupidity killed us. Three years and hundreds of thousands later, we released an alpha version to a modest 30 people for the first time. Everyone hated it. Our capital was gone. Our morale: zero.I see this all the time. Startup founders hiding their ideas because of the fear that someone will steal it. Remember: no one cares about you. Your biggest issue is getting discovered. If someone steals your idea, that means you’re doing something right.Because of this syndrome, most startups are wasting their time and money building products no one wants. Why? Lack of testing. The biggest mistake a company can make (product wise) is to avoid talking to and testing with potential and current users. Every day. It’s also one of the main reasons startup’s fail.If you’re not constantly releasing and looking for feedback you’re either a) delusional (me) thinking too many people will sign up/buy your product and you won’t be able to scale b) scared that it’s not good enough (me) or c) someone will steal your idea (as I was).A. SCALING“Your priority, in short, is proving that people will use your product at all. If they won’t, then it won’t matter if you can’t scale. If they will, then you will figure out a way to scale. I’ve never seen a startup die because it couldn’t scale fast enough. I’ve seen hundreds of startups die because people refused to embrace their product.” — Guy Kawasaki [Emphasis mine]I’ve done this and I’ve experienced this in the past three startups I’ve worked in. It’s completely delusional. If five out of five people tell you that they wouldn’t use your product (before you build), quit. If eight out of ten people tell you that they hate this feature and you empirically see that they’re not using it, kill it. Don’t assume. Always be testing.More on feedback below.b. TESTINGSee point A.C. STEALING(!)No one will steal your idea. It takes time, money, skills and immorality to steal. Not everyone is born that lucky.Most importantly, no one cares about your idea.They’ll only start caring when there’s a massive amount of initial traction (50,000+ users). By then, you’ve already established a strong user/customer base and it’s too late for the others.HIRING FOR WEAKNESSOnly hire for a strength that needs to be filled in your company. Never for a weakness.Not once did any of the startups I worked in hire for a strength. I repetitively recommended hiring people purely out of loneliness, fear and scarcity repetitively. Each time it sunk us deeper.But what does that mean?Hiring for a weakness means that you attempt to fill a weakness in the fundamenetals in your company by hiring for a weakness. Example: If you’re building a product and it’s not gaining traction and your company doesn’t have inherent fundamentals, hiring Ryan Holiday to sell your product won’t help. You can’t fight weakness with weakness.However, if you have a rockstar engineering team and you want to add a marketing person to help take the product get to another level, then you’re adding a strength.Hiring for weakness also means:a. You hire a B+ player instead of a A+ player.b. You hire people so that they go through the struggle with you, so that they share your fears and paranoia. Not so they execute on what’s needed.c. Hiring someone to fill a position. Not to compliment the rest of the company.d. Hiring someone and not having any idea of what the hell you want them to do.e. It means hiring someone because you think there’s no one else. Scarcity.f. Hiring a client’s friend. Because you’re scared.It’s ultimately about the fundamentals. If the fundamentals of the product and the team aren’t there, adding someone is just adding a weakness. It won’t help, because it’s not a strength.PAINTER’S DILEMMAApproving emails? One week treks. Our first wireframes? $40K and four months. Did we have a working product after all this? No. We failed.The Painter’s Dilemma is when you’re so deep in the details of your project that you don’t even know what the idea is anymore. You’re blind. When you’re too deep you need help.How to solve it? Stop. Talk to people. Get feedback. Iterate and build. Release. Breathe.Repeat the loop.The more feedback you get the healthier you and your product are.FEEDBACK*I can’t emphasize this enough. If you don’t get feedback (everyday) you will die. I never got feedback. EVER. Well, until the cash ran out. Oops.If you’re not getting qualitiative and quantitive feedback/data everyday, the cancer will start.It’s easy: speak to people, Google Analytics, send surveys. Just don’t hide from it.*This is the crucial and worth a dedicated blog post in the future.COMMUNICATE“Don’t talk to him, he doesn’t understand. He’s out of the picture next funding round anyways.” I hid everything internally. It was easy, we were in 5 different countries! Our developers were remote (I’ll get to that) and Basecamp was our only means of communication. In other startups, I wouldn’t included people from discussions because “it isn’t necessary. That isn’t their job”New features, awful designs, conniving plans were all pushed through a funnel. I was the leader of the deceiving. Architecting a blue print to push my own delusional “never test and succeed” agenda. My style? The longer the email the less likely someone important will read it. What a strategy. As always, the CEO is the biggest idiot.I don’t care if you’re a church, a tech startup or a non-profit. If you don’t have a system of communication in place that keeps everyone aware of what everyone is doing in the company, in real-time, for every milestone, everyday, you will die very soon.Lesson: Live and breath Scrum.SCREW LAWYERSLawyers are criminals.I spent $15,000 on legal documents/fees we never used. Every entrepreneur/startup I’m involved with thinks lawyers are the first step to success. Bullshit.DOCSAll the legal documents you ever need are available online. If you’re B2B, all companies that you’ll work with have their own standard LOEs, NDAs, etc., that they anyways steal from Fortune 500 companies. Request it. Then use it. B2C? Here.BUT I NEED A TRADEMARK!Unless you have 10,000 clients you don’t need to think about copyright or even the name. Prove the concept first. Worry later. If you do have to worry, those are very nice worries to have.PATENT IT!Patenting something that isn’t validated with at least 10,000 clients is moronic. Ironically, this is the only mistake my first startup didn’t follow through with (fully, at least).DECISION MAKINGI was traumatized from taking decisions. Most startups never take decisions. In other statups I work in, decisions took weeks. People join startups for the reason of avoiding bureaucracy but everyone still does it. Why? Lack of trust and overview of the team, so they choke the process (have I suggested Scrum?).The board should decide on the vision and the group should decide what to execute on by creating a backlog for the week. The team should then have the power to execute it. With a great communication process in place, teammates should be able to take decisions without reporting to anyone while keeping everyone updated with everything’s that going on, live. Have a flat structure to achieve this by using Scrum.Let people do their jobs. Trust them. Don’t have a tedious review process as most startups do. Don’t suffocate the system. Empower your people.Read Scrum by Jeff Sutherland on how to manage your team. Then read Team of Teams by General Stanley McChrystal for how to organize the information flow. Both books compliment each other perfectly.THE BOARDThe ideal board is 3–5 people maximum if you’re a startup. Anything above that means that either no decisions will ever be taken (my first company) or someone has a hidden agenda and profits from a discombobulated board.A business is not a democracy. Unanimous decisions don’t work and will never work.Who’s should I put on the Board?Only investors/shareholders who hold a large stake and are extremely active in the success of your venture.INVESTORSSmart Money vs Still MoneyJust because someone is offering you cash almost always means you shouldn’t accept it.Your investor can have the greatest contacts in the pharmecutical industry. She can be CEO of Merck. If she doesn’t have a massive network in whatever industry you’re in, it’s worthless. The money will be worth nothing. This is true 100% of the time.Always onboard investors that can help you in your niche industry.MEETINGSThis is my top 3 favorites. Most won’t agree with me on this.I’ve never been to a meeting that has made me money/funded my venture. I don’t think anyone has. Has anyone ever handed you a check at a meeting? I doubt it. Today, it usually happens by wire-transfer.Meetings are pointless. Every team I meet, consult for/work with all think that going to meetings is the most crucial part of business. Most importantly, the whole team should be there. Pick up the fucking phone. Travel is time and money expensive. Even if you’re taking a cab.I would fly 10,000 miles for a 3 hour meeting and then fly back to Europe that same day. $30K. Gone.“If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be: ‘meetings.’” - Dave BarryMost of the discussion can be ironed out over email and FaceTime.Ok yes, I agree. Meeting in person is important. But not until it’s necessary. Most of the time, it’s unecessary. And even when it is, it shouldn’t always be an excuse to leave work for a business lunch or to Shanghai for the day.Avoid meetings. Get more done.It’s a waste of time 99% of the time.FOUNDING PARTNERS = YOUR SPOUSEYou will be married to your partners and investors for the next 7–10 years. Choose wisely.Know your team. Speak to your investor’s enemies. Get references for everyone.Don’t be a deceiver. Use Scrum.WORKING HOURSWe worked 16 hour days. Yey! Startup life!No. Work 8–10 hours and you’ll get more done than working 18 hours a day. Don’t believe me. It’s proven.Working 18 hour days leads to a burn out, which leads to painter’s dilemma, then delusion, then deceiving others around you, then depression. Then it’s too late.Ultimately, the more you work the more mistakes you’re prone to make. Mistakes made are mistakes that need to be corrected. Mistakes that aren’t correct can take up to 24x longer to correct than if they were corrected immediately.But you can’t see that. You’re burned out. You’re in Painter.PRODUCT / MARKET VALIDATIONAnother reason I refused to test in the three product startups I was involved in was because “the ideas work successfully elsewhere. They will also work here.” Doesn’t work like that.Just because you’re making a mishmash of several products that have product/market validation elsewhere doesn’t mean people are willing to use your product. I have yet to meet a new founder who hasn’t claimed this.In order for someone to switch to your product, your product needs to be at least 8x better.*Is your product really 8x better than your biggest competitor? If the answer isn’t a clear yes, quit.*Read Hooked by Nir Eyal and Ryan Hoover for how to build habit forming products.RECREATING THE WHEEL“God gave you eyes, so plagarize.” -Michael LewisNo need to re-create the wheel. Everything is out there already for a reason. Use APIs, read books (many books), steal functions, designs, ideas, marketing slogans, branding, on boarding processes, software, colors, clients, everything from other people/companies who are successful.This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t test it in your own environment. You must validate every single function that you put out there. Use the Lean Startup KanBan by Ash Maurya for this.DILUTIONWe gave away 51% for our first funding round. How much did we plan to keep when we “exited?” Think about that. It doesn’t make sense.Startups do this all the time. If you retain 51% after the seed round, how much does the founding team plan to keep by Series B? 20%? If you take the average of what you got paid for equity after the exit + your salary you’ll be paying more in taxes with a minimum wage paycheck for the past 8 years it took you to exit. Might as well work in a shoe store.If you don’t have the bargaining power (a validated product) to raise money with, quit.GUYS IN SUITSOur tech partners wore suits. That made us comfortable. They ended up quoting $100k. We ended up with nothing.If you see tech people in suits, run.OUTSOURCINGI lost well over $100,000 for our first version that was outsourced. We were smart enough to not learn from our mistakes so we found another team to outsource with. Another hefty sum gone. Only myself to blame.I’ve had terrible experiences with outsourcing and great experiences with in-house development.However, many products (we all use everyday) have found great success in outsourcing. I also know many entrepreneurs who outsource and are extremely succesful. While there are massive benefits, there are also downfalls. If you plan to, find a free consulting company that has pre-screened teams.Either way, using Scrum increases your chances of success in-house or out.YOUR TEAMEntrepreneurs read about Steve Jobs’ management style and think he was a tyrant. So they curse at their employees and tell everyone that they are “shit.” They think that’s how a company should be run and that’s how teammates should be treated. Wrong. Treat your team like shit and you’ll get shit.Either way, that’s not how Steve Jobs did it. Steve Jobs empowered his team. He told them that what they’re outputting is shit because he knew that they could do better. Because they are the best in the industry. He made them feel good. He challenged them and today Apple is Apple because of that.On the other hand, I lied. Didn’t speak about the hard things and repressed whatever fear or worry we had. We were scared that someone would quit or that we would look bad if we showed our emotions in front of our investors.You should always be able to tell your teammates all the fears and worries you have. Chances are, if you’re worried about something, everyone is worried about the same thing. Bring it up. Talk about it. I keep mentioning Scrum* because it encourages team members telling each other what’s bothering them and what’s impending the growth progress. This is key to not failing.Not once, in any of the startups I was in, did I or others get credit for great work or for their ideas that ended up being implemented. Not once did anyone congratualte a teammate on a engineering triumph, a beautiful design or a new lead. Startups think “business is business. This isn’t a cute place to pat each other on the backs.”BUT THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT A BUSINESS SHOULD BE. You should be holding each other up, helping one another and listening to the problems in the team. Because ultimately, you’re on the same mission.The second the negativity flows in people become scared. They stop raising issues, telling you how they feel and how to improve the business. When that happens you start to slowly die because you’ve fell into dillusion that everything is working. Six months later, you’re on the street.Empower your team. Congratulate people. Love each other. When someone screws up, tell them that. But also tell them how to improve and ask them why they think they screwed up and how to make their job easier.You’re a team. Be one.*Believe it or not, I’m not affiliated with Scrum in anyway. I’m not even a Scrum Master.—When I reflect on all the stupidity I’ve personally done and the startups I’ve been involved in, I realize that the only thing I ever followed up through and executed with absolute perfection, were the things that eventually ended up killing us: not telling a soul what our idea was. Talking to lawyers. Partnering with bad teams. Hiring out of weakness. Going to too many meetings. No decision making system. Not using Scrum. Hiring people out of fear. Hiding from reality.Mistakes are simple to make but hard to correct. They’re usually the first option that pops up. But as entrepreneurs we do thing because they’re hard, not because they’re easy.Hard choices take a long time to get right. It takes guts, intuition, experience and lots of luck. But never settle. Never accept your situation.Life can always be better.…..This was originally posted on the NY Observer and our blog on Penta.Follow me @lukaivicev or contact me directly at luka@getpenta.com.

I've interviewed candidates for both permanent and contract positions.For a permanent position, red flags are:Mr Angry: This may sound cliched, but bad-mouthing your last boss or employer is a big red flag. You don't have to lie about your reason for switching, and everyone knows that sometimes you're stuck with the wrong boss. But a professional is expected to take things professionally - not personally - and the way you express yourself reflects that. I do appreciate someone telling me that their job did not meet their growth aspirations (read as "wasn't getting promoted") - that's OK.Mr Jumpy: This is relative. For a highly skilled candidate (as assessed during the interview), annual job hopping could be OK, but for an average candidate it's not. Hopping jobs voluntarily every few months is a red flag for anyone seeking a permanent position.Wolf in sheep's clothing: One of the open-ended questions I like to ask is for the interviewee to describe one of his/her most challenging projects. If a person I'm interviewing for a hardcore coding role starts talking about cost overruns, then I might wonder if his/her interests align with the role I'm trying to fill.Nothing to gain: I am very interested in learning why someone wants the role being offered. Weak, generic answers such as "I've heard a lot of good things about this company" don't really cut it. There must be something non-monetary and convincing that the candidate can benefit from in the role - and he/she should be aware of what that is. I usually fill roles with slightly underqualified candidates, and very rarely with overqualified ones.Trust me: I've had candidates being dismissive or overly brief when asked to explain the reasoning behind a specific approach. The justification would often be that they're the expert at it, or that they've worked for companies that were far more advanced in that area than us. "Trust me, I'm an expert" is not valid reasoning and the person wouldn't fit in a culture that strongly discourages "because I say so". Flaunting a famous alma mater too often in an interview as a way to establish credentials is a red flag as well. I'm interested in who you are, not where you've been.Sarah Palin: Poor language skills isn't a deal breaker, depending on the role. Nor is being introverted or reserved; some of our smartest coders take time to warm up. But poor listening skills, i.e. repeatedly misunderstanding questions (whether intentional or not), is a red flag and is indicative of someone who can bring down the productivity of the entire team. Paraphrasing a question to make sure you understood it, on the other hand, is encouraged, as is saying "I don't know".Tardiness: Being late for an interview without prior notice (even a few minutes before the start time is fine) is a major red flag for most roles. It is indicative of either a lack of interest, or personal nature. Some brilliant people are tardy by nature, and can be quite successful despite it, but brilliance rarely makes up for tardiness in a team setting. A 'no show' is worse, whether it's for an interview or the date of joining. I'm inclined not to consider such candidates for any future position, even if I switch jobs myself.Unwarranted over-confidence: Being self-assured is generally good for many roles. Unwarranted over-confidence is when you act like you know what to do in every situation, when you obviously don't. Over-confidence is becoming more and more prevalent among junior hires, presumably because self-confidence is constantly ingrained in them in schools and college, so I've had to relax my standards as well. The bottom line is that a candidate needs to show a willingness to learn and adapt.The I-Player: This is relatively minor, but relevant nevertheless. When describing past projects and accomplishments, I expect a healthy mix of 'I' and 'we'. Too much 'we' could indicate a freeloader, and cause me to probe further on individual contribution. Too much 'I' when describing projects that are obviously team efforts can indicate a poor team player who does not attribute credit where it's due.Air-time hog: This one is a personal pet peeve and is hardly universal. I am biased against air-time hogging, i.e. when someone seems overeager to talk when he or she has nothing worthwhile to add to the conversation. This is strictly YMMV - some interviewers interpret this positively as eagerness, but I see it as a waste of time.Fence-sitters: Making a job change is often a major decision, and I can understand that. I'm always happy to explain to a candidate why I think he or she could be a great fit, and to give him/her extra time to take a decision. However, once a negotiation is mutually complete, it's done. Trying to re-open negotiations on receipt of a 'better' offer elsewhere, or repeatedly extending the date of joining with no good reason, is a red flag - I don't consider such candidates even if he or she is worth the higher offer. I'm more inclined to consider such candidates for future opportunities if he or she politely and promptly informs us that he or she isn't joining.

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