8 Hour Startup: ThankThank Notes

This is a guest post by Cubit and ThankThank Notes Co-Founder, Anthony Morales. Anthony and his Co-Founder Kristen Carney are Venture Forth alumni, as well as Capital Factor alumni. This post details how they created a new company in 8 hours and how they got their first several customers with another hour of work. As they scale, we'll have more from them.

Content and Structure of Your Investor Pitch

Structure your communication correctly, and your content will sink in effortlessly. As we’ve heard it before, it’s not so much what you say, but how you say it. Let’s go ahead and talk about a HUGE exception to that rule: The Investor Pitch. Structure is hugely important here, but if you don’t answer the question, “How will your business make the investor money,” then structure doesn’t matter. Neglect to answer that question overtly and specifically, and you’re going home.

Entrepreneurial Marketing and Blogging Angst

This is a shout out to all those techies who consider themselves well-informed, leaders in their sector but alas, have never blogged… and therefore worry that they are being marginalized.

There are so many good reasons to blog: vetting fresh ideas in a diverse arena, motivating others and generating a following, showing passion and differentiating yourself as a thought leader.

But are there good reasons not to blog?

Entrepreneurship 101: Learning to Love Selling

There is nothing harder for a non-salesperson than building a sales pipeline. In Bagging the Elephant I highlight a post about a recent event in NYC, in which entrepreneurs discussed how to build strong enough relationships with larger businesses in order to be taken seriously enough to close deals with them.

This is part of a much broader issue, though, and it's one that is a constant struggle for most small businesses: how do we keep new sales coming in the door, when that's not our background?

Yigdigs - Do It Yourself Real Estate Tools

Jonas sits down with Andy Salo, founder and CEO of Yigdigs (http://www.yigdigs.com). Yigdigs is a Real Estate For Sale by Owner webservice. Andy discusses his journey from executive to entrepreneur.