AskAlex Podcast

Our startup review is with Lior Ohayon at https://scopeleads.io/. If you are a digital marketing company looking to get more leads, check it out! The startup struggle is churn. Yes, he’s a SaaS company. There are no simple answers here as there are so many things that CAN be focused on, but with limited resources, you need to figure out what you SHOULD focus on. Lior is left with a lot of things to think about. Hopefully in future we will do another session and see how things work out and he can share his learnings with you. If you are a SaaS founder, or just any founder who knows things aren’t quite perfect and you need to do better, hopefully this will give you some impetus to think about your own startup and what your core issues are. EVERYONE has them. The best founders admit it and do something about it. If you want to step up and get some perspective, just like Lior, you can reach out to me here: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/askalex/

Dictum meum pactum is a phrase I learned in high school whilst writing essays for my application to Oxford University and it is the first thing that comes to mind when I think of reputation. It is something that I have oft found not possessed by people, and nor understood, both figuratively and literally. It means ‘my word is my bond’ and it has been the motto of the London Stock Exchange since 1801. Early on in my career, as a wet behind the ear, but enthusiastic banker, I rapidly realized idealistic principles were not widely held beliefs. This is something I have never adapted to and it has cost me. A VP once said to me “What is with this loyalty to the firm when the firm is never going to be loyal to you?” I don’t recollect responding, but it is something that has stuck with me and I never came to terms with. You can read the blog here: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2014/...

Read this blog to understand the Rule of Three: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2018/... You can read the blog here: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2016/...

TL;DR: This is a blog about value creation and the control founders have over their startup. You need to give away some control to build something valuable. How much is up to you. Founders and CEOs, Let me ask you a question “Does the degree to which you have founder control of your startup affect your company value?” I am pretty sure your answer is simple and resounding. Yes. I am good for my company. I am what makes it valuable and that will continue to be the case so long as I have breath to run things. Well, it seems you can’t have your cake and eat it too. That is a question Noam Wasserman, former professor at Harvard Business School asked himself. He has published a paper that finds startups where founders retain control of their startup after 3 years are in fact worth less. It seems founding CEOs are bad news for making big valuable companies. Well, the headline anyway. You can read the blog here: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2017/...

Dress code. Really? You have so much stuff to deal with growing your company with like, no resources, and having to beg investors for cash to make the hires you need to close. Seriously, now we’re talking about fashion with VCs? Well, you’re reading this blog, aren’t you?

You have a startup idea. Now what? This video is going to take you through the key facets of a business model and the industry environment to help you build conviction that your startup idea makes sense before you start. It’s not just a list of things to test in coffee shops and with a live product to validate it. If you internalise all the key factors, you’ll be able to rapidly evaluate each and every idea you have and hopefully help you mitigate wasting time on ideas that are doomed to fail for reasons you could have predicted. Book consulting call: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/50fol... You can read the blog here: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2018/... A meaningful founder exit is not the same thing for venture capital: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2017/... Your solution is not my problem: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2013/... How big can this get? This market sizing question has killed many startup fundraises: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2017/... Shrinking a market and owning it: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2013/... If you do this one thing your startup business model is doomed to succeed!: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2017/... Perfect Pitch Deck: https://perfectpitchdeck.com/ Passion is over-rated. Build a better mousetrap instead: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2018/... Investible Founding Startup Teams: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2015/... The real reason to launch faster (not talked about): https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2015/... Complete startup guide to start a blog and begin content marketing: https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2017/...

VCs want to see your product demo. The earlier stage you are, and the less metrics you have the more important this is. If you are growth stage, no one cares. You have numbers. Early stage your product demo shows you have actually shipped something. This is important. It’s the ultimate show don’t tell (Check it out vs trust me we can code good). So if you do a demo in person, what needs to be in your deck? You need to have a product slide in your deck, but you want to keep things on your product simple. What I do is a slide which shows the ‘4 things it does’…. the key ones anyway. You just want to explain it at a high level so an investor gets the core and want a meeting to learn more. You can demo in a meeting… once you get one. You are going to share your deck before a meeting (most of the time) so a simple overview of your product is a very good idea. You can see slide examples here: https://perfectpitchdeck.com/custom-pitch-deck-examples/  You can read the blog here:  https://www.alexanderjarvis.com/2018/10/12/how-to-do-a-demo-in-a-venture-capital-pitch/ 

Investors want to know if they are going to get rich, or not. They are implicitly trying to figure out how big you are thinking of going.