by tomnora | Apr 1, 2013 | Angel Investor, Business Development, CEO Succession, early stage, founder, Launch, Revenue Growth, Scalability, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora, venture
After a recent speech I gave for startups, I was interviewed by Jennifer DesRosiers (love that name!) about tech startups. Here are my answers…
When did you first discover your love of technology?
>> When I was a 11 my brother built a homemade crystal radio. It was fascinating to see him assemble these inert parts and then hear sound come out. From then on I was hooked on technology and electronics.
What is your favorite part of your job?
>> The unknown factor, the challenge to create the future and make something grow from nothing.
What sparked the idea for NeoRay?
>> The original idea for me came from seeing people use their cellphones to buy from vending machines in Japan. Simultaneously Alessio watched his father create a PayPal competitor and he wanted to make something more futuristic for mobile payments; he then saw a WIRED article “Kill The Password!”. We compared notes and decided the timing was right for mobile payments without passwords leveraging advances in biometrics..
What in your opinion is the next big thing in technology?
>> The 15 Minute Website and Personal Website “Portfolios” – soon anyone will be able to build multiple personal sites with full e-commerce, payment systems, community, social networking, SEO, and big data analytics with no coding and very easy manipulation. Currently there is a barrier to this – you must know some coding to optimize this and it’s difficult to manage multiple sites. People and companies will have a portfolio of websites and not even think about it.. Most of the tools already exist but need a lot of refinement; it will take another 2-5 years.
What excites/interests you most about tech startups and what makes them successful?
>> The Scalability challenge. Much of my career has been dedicated to trying to create the alchemy of continuously growing a company. The progress of E-Commerce, HTML5, CSS3, PHP and Javascript have made it so any startup idea, tech or non-tech, can become reality with very little money or work. The difficult step has shifted from launch to revenues, scalability, growth.
This is exciting because it allows so many people to give it a try which equals more great ideas coming to light, but still requires a great idea and great execution to have larger success and growth. Pretty soon the most important people at startups will shift back from developers to those that can create and sustain growth.
by tomnora | Mar 7, 2013 | Angel Investor, CEO Succession, early stage, founder, Hawaii, Launch, Scalability, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora
- What are people doing now because your product doesn’t exist, what is the pain you will solve?
- What is it that you know about your specific niche that other companies do not?
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How and when does this make revenue and profits? What is the growth graph?
@tomnora
by tomnora | Dec 14, 2012 | Angel Investor, Business Development, CEO Succession, early stage, founder, Hawaii, Launch, Revenue Growth, Scalability, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora, venture
Being the CEO of a startup is crazy, fun, very hard work, inclusive, humbling and of course can be quite rewarding. Weekends are meaningless. There is a continuous decision stream where each decision informs the next. Your mind is thinking 24 hours a day, even when you sleep.
When you’re the CEO of a startup, a real startup with product and some cash in the bank and/or revenue, there are 3 FULL TIME JOBS.
1. Raising Money – you are constantly doing this, preparing for this and thinking about this, whether it’s pre-seed, seed funding, debt, revenue, partnerships, IPO or other.
2. Managing and Properly Growing The Business – this includes several things, depending on the size of the enterprise: managing employees, administration, hiring, firing, leases, expenses, unhappy employees, fixing other problems, etc.
This piece is what often kills an otherwise great business, which justifys the case for less is more when it comes to employees and infrastructure.
3. Selling – The CEO of a startup must ABS, always be selling. You start every day working this, just like #1 above, they’re closely related. Using the CEO to close sales no matter what size the business is, is vital to success.
This piece emphasizes the importance of having an awesome, mature VP of Sales, if you can afford it; it takes a lot of pressure off and frees up the time of the CEO.
Overall, it can be the most exhilarating experience you’ve ever had, especially when things work. And it’s more accessible to most people than ever before. But it’s not for everyone – you must decide what your #1 goal is. If it’s to create a successful long term business, being the CEO should be something you’re willing to give up if it threatens goal #1. If your #1 goal is to try it out to see how it feels, then by all means do it, get professional help, and make the most of it. Contact me if you’re dead serious and I can help you. The Startup CEO by Tom Nora
by tomnora | Nov 19, 2012 | Angel Investor, Business Development, CEO Succession, early stage, founder, Launch, Revenue Growth, Scalability, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora, venture
This is a line that was pretty common in Silicon Valley until recently. Steve Jobs even (ab)used that line on Dropbox when trying to buy them out of the market (They turned him down.)
Now that’s all changed, for the moment. The threshold for “company” status is very low, including the following list of minimum pieces at their lowest cost.
1) a url – $10 2) incorporation – $200 3) Internet – free 4) build a website – free 5) development tools – free 6) office space – free – home, starbucks, hipster coffee shop
In other word, the barriers have dropped if you’re willing to do most things yourself, which is a good thing. You still need an amazing idea , business model, some focus from a developer (critical!). You can create a single feature “disposable” company, nothing wrong with that, it’s a learning experience, fail fast, etc., it might even create some value and get acq-hired. And It’s a lot better than talking to folks for a year about an idea that never materializes.
But that’s not the way to create a company that can live and grow for years. In doing that you have to be honest with yourself, make some sacrifices and seek continuous enhancement of your entity. In the world of easy startups, everything is a startup, people drink their own koolaid too much.
Here are some great ways to maybe move into higher ground:
- Seek outside criticism and listen to it. Put on your flack jacket and let ’em rip you up. Be open to changes but don’t be a wimp either. You may see something nobody else does, but listen.
- Pay those you ask to help you – money, equity, trade services, something meaningful. Give them incentive to help you think straight. Make sure you pick the right mentors with track records. Never ask for something for nothing, you’ll get what you pay for and a bad reputation fast. Better yet, pay it forward. This is an area where strong developers actually have a lot to trade these days, but usually try to do everything themselves. Not likely to succeed.
- Diversify – get people difeerent than you involved as team members – different genders, races, ages, expertises. Here’s a great 3 minute talk on this by Stanford prof Kathy Eisenhardt http://j.mp/UaVjky
So look for the opportunity to build a company, share the wealth, and seek higher ground.
follow me or DM me @tomnora
by tomnora | Aug 10, 2012 | Angel Investor, Business Development, CEO Succession, early stage, founder, Launch, Revenue Growth, Scalability, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora
1. The Executive Summary
I often get inquiries about getting involved in early stage companies here and around the country.
The beginning point to discussing a startup the Executive Summary of the company, which lays out the key facts about a startup in 1-2 pages. But I’ve noticed that in L.A. it’s the exception rather than the norm, people want to meet first. Real investors don’t usually work that way.
The Executive Summary is CRITICAL to getting prospective investors excited. Without it you have little chance of getting the next step – a meeting to discuss the project and funding, more team members, more ecosystem. It’s a key qualifier as a serious player in the startup world. You hardly ever see a Silicon Valley startup without one, no matter how early stage.
The pitch deck has replaced it lately, but that takes more time to read and it’s harder to find the key info quickly. (One exception to this is the deck Hank Cho sent me; one of the best I’ve seen in a while.)
So google “Executive Summary”, look at several and put one one together. Send it to me and I’ll critique it for you. Make it less words, more impact, numbers, facts, the team.
It will also show where your holes are.
1. Let’s Loosen Up
The current startup scene combined with our poor economic/job situation is causing many people to panic a bit. It’s understandable, but if it transfers to your persona as a startuper, it won’t help. Many people I meet are very rigid, look a little scared but fake a smile, unable to open themselves to criticism. This doesn’t get investors excited.
Sometimes a 20-30% change or add to your business can make a major difference. Not a complete pivot, that implies 90-180 degree change, but be open to suggestions by those who’ve been there before. Maybe change your name, change your graphics(!), merge/acquire/acq-hire, drop yours for another better one.
Let go of your ego, let go of some equity.
The goal is to build long term sustainable businesses and revenue streams. Add smart people to your circle for the bigger good of the company. Loosen up, smile, have fun. But make some money for everyone involved. Be better.
@tomnora
by tomnora | Jun 30, 2012 | Angel Investor, audio, Business Development, CEO Succession, early stage, Hawaii, Launch, startup, startup CEO, Tom Nora
About a year ago, during a speech I was giving for a Hacker News group, someone in the audience brought up the notion that “Failure Is Good”, i.e. Fail Fast, Fail Often. This is a major change in thinking from the past, due to many factors, and it makes a lot of sense. Rapid prototyping of web apps and mobile apps now means rapid prototyping of startups.
Since everything in life is becoming an app and MVP is good enough to actually attract revenue and/or funding, you can actually try something and throw it away within a few weeks. The cost for this is from $0 to $5,ooo.
The problem is when someone tries this over and over with the same result – junking it. I see a lot of this in my circles There is a price for doing this; you wer yourself out, lose credibility, waste peoples money and time, lose friends, etc.
A better option is to vastly improve your odds each time by getting smarter, refining, capitalizing on mistakes, getting help in the areas where you’re weak, have less ego and more focus on not accepting failure.
If you add up all the attempts to launch startups over the past 2-3 years by all participants, there are probably at least a million failures. Many of these were stepping stones to better things and/or a quite valuable learning process, maturity, personal growth. But over half were probably unnecessary ego bursts and fleeting ideas where deep down inside the founder knows it ain’t gonna happen but keeps going for many reasons.
Most people are very good at one thing at a time, not five so pick ONE and try that role and let as many others as possible help prevent failure number one million and one. @tomnora
