I'm headed out to the Google HQ in Mountain View next week for a CPC conference. This should be a good way to get some fresh marketing ideas and best practices on CPC strategies, conversion techniques and so on from the gurus at Google and from some of the other companies that were invited. Lots of smart people out there....I'm really looking forward to this one.
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I'm headed to India in late November to attend a friend's wedding and to hopefully meet with an Indian Angel Investor to discuss a Mixed Martial Arts site I have been working on. We built Fightlaunch.com to connect the members of the mixed martial arts community including MMA Fighters, Promoters, Gyms, Ring Girls, and fans. The most popular connection that is made comes from fighters (across various martial arts) seeking promoters that can help take their career to the next level.
After the India trip, we're headed over to Thailand for a nice vacation. Hopefully, I'll get to train with some muay thai fighters where we're staying in Phuket :) . I'd love to see a professional muay thai fight while we're there too. Should be an interesting trip.
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SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a complicated subject and it would take hundreds of posts to cover everything in depth. So, I won't get into the details here. But, I do want to point out that choosing the right SEO expert can mean the difference between driving millions of free visitors to your site or becoming another statistic in the startup grave yard.
The basic concept behind search engine optimization is to "optimize" the pages on your website so that your site appears higher in the organic search results for search engines. There are a number of factors that help you achieve higher rankings for any given keyword and SEO tactics constantly shift as the search algorithms change. So, you have two options:
1) Learn SEO yourself and make the changes in-house
2) Hire a single expert (if you're a small company) or a group of SEO Experts (for the larger players)
I've been involved with a number of sites and we've gone both routes. Personally, I hate keeping up with the latest SEO trends and tactics. So, I prefer bringing in a group of outside experts or hiring a solid guru to bring "in house". Costs can vary wildly for these services and the most expensive groups generally aren't necessarily the best.
My next point seems like a no-brainer, but you'd be amazed at how many people blindly hire lousy "experts". Before you hire anybody, look at the rankings on their own site and rankings they've achieved for previous clients. This is often the best way to determine how good they are. Make sure that they were actually the ones that achieved those rankings. Were the rankings achieved on highly competitive words? Or, did they simply target easy keywords that drive little traffic and even worse conversion? Finally, how much are they charging you to do the work and who is actually responsible for making the changes on the site? Finally, how long will it take them to achieve your desired results?
There is a lot to consider here. But, if you do your homework and choose the best option for your situation, your SEO efforts will pay off handsomely for you in the long run.
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A quick note about building the proper team for your startup:
Every entrepreneur is passionate about their idea--especially within the first couple of weeks of hammering out how that idea is going to "change the world". In that excitement, entrepreneurs often rush to throw together the first group of guys that they can find who are equally passionate after buying in to this grand vision. The problem is, most entrepreneurs get caught up in the rush and fail to put together the proper team. So, they grab their best friend and a guy who knows a guy who can program their new website, etc. And, ultimately, they end up with a "D" team instead of an "A" team.
When you start with a "D" team, it's nearly impossible to attract "A" level talent down the road. This virtually guarantees that you're doomed from the start. This is a really common issue with first time entrepreneurs, but I've even seen experienced serial entrepreneurs make this mistake.
Don't hesitate to shoot for the stars when building your team. A lot of entrepreneurs think they have to have built several successful businesses in the past before they can even think about approaching the top guru in their industry. Of course, a strong track record doesn't hurt. But, it isn't a deal breaker if you don't have the pedigree. If your idea has legs and you can execute on it, you won't have trouble attracting some of the best talent in your area.
Try to harness that excitement just a little longer and build the proper team from the start. Believe me, it's easier than firing the entire "D" team to make room for the A-level guys that you should have started with.
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A lot of first time entrepreneurs get hung up on the little details when forming a company. What legal entity do I choose? What URL should I pick? What should I name my company? All of these questions are important to answer in time, but they're meaningless if they prevent you from even getting your business off the ground. The third question, "What should I name my company?", is one that I've been asked twice already this week (Yes, it's only Monday). I only have one response to this question. If you had never heard of any of these companies in advance, what would you think of when you heard the names "Google", "Yahoo", "Ebay", and "Amazon"? The answer is "nothing". Except "Amazon" of course---it might remind you of a river, but definitely not a massive web company that made a name for itself by selling books online. The point is, a name is meaningless if you fail to execute on the idea. So, if you ask me what you should name your company, I'll say "Shut Up....and get back to work!" Otherwise, you'll never build a company.
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If you get the chance to make it out to the next ACA Summit (in Atlanta), I highly recommend it. This year's summit was held last week in San Diego. The ACA hasn't been around too long, but the event was well attended by 375+ angel investors from groups across North America. There were even a number of angels from Europe, and as far away as Australia and New Zealand.
The Summit offered some great insight into the latest trends from the angel community. I had a blast meeting with a number of Angels and heard some amazing stories of triumph and disappointment from the trenches of early stage funding. My biggest surprise came from the tremendous turnout by Ohio-based Angels. I believe Ohio posted the second largest number of members in attendance (surpassed only by California---no surprise!). Congratulations to Ohio Tech Angels' John Huston for his appointment as the new Chairman of the ACA. This is a good start in putting Ohio's early stage funding potential on the map.
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I just got back from a short trip to Scottsdale, AZ for a family reunion on my wife's side. As always, I ran into a couple of successful entrepreneurs who have built large businesses (one employed over 600 people before exiting, another recently sold to a major tech company). Despite coming from a completely separate industries and business models, they both had two things in common:
1) Fear
2) Multiple irons in the fire
Fear:
The first entrepreneur spoke at length about how scared he was while running the business. He ran a manufacturing plant that employed 600+ people. In order to keep up with the competition, he had no choice but to outsource some of his technical work to India and China. The problem was, he was deathly afraid that they would steal his IP and begin competing with him. He took a leap of faith (the fundamentals behind the decision weren't difficult to analyze) and sent some work overseas. Ultimately, this boosted the company's growth, created even more US based jobs, and gave him the ability to exit the company at an incredible payout.
Entrepreneur # 2 experienced fear primarily after the company sold. Will he have a job in 2 months? Will he get the payout that he's expecting? What will he do next? ....etc.
The bottom line is that there's no way to escape fear as an entrepreneur. But, those that can harness this fear and transfer it into motivation seem to be the most successful in their ventures.
Multiple irons in the fire:
This one's tricky. As with most entrepreneurs, both of these guys were working on multiple investments at the same time. But....and this is a HUGE "but", they focused nearly all of their time and energy on one venture. Their other investments were managed nearly 100% by other entrepreneurs. I've seen way too many entrepreneurs get sidetracked trying to run multiple ventures at the same time. It's nearly impossible for one person to devote the type of management that a startup requires to more than one venture at a time. It can be done, but it's not a probably not a good idea. Let's face it, every entrepreneur has a million "next ideas". They'll all come in time. But, it's important to focus on your venture at hand or they'll all go nowhere!
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I'm headed out to the ACA Summit in San Diego (May 7th-9th). It's a large gathering of angel investment groups from North America. Let me know if you'll be attending and would like to meet up some time during the conference....it should be a good time.
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