Editor

article placeholder

Not Just A Piece Of Paper: MBA Advice For Startuppers

Editor

A little business savvy never hurts, in any startup. By Anagha Nadkarni (Co-Founder, Appguppy)

People seem to agree that you don’t need an MBA to be a successful entrepreneur. Broadly speaking, that’s true. However, the MBA I recently completed from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan has positively contributed to my company’s entrepreneurial success.

Getting an MBA doesn’t make you into an entrepreneur, but it can provide you with a solid foundation and experiences to make you a better entrepreneur. Here are some tips on choosing and managing your MBA program for entrepreneurial success.

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

How To Keep Your Existing Customers Happy (Branding)

Editor

Save $150 on the Udemy "Smarter Branding For Startups" online class on how to create a powerful brand - without spending a lot of money. By Brenda Bence (Instructor, Udemy)

Maybe you’ve heard the saying, “Make new friends, but keep the old… one is silver and the other gold?” Well, when you’re running your own business, these “old friends” are your existing customers. Just how golden are they?

Studies show that it costs six to nine times as much to attract a new customer as it costs to keep an existing customer happy.

This concept can directly impact your bottom line. Think of this way: If you have $100 to spend on marketing, would you

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Interview With Tamara Abdel Jaber, Jordanian Woman CEO Who Founded And Runs High-Growth Business Palma

Editor

My mentor taught me that Jordan is a small market. He encouraged me to go beyond our borders and focus on the region at large by looking at Egypt, Syria, West Bank, and all over. By Rania Anderson (Co-Founder, Women's Capital Connection)

Flashback to 10 years ago: A 26 year old entrepreneur begins her own business and technology consulting company. In the Middle East, IT is largely known as a male-dominated field, so what was she thinking? Who was this young woman asking to meet with high-profile companies? Their curiosity got the best of them; they just had to meet this anomaly for themselves.

Fast-forward to today: Tamara Abdel-Jaber is the CEO of her company, Palma, with 22 full-time employees and 150 contractors across the Middle East.

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

LUMOback Funded On Kickstarter – The Benefit Of Being Open

Editor

We have pre-orders of over $175,000, and counting (3 days to go on our campaign!) By Monisha Perkash (Co-Founder & CEO, LUMOback)

My startup LUMOback, a smart posture sensor, recently launched a campaign on the crowd-funding platform Kickstarter. Our experiences thus far have reinforced my team’s deep belief in being open rather than stealthy.

More than anything else, Kickstarter has served as a great "test" and validation point for us. As passionate entrepreneurs, we become susceptible to drinking our own Kool-aid and thinking that what we’ve built is the best thing ever. Putting it out there on Kickstarter has been an opportunity for us to test market demand and

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

How One Fateful Experiment Changed The Future Of My Company

Editor

The demands for “PromoJam” promotions were quickly transitioning from a side-project to a full-time gig. By Amanda MacNaughton (Co-Founder & CMO, PromoJam)

One of the most important things to understand when starting or running a business is knowing when to pivot - you must be open to change. I learned this lesson early on when one fateful experiment changed the entire course of my company forever.

It was the summer of 2009. Facebook was quickly digging MySpace’s grave, the iPhone 3Gs had just invaded the market, and Twitter was becoming mainstream. My business partner (who also happens to be my brother) and I were busy developing a new social network that focused on content monetization and distribution.

... Read More...
FoundersUncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Venture Capital Is A Great Place For Women – Give It A Chance

Editor

Women VCs interviewed say despite the low numbers, the VC industry is a great place for women. By Grace Nasri (Managing Editor, FindTheBest)

The facts: Women make up just 6% of chief executives at the leading 100 tech companies. Women are launching companies at a rate 1.5 times higher than the national average, but they receive less than 10% of venture funding. Women make up only 9% of board members of Silicon Valley companies. At the leading 25 VC firms, only 8% of the investment professionals are women.

The opinions: The rationalizations as to why this is the case range from placing the onus on women for not majoring in quantitative fields and lacking the necessary skills needed to lead or invest

... Read More...
Uncategorized1 min read
article placeholder

New Kickstarter Campaign: Culture Kitchen Kits

Editor

Pressing that little green rocketship was a little harder than anticipated. By Jennifer Lopez (Co-Founder & CEO, Culture Kitchen)

"Should I hit the green button?" "Are you ready? You sure?" "Okay, let's press it together."

A little dramatic, I know, but that was what my Monday morning looked like. Those were the last few seconds before we officially launched our Culture Kitchen Kickstarter campaign. My co-founder Abby Sturges and I physically pressed the button together for the 15 incredible Master Cooks we work with, the hundreds of customers who eat lovely Culture Kitchen dinners every month and the countless people in our community that say, "I just love Culture Kitchen."

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Startups Need To Learn To Pitch To More Than Just Investors

Editor

I started Pitch Refinery for the same reason I started my women coding group, CWDevs - I built it because I didn't know how to do it... By Melissa Pierce (Founder, Chicago Women Developers)

It's a catch 22 starting a business built on learning to pitch to anyone when I don't know how to pitch myself.

I often joke about wishing I could attend my conference before I organized it. Not having pitching skills is all too common a problem in the startup space, especially in women led startups. Let's face it, until recently, we've been taught NOT to draw attention to ourselves.

Add the fact that many women entrepreneurs come to startup land via the non-business school route

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Women-Led Startups Compete With “Bro-grammers” For Funding

Editor

Gender stereotypes die hard as females make tech gains. By Christopher Heine (Staff Writer, Adweek)

Sophia Chou is president of Loudly, a new text-and-call phone app that just finished a 12-week accelerator program called Woman Innovate Mobile (WIM).

Every morning, Chou and Loudly co-founder Foy Savas leave a tiny apartment they share in Bay Ridge Brooklyn and head into Manhattan, often to meet with venture capitalists and other potential investors. They moved from Boston last winter to participate in WIM and rub elbows with movers-and-shakers in New York’s growing tech scene.

While Chou’s forecast for Loudly is clearly optimistic, she

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Google, The Carrier

Editor

The internet is designed to replace both legacy voice calling networks, which currently is the cellular (mobile) and PSTN (landline) platforms that millions and millions Americans use to make telephone calls. By Patricia Handschiegel (Founder & CEO, 9)

Google officially entered the carrier arena today.

For those who may not click through, it’s Google’s new internet offering, which it has rolled out in Kansas. According to the Associated Press, the company is intending to push digital television, which is television delivered via the internet platform versus broadcast TV platform. The internet has always been designed to do this since its original creation, and has been able to deliver it in a meaningful way (aka, no quality issues, delays, etc.) since roughly 2005. That had more to do with the internet

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

The Power Of Diversification (Investing In Startups)

Editor

You need to make enough investments to be confident that you will get at least one big winner. And so that means making enough bets. By Fred Wilson (Managing Partner, Flatiron Partners & Union Square Ventures)

Investing in startups is risky. If you make just one investment, you are likely going to lose everything. If you make two, you are still likely to lose money. If you make five, you might get all your money back across all five investments. If you make ten, you might start making money on the aggregate set of investments.

The math behind this is pretty simple. If you assume that the average startup has a 33% chance of making money for the investors, a 33% chance of returning capital, and a 33% chance of losing everything and that only 10% will make a big return

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read
article placeholder

Brittany Wenger, 17, Wins Google Science Fair Grand Prize For Breast Cancer Diagnosis App

Editor

Earlier this week, the winners of the second annual Google Science Fair were announced. By Dino Grandoni (Contributor, The Huffington Post)

The Grand Prize winner of the science fair, for good reason, was a 17-year-old from Lakewood Ranch, Florida.

Combining the fields of biology and computer science, Brittany Wenger wrote an app that helps doctors diagnose breast cancer, according to the description of her project on Google.

The type of computer program, called a "neural network," was designed by Wenger to mimic the human brain: Give it a massive amount of information (in this case, 7.6 million trials), and

... Read More...
Uncategorized0 min read

Editor