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Posts By / seth levine
How Startups Actually Grow
We’ve all seen the growth curve on the left – all successful startups strive for a version of one. But in reality, the notion of a smooth growth curve actually masks how most successful companies truly grow. Our experience at Foundry suggests that if you blow up the growth curve you’ll find that companies grow linearly and that what creates the log curve is a series of small changes that either change the slope of the growth (it’s still linear, but now growing faster) or that “jump” the growth curve up (growing at the same rate but now from a high base). Examples of things that fit in the first category are changes in sales efficiency, successfully adding to the…
Friday Fun #3
Grumpy Cat always makes me laugh.
Vote FOR a renewable energy future by voting AGAINST the Boulder muni
I’m really frustrated with the way many from the the pro-muni block in Boulder have misappropriated the idea that being for municipalizing our local utility infrastructure (condemning the Xcel’s local grid and forming a city-owned and operated electric utility) is the only way to move Boulder towards the goal of 100% renewable energy. They’re trying to co-opt the idea that a vote against muni is a vote for fossil fuels and a vote for it is a vote for renewables. I couldn’t disagree with this line of thinking more. In fact I think the opposite is true – a vote to continue the Boulder muni effort is the wrong way to go about pursuing the goal of lessening our dependence on…
Is your sales problem really a product problem?
Not suprisingly when companies are having issues in sales they look to their sales or and sales leadership for the source of the problem. In the cliche example (but one which happens all the time) sales will loop in marketing (“we’re not getting enough leads”, “the leads aren’t high quality enough”). But typically product is left out of this mix. To be clear, there are plenty of sales related issues that are directly attributable to poor sales processes, bad training of sales resources, poor time management, etc. But often overlooked is the role product plays in sales challenges. I’m not writing this to offer a ready made excuse for sales teams that aren’t executing but as a reminder to executive…
The Feature -> Product -> Company Continuum
I’ve been thinking about the continuum between a feature, product and company a lot recently. Specifically the challenge that companies have as they move across this continuum, how rare that last category really is, and the combination of product idea and market potential that is required for companies to actually make it to Company status. Most companies begin life somewhere between a feature and a product. They’re started by an entrepreneur trying to solve some problem that s/he finds compelling and generally that problem is a feature of some larger set of problems. At this stage most entrepreneurs are given the advice to “focus”. It’s good advice (and advice I give all the time) but does sometimes perpetuate the feature-ness…
Friday Fun #2
Beware of Lotters. And guys with guns who can’t spell.
Friday Fun – #1
The world needs more humor (or at least I do). I’ll be posting some here every Friday. Enjoy! Today’s #FridayFun is one of my favorite all time SNL skits. More Cowbell – Saturday Night Live! from Robert J. Lunte on Vimeo.
How to value your SaaS company
If you read my blog regularly you know I love (LOVE) metrics. So no surprise that when River Cities Capital released an overview of SaaS operating and valuation benchmarks, I hung on every juicy detail. It’s chocked full of them – I’d highly recommend your reading the full report. But if you’re too busy for that, below are some of the key take-aways. I’ve added color commentary of my own that’s more relevant to earlier stage companies as well. The methodology here was great. They took the 92 public SaaS companies and analyzed their key operating metrics. Beyond that, they actually went back in time and looked at the earlier stage periods for these companies so we can track how…
Drowning
I’m struggling and I’ve avoided talking about it. I’m used to being busy and I’ve often said that what I like most about my job is the constant phase shifting – it fits my personality and, frankly, my attention span. I’m used to a certain amount of chaos and uncertainty. But lately I’ve been feeling overwhelmed by it. I’m not sure if it’s the constant barrage of news from a president I can’t stand and who I think is ruining our country. Or the friend who was just diagnosed with advanced metastatic stage 4 pancreatic cancer. Or the other friend who was diagnosed with stomach cancer. Or the crap that’s going on in tech and venture that makes my stomach turn….