David Cummings on Startups

Category: Entrepreneurship

  • Pod/Matrix Team Approach in Startups

    Image representing Rackspace as depicted in Cr...
    Image via CrunchBase

    A couple years ago the co-founder of Rackspace told his success story to the EO Atlanta chapter. One of the takeaways I enjoyed from the event was the concept of the pod/matrix approach. Morris, the co-founder, recounted Rackspace hitting several hundred employees and feeling the growing pains trying to service customers with fanatical support. They had dozens of people of in their support department, dozens of account managers interfacing with customers, and dozens of people in accounting to field all the billing questions.

    Departments where having difficulties with more and more layers of management and customer complaints were increasing. In addition, the executive team was really concerned as to how they would scale the entire business from a few hundred people to a few thousand. The solution was a pod system where teams of five were built to handle the majority of customer questions quickly and efficiently. Pods were built to match the most common customer requests:

    • Two Tier 1 support reps
    • One Tier 2 support rep for harder technical issues
    • One account manager for sales
    • One accounting clerk for billing

    With these pods in place, scaling the business was simply a matter of having more and more of these teams as they added more and more accounts. Problem solved.

    What else? What are you thoughts on a pod/matrix system like this?

  • On the Startup Path

    An Aerial view of Chicago Midway International...
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    As I was rushing to the airport tonight to fly from Chicago to Atlanta (I’m prone to be late) I had time to reflect on the train. You see, sitting on the train to Midway Airport there was nothing I could do to speed things up to catch my 6:45 flight. I had my goal in mind: make my flight so as to get home at a reasonable hour for a weekend with my family.

    Being the startup geek that I am, I equated the experience with entrepreneurship.

    Entrepreneurs have a goal of building a successful company. Once the goal is crystallized, much like my more simple quest to get home to my family, you start working backwards and planning the steps to achieve it. During many parts of the entrepreneurial journey there are situations where you put yourself in a position that you are at the mercy of others around you, no matter how much you’d like to speed things up, similar to how I was sitting on a train hoping to get to the airport faster.

    The most important takeaway is there are many things you can control and many things you can’t control. Setting your sights on a target, controlling what you can control (that was a favorite line of Andre Agassi’s coach), and putting yourself in a position to succeed makes all the difference.

    What else? What are some other parts of the startup path?

  • Mission, Vision, and Values

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    At last week’s EO Strategy Summit we spent time on a number of topics and one of the areas was around mission, vision, and values. EO does a great job with these and should be commended. Here’s a definition of each and EO’s position:

    • Mission – purpose, reason for being, the “why”
      EO mission:  Engage leading entrepreneurs to learn and grow.
    • Vision – where we’re going, aspirations
      EO vision: To build the world’s most influential community of entrepreneurs.
    • Values – non-negotiable rules of the road
      EO values:
      Boldly Go! – Bet on your own abilities
      Thirst for Learning – Be a student of opportunity
      Make a Mark – Leave a legacy
      Trust and Respect – Build a safe haven for learning and growth
      Cool – Create, seek out, and celebrate once-in-a-lifetime experiences

    Mission, vision, and values are important and I recommend entrepreneurs spend time working on them for their startup.
    What else? What do you think of mission, vision, and values?

  • Little Apps or More Modules in the Core Product

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    Image by alphabetjenn via Flickr

    Sometimes we get the urge to build a little app on the side to solve a certain problem that isn’t as core to our main product (like billing). Fight the desire, we must. Building a small app outside the core product introduces a host of challenges like:

    • The fresh excitement to build an app from scratch wears off when no one wants to maintain it on a day-to-day basis
    • Testing and QA won’t be as rigorous due to higher priorities
    • Interface changes won’t be implemented consistently due to the separate code base
    • Server monitoring and administration infrastructure won’t be as thorough due to unique aspects of the architecture that are different from the main app

    My recommendation is to avoid making little apps when at all possible as maintenance of them becomes a serious challenge. Unfortunately, they won’t be given the necessary on-going attention.
    What else? What other thoughts do you have on making little apps vs more modules in the core product?

  • The RSS-Driven Startup Dashboard

    This icon, known as the "feed icon" ...
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    RSS is great in that so many apps support publishing and consuming the XML format. So much so that it really becomes the core plumbing to drive a startup dashboard. Tools like Google Reader, Socialite Mac, and Thunderbird support bringing in RSS feeds along with other types of information, perfect for creating a central hub of data.

    Here are some potential items for the RSS-driven dashboard:

    As you can, this is really a list of critical business apps and RSS provides a mechanism to centralize the most important information for each, which in turn represents the current pulse for the entire business. Of course, this could lead to information overload but I’ve found it’s better to have too much information compared to too little.
    What else? What do think of an RSS-driven dashboard and what feeds would you add?

  • Business Idea: Prospect Instant Call-Back and Qualification Service

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    There’s a need in the market for a technology-enabled business services startup that specializes in calling inbound leads and qualifying them immediately in a pay-per-action manner. Most companies do a poor job of getting back to prospects that raise their hand for the first time in a timely manner. Think about this: when you fill out an online form, how long does it take for you to hear back from someone? In my experience, I expect to talk to someone within 24 hours of filling out a form, would prefer to talk to someone within an hour, and usually hear back in 2-3 days, if I’m lucky.

    It isn’t that companies don’t want to follow-up on their new prospects instantly, it is that it is too costly to staff a dedicated person to do it and existing sales and marketing teams already have competing priorities. Studies have shown that the sooner you get an inbound lead on the phone after they request information, the higher the chance of closing the deal. That’s right — let a lead linger and every hour you wait the chance of them buying from someone else goes up.

    Here are some ideas on how the business might work:

    • Pay a fixed cost per lead called and qualified (e.g. $50) as well as a bonus for the desired outcome (e.g. an additional $25 if a web demo is scheduled on the phone)
    • Allow for hot-swapping the call from the person qualifying the lead to a sales rep
    • Provide a set of standard questions to qualify the lead as well as simple next steps.
    • Use an extremely friendly, well-paid onshore call center
    • Interface with leading marketing automation, inbound marketing, and CRM products to process leads
    • Partner with marketing agencies, appointment setting firms, and marketing technology products as the indirect channel
    • Sell directly to marketing managers and sales managers espousing the benefits of timely follow-up

    There’s a marketing opportunity for a technology-enabled business services company to fulfill this need and provide more timely call-backs to new prospects. Everyone wins: sales and marketing close more deals and leads get to talk to a company representative faster.
    What else? What do you think of the business idea?

  • ARMD Goals for Startups

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    Image by Tes Mar'a via Flickr

    Continuing the EO Strategy Summit theme from yesterday, there was another new methodology used that I hadn’t seen before: ARMD goals. Back in 2008 I talked about SMART goals, and now that I know about ARMD goals I like them better because they are simpler and don’t have the redundancy sometimes found in SMART goals.

    Here are ARMD goals:

    • Actionable – What specific things need to be accomplished?
    • Realistic – How attainable is the goal?
    • Measurable – Is there a number (metric is ideal) or “completed/not completed” that can be attached to it?
    • Date – When is it going to be done?

    My recommendation is to answer the four points of ARMD when making goals.
    What else? What do you think of ARMD goals?

  • Business Architecture Stack

    The High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia.
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    At today’s EO Strategy Summit we planned the high-level goals for next year’s EO Atlanta chapter. This is the third time I’ve been through the full-day strategy summit planning session and each time the EO certified facilitators do an amazing job. Today’s event was no different.

    One of the techniques they talked about today that I hadn’t seen before was the Business Architecture Stack. I’ve seen the individual elements of it but hadn’t seen it presented in this particular manner. The idea behind the stack is that it is a concise representation of the six most important overarching aspects of a business. Here’s information on the stack straight out of the EO workbook:

    • Mission – What you want to do – your reason for “being.”
    • Vision – Why you’re doing what you do – the big-picture goal: have to be able to “see it” in your mind’s eye.
    • Core Values – Four or five beliefs you never compromised and in which you measured against.
    • Positioning Statement – A one or two sentence description of how you do what you do and for whom (i.e. what markets).
    • Value Proposition – One sentence that conveys to others the value you provide for your customers.
    • Tagline – Quick, catchy statement or phrase that embodies who and what you are.

    My recommendation is for all startups to go through this exercise within the first 12 months of their business and revisit it annually.
    What else? What do you think of the business architecture stack?

  • Vacation Policy: Be Reasonable

    Take a Vacation!
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    We have a very simple vacation policy: be reasonable. That’s it. We don’t track vacation days, sick days, or flex days. Not tracking vacation days doesn’t mean people take as much time off without getting their job done, rather it means that we track results and people make sure their work gets done on their own.

    If a team member wants to take time off we ask them to coordinate with their team in advance proportional to the amount of time off (e.g. give a week’s notice to take a day off, a month’s notice to take a week off, etc). The idea is that it’s the employee’s responsibility to make sure their results are taken care of and not the manager’s responsibility.

    When I explain to people that we have a “no vacation tracking policy” I’m inevitably asked what do we do if someone abuses it. The answer: we’d let them know they aren’t meeting our “be reasonable” goal and we’d part ways if it continues. It’s never happened.

    As part of our good work, good people, and good pay approach, we believe employees are our most important asset. Empowering team members to come and go as they please as well as take as much or little time off as needed while their work still gets done helps contribute to our strong culture.

    What else? What other thoughts do you have on this vacation policy?

  • Sales Strategy for SMB SaaS Startups

    Central Call Center - Library101
    Image by mlibrarianus via Flickr

    This morning I met with a startup in town that recently closed their Series A round and was getting ready to ramp up their sales and marketing. We talked about a number of different aspects of building a SaaS company focused on the small-to-medium sized business market.

    Here are few takeaways from the conversation:

    • Once you charge more than $100/month an inside sales team becomes necessary as people are much less likely to do a self-service credit card checkout process.
    • Pricing a product between $100/month and $500/month is usually no-mans land unless you have a really short sales cycle because prospects will require the same amount of sales engagement whether they are spending $200/month or $500/month.
    • Pricing should follow Occam’s Razor where the all things being equal, the simplest solution is best.
    • A two-tiered sales process with sales development reps and junior/senior inside sales reps works well to develop a farm system of sales reps and specialties.
    • Having more $30k base/$80k on target earning sales reps than the comparable expense with $75k base/$150k on target earning reps is better due to sheer number of activities involved to close a deal over the phone.
    • Writing skills are critical for today’s email-heavy selling environment and a written essay as part of the hiring process goes a long ways.

    The inside sales process requires a completely different approach when compared to the traditional enterprise software sales model. My recommendation is to follow these best practices as part of the sales strategy for SMB SaaS startups.
    What else? What are some other components of the sales strategy for SMB SaaS startups?