You don’t have to hire an expensive firm to have a Public Relations (PR) strategy as a startup. The beauty of today’s internet is that anybody has the power to reach tens of thousands, even millions, with a properly timed tweet, hacker news mention, or mention on an influential blog. You don’t have to make it onto a cover story in Inc. or Entrepreneur in order to achieve your PR goals, in fact...
Last week I wrote about the importance of knowing your audience, and tools for getting to know more about your target demographic. This week I’ll be diving into ways to get to know their biggest pain points. We’ll go through the tools available to seek out some potentially unsolved pains that they have, as well as pitfalls to avoid, like why asking them to identify their pain points is a...
Product validation is the crucial foundation for building a successful startup, a process that cannot be taken lightly. Many applications have been built and have consumed many hours and dollars only to discover that potential customers don’t really see enough value to whip out their credit cards.
Product positioning is a technique used in marketing that seeks to bring a specific idea to mind when presented to an audience. For example, when I think of Apple laptops, I think “high-end laptop geared towards creatives.” When I think of HP laptops, I think of “affordable laptops geared towards the masses.” These are product positions, and they are re-iterated by the marketing, the pricing, and...
Do you have a product idea floating around in your head? Perhaps you actually have a list of ideas you keep in Evernote, of ebooks to write, apps to build, or services to offer. Without spending the time and money to build all of those product ideas out, how can you figure out which ones will be worth building? How can you validate your idea?
Even a minor amount of short-lived stress can make an impact on your health (both physical and mental). While entrepreneurs often feel that they need to “go go go” in order to be successful, taking time out of the day to practice meditation has been a proven, effective method for increasing your productivity, providing appropriate perspective, and training to react appropriately to stress.
Previously I had the pleasure of attending the MicroConf Conference in Las Vegas. Whether discussed during the talks on stage, in the hallway, or on a walk to dinner–these are the key takeaways that made the nearly $2,000 trip worth every penny (and led to me being a speaker at the same event the next year).
Because the brain is so complex, we often have a hard time juggling so many thoughts throughout our day, and end up overwhelmed, lacking clarity, or simply unable to process the jumble of inputs, floating thoughts and ideas. Fortunately, we can use tools to help our thoughts sort themselves out, one of the most effective being a journal.
One of the key personality traits of an Entrepreneur is that we like to hustle, try new things, and fill our workday with variety. A negative side-effect of this is that we also have a hard time giving up control. As an entrepreneur, we must learn to delegate certain tasks to others. Without delegation, the sad truth is that we stall the growth of our companies because there is only so much time...
I feel that the quest to be productive will last my whole lifetime. Every time I think that I have it figured out and put a system in place, the smallest change usually sends the system crumbling. However, I’ve recently settled on a few tools that are starting to stand the test of time, and I thought I’d take a moment to share them with you.
HI, I'M RYAN. I believe the best way to learn and remember is by writing things down and sharing them with others. This blog exists to help me synthesize and process my journey towards self-improvement.