From the Investors
United Ventures releases their analysis of consumer growth markets and dubs South Africa, Indonesia, and Mexico as ‘countries to watch’ in “Getting Ready for the Next (Digital) Billion Consumer“
Elisa Schreiber of Greylock Partners encourages founders to tell their startup’s story with a humanized version of what they offer, to whom, and why they’re different in “Storytelling for Startups“
Nicolas Wittenborn of Point Nine Capital details how ‘native connectivity, 3rd party platforms, behavioral cues, and power-up-experiences’ can create an organic growth engine’ in “Four Ways to Grow Your App Organically“
Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures reflects on the saying, ‘a rising tide lifts all boats’, to remind startups that today’s business environment won’t last forever in “Reblog: VC Cliché of the Week“
Jeff Carter of West Loop Ventures offers some guideposts for what can happen to a startup if its valuation is set too high or too low in “Valuations – Be Careful”
Ciaran O’Leary of EarlyBird Ventures advises fundraising founders that they can ‘bluff a little, but make sure it doesn’t come at a horrible cost’ in “Leaped Like a Tiger, Landed as a Bedside Rug – The Risks of Overselling Your Round”
Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint Ventures expands on how startups should focus on customer segments, customer lifecycle stages, and content type in “The Three Dimensions of Content Marketing Strategy for Startups“
Ryan Sweeney of Accel Partners compliments the increase in the quality of content he sees from media companies like VICE, Netflix, VSCO, and Vox in “Online Content”
From the Operators
Camille Ricketts of First Round Review features designer Kelly Robinson who shares how to design office spaces for cooperation, creativity, and wellness in “Get the Most Out of Your Space – Secrets from the Designer Behind Airbnb and SoundCloud“
Shri Bhashyam of EquityZen explores how the market for secondary shares has evolved since 2009 and the impact of ‘companies staying private longer’ in “Secondary Shares Are Deeper Than Ever”
Serial Entrepreneur Steve Blank and Stephen Chambers discuss building SynbiCITE, the UK’s synthetic biology consortium and UK’s Life Science ecosystem in “Life Science Startups Rising in the UK”
Jory Mackay of Crew examines the psychology of personal growth and says, ‘being first rarely means being best’ in “The Growth Hacking Myth: Why We All Need to Slow Down“
Anand Iyer of Threadflip believes startups should not just look at user retention metrics, but also look to see if pushes are causing user churn in “The Most Important Push Notification Metric”
Roman Itskovich of Ebury looks at Uber’s growth trajectory and recommends founders ask themselves if their startup can ‘execute fastest in its market’ in “Economies of Speed”