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Looking for the next billion dollar idea? Good luck. Many unicorns pivot away from their initial idea and novice entrepreneurs often fail to understand this and instead attempt invent the next “you name it” idea from the get-go.

Experienced entrepreneurs know the better way. All they need to do is to look inside their inner self and talk to other people to learn what remains broken in the world around. Then — fix that, in the best possible way.

Well, so easy to read, but the devil is in the details. That’s why I’d like to share the set of techniques how to come up with better ideas for a startup.

Look Inside Yourself

Great ideas are born when you feel a particular need on your own. However, you may not notice those signals in the daily rou...

Since 2004, our companies have worked with thousands of entrepreneurs raising capital for their businesses. Over time, this has provided us an incredible vantage point from which to observe how the most successful entrepreneurs prepare for approaching investors. We have also seen firsthand that there are many things most entrepreneurs don’t know about investors, but should. We’ve compiled a list of the 10 things every entrepreneur should know about investors to help prepare them for the process.

#1: There Are a Lot of Investors Out There

According to the Center for Venture Research, there are 8.7 million people who qualify as accredited investors in the United States. However, only a small portion of those people actively invest in deals (a...

Logos. They’re little things that can make a big difference to your company. In this age of iPhone tiles and fractured attention, a great logo can help make your company — while a terrible one can break it.

However, too many founders try to design their own startup logo. I’ve seen the results — and they’re rarely pretty.

While designing your own startup logo might seem like a good way for a bootstrapping startup founder to save some money, it’s one of those things (like waxing and home electric work) that you should probably leave to the pros.

I spoke with two such professionals — Zaheer Dodhia, the CEO of DesignMantic and branding expert and logo designer Carolina Correa — about the common mistakes that companies make when it comes to star...

There is a never-ending supply of questions when starting a business. Who is your target consumer? How does your product improve lives? What is the best way to showcase your value to buyers? While the questions are many, your core values should never be floating around with these unknowns.

After all, your mission or philosophy is the reason you took the financial and emotional risks of putting yourself and your new venture out there. And, no matter how difficult things get, your core values are akin to the North Star, guiding you in running and growing your business.

Retaining these core values is easier said than done, though. Temptation to let moral priorities slide can come up when you’re under pressure — either from investors or a deple...

Business theory can be tricky to understand. Leave it to the power of one cow to help you grasp the workings of these popular business models.

The Direct Sales Model

A direct sales business operates through a network of salespeople. Typically there is no fixed retail location.

Examples: Avon, Mary Kay, Traveling Vineyard

The Freemium Model

A business under a freemium model gives away a service at no cost before offering advanced services as add-ons.

Examples: Dropbox, Hootsuite, MailChimp

The Subscription Model

The objective of a subscription business model is to retain customers under a long-term contract and secure recurring revenue.

Examples: Netflix, eHarmony

The Franchise Model

Under a franchise business model, business owners purc...

Recently I published “The Ultimate Cheat Sheet for Your Startup’s Investor Pitch Deck” and the response has been overwhelming! Thanks to all the readers and people who have reached out!

One of the main requests was “Can you please do a cheat sheet for a sales deck as well?” Yes! With pleasure.

Similar to an investor pitch deck — there is a specific “narrative,” a framework that just works! It’s because of the psychology of the human brain. You’ll find that the 2 frameworks are very similar, with some tweaks. So here we go:

The Best Kept Secret to Successful Sales

Think of a time that you went shopping and ended up buying way more than you intended to. What happened there? Most likely you encountered a salesperson that was REALLY good. The ...

Let’s talk top startups of 2018. But first of all, did you know that entrepreneurs create more than six million new businesses in the United States every year? Sifting through those multitudes is impossible, even for startup junkies. And when you consider the high number of startup failures, the shifting sands of the startup landscape become even harder to track.

So how can you possibly know what’s good? How can you separate the wheat from the chaff? How can you ever know what the top startups are?

Well, one way is by relying on experts who interact with new companies every day. And it doesn’t get more expert than the team at Fundable, the largest business crowdfunding platform that’s exclusively about helping startups raise money. Fundabl...

There are no doubt people who enjoy designing presentations, though chances are good that you’ve never met them or employed them at your business. That’s because presentations surely rank as one of the most common, painful, necessary evils.

Email might be a time suck, but at least it involves generating something new. With presentations, on the other hand, so much work goes into dressing up content that’s already been produced. Wouldn’t it be great to bypass the design work entirely?

Slidebean allows anyone to create a professional slide presentation with barely any effort on the design end, so that presenters can devote their energies to the information that matters most.

With Slidebean, templates and other presentation tools essentiall...

Nancy Duarte is a pro when it comes to presentations. Not just giving presentations, but starting them, finishing them, and every step in between. Author and co-founder of Duarte Designs, Nancy Duarte is a seasoned veteran when it comes to incorporating storytelling into speaking and creating connections with an audience.

Learn How To Present Your Pitch

The below video is the final part in a series of 10 in which Nancy shares the key components to making a successful startup pitch using creativity and critical thinking. Find out what she has to say:

Learnings from Nancy’s TED Talk

If you’ve ever watched a TED Talk, you know that they’re packed with enough inspiration, wisdom, and advice to make you go out and save the world before the nigh...

What are the best banks for business loans? When we think of startup funding, we usually think of venture capital — but that’s not the only option out there. Small business loans are a more traditional way of getting financing that are also open to startups. In addition to not requiring founders to give up any equity, they may even be easier for some startups to get than venture capital, which can be a long and arduous process.

Small business loans are a great option for startups that already have some momentum and — even better — some income coming in. That’s because while venture capitalists are all about taking big risks for the potential of big rewards, traditional banking institutions are more careful with their funds.

So, if you think...