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WHAT IS AN LLC?

LLC means “limited liability corporation,” which is a type of business structure that creates a legal entity for the business that is separate from the business owner(s), meaning that the owner(s) are usually not personally liable for the company’s debts or lawsuits. Other common business entity structures such as corporation, general partnership, or sole proprietorship do not offer the same protections.

LLCs, which can be owned by one person (a single-member LLC) or more than one person (a multiple-member LLC), are essentially hybrid entities that combine the asset protection of a corporation with the flow-through taxation benefits of a partnership or sole proprietorship.

LLCs are a popular business entity type for new and...

Like doing any deal, getting good angel investment deal structures is all about creating a win-win situation. Once you get an angel investor interested in your deal and agree on basic terms, you will need to discuss the best way to structure the investment.

This is a critical juncture in every startup’s evolution, as the provisions you agree on here will be carried with you for the life of the angel investment deal.

How to get angel investor Agreements with win-win deal structures

1. Be Cautiously Optimistic

At this stage, many entrepreneurs get so excited that they forget to dot the i’s and cross the t’s on their deal.

Make sure you thoroughly review any term sheet with a lawyer to make sure you completely understand the deal structure an...

The first step to find venture capital is to make a smart introduction to the venture capital firm you’re interested in meeting.

Venture capitalists rely heavily on trusted connections to vet deals.

You’re not trying to contact as many people as possible; you’re trying to find venture capital firms that are the best possible fit for your deal. The more closely aligned you are with the needs of the venture firm, the more likely you’ll find venture capital firms willing to write you a check!

Getting Introduced to VC Firms

Every pitch to a venture capital firm starts with an introduction to someone at the firm. It helps to know the exact profile of a venture capitalist to know which level of introduction makes sense. Typically you’ll start wit...

It’s hard to rattle Tristan Walker. Maybe that’s because he grew up one of three kids, kept on the straight-and-narrow by a hardworking single mother in the projects of Queens.

Or maybe that’s because he constantly worked his ass off to build a better life for himself, always beating the odds, whether it was his scholarship to attend the elite Hotchkiss boarding school, attending Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, getting an early internship at Twitter, and then jumping to Foursquare to lead business development when it was scorching hot, before then grabbing an entrepreneur-in-residence slot at top venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. And that level of success frequently meant being the lone African American man in the room.

O...

We can all agree that bringing qualified customers to a new website is no easy feat. To add to that, most of your customers won’t be willing to pull out their credit card the first time that they reach your site.

Yeah, we know. It sucks to hear, especially since half of the people who stumble upon your site probably won’t come back for a second visit.

So how do you actually sell to these online customers?

Well, you don’t.

You give them insane amounts of value for free and make it easy for them to buy when they’re ready.

That’s right. The days of bombarding your potential customers with sales tactics and TV commercials are coming to a close. The secret to winning customers is to offer them exactly what they’re looking for when they actively ...

What happens when the people who helped start a company are no longer qualified to work there?

▸ What about Kimberly who became CFO because she was the only person at the time who had taken an accounting course?

▸ How do you find a home for Willis who was the jack-of-all-trades …but now is the master of none?

▸ Should Arnold still be leading the engineering team even though he has less experience than the entire team now?

As our startups mature, we are quickly faced with the harsh reality that the folks that were critical at one stage of our growth are woefully under-qualified for our current state of operations. Things get weird. We can feel the tension mounting as we try to wrestle with our own evolution and how it impacts each team membe...

H ave you ever taken a quiz to find out what Disney Princess you are? Or clicked on a listicle on Buzzfeed promoted by [insert brand here]?

If so: Congratulations. You’re a human being.

You’ve also been on the receiving end of one of the most formative marketing trends of the 21st century: content marketing.

Content marketing isn’t exactly new – it’s been sweeping the marketing landscape for a decade or more now. “Content is king” the headlines proclaim – and for good reason. From blog posts and infographics to Youtube channels and branded podcasts, brands today are tapping into an ever-expanding toolbox of tactics and storytelling techniques to get their message across.

But, what about the plan behind the substance? What is it that makes t...

Seneca once said that “Luck is where preparation meets opportunity.” I truly believe that we can help luck along by being prepared for opportunity when it knocks.

And one of the must-have tools in our storytelling arsenal is the infamous Elevator Pitch – or the “Quickpitch” as I often dub it. And you never know where the opportunity might knock – at a networking event, in an Uber Pool, or even in line for coffee at Starbucks.

If you find yourself conversing with someone who could be a potential investor/user/partner/connector – are you ready to pitch them in a fast, powerful way?

I heard the amazing Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube speak this year, and she said that it usually takes people about 15 minutes to explain to her what they do and w...

It’s all about finding “the one”. We have hired hundreds of people in the last 7 years and I will attest that ironically, the HR positions were by far the most challenging to hire for.

My “golden” question when interviewing for HR: “How have you handled a situation in the past where an employee asks to “speak with you in confidence” about a problem they are having with their manager?”

“I tell them absolutely, come on in”. Wrong.

“I take notes and launch an investigation”. Wrong.

“I ask them to tell me more details and I will handle the situation for them”. Wrong.

“I remind the employee that I am there to listen to them and advocate for them”. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong!

Correct Answer: “I redirect them back to their manager and then to help coach...

What does beta mean? Unfinished? Imperfect? Flawed?

Not so much. Try growth, hustle, and an endless quest to be better. If you’ve ever read The Startup of You from Reid Hoffman, Co-Founder and Chairman of LinkedIn and Ben Casnocha, you know exactly what I’m talking about.

Life Under Construction

Ask a room full of founders what scares the living sh*t out of them, and you’ll probably hear the word ‘irrelevance’ a lot. When you’re hustling day in and day out to change the world, the thought of being forgotten by history can shake even the most confident founder to the core.

But here’s the best part – staying relevant doesn’t mean bringing a new product to market every few years. It’s a hell of a lot simpler than that.

Like Reid explains, real...