Vanity Metric Dangers, Planning for Failure, Black Founders Survey • InNewCL
Vanity Metric Dangers, Planning for Failure, Black Founders Survey • InNewCL
#Vanity #Metric #Dangers #Planning #Failure #Black #Founders #Survey #InNewCL Welcome to InNewCL, here is the new story we have for you today:
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Only a few startups start with a coherent content strategy.
In the early days, every project is a sprint, and there are times when putting on a show for investors can be more important than actually serving your clients.
Blogs are a great example: Because they’re a low-cost way to drive SEO, companies crank them up and then use KPIs like time on site, pages per session, and social media to demonstrate how successful they’ve been.
“The truth is, vanity metrics don’t measure how engaged prospects are,” writes Christopher P. Willis, chief marketing and pipeline officer at Acrolinx.
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Relying on vanity metrics is like attending a Little League awards dinner: everyone goes home a winner!
“You simply measure the relative popularity of your company. This makes measuring ROI difficult.”
Creating a consistent brand strategy is not a big investment and creating a common style guide for marketing, design and sales generates a positive ROI. With a content governance plan, any startup can track which offerings are most likely to attract new customers.
“The biggest benefit of this is content that inspires trust,” Willis writes.
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Banish vanity metrics from your startup’s pitch deck
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It’s nice to give your hard-working team goals to work towards, but vanity metrics (e.g. X email signups in Y days, 20% more retweets) are like a little league awards dinner: everyone goes home as a winner!
“The truth is, investors know what traction looks like,” writes Haje Jan Kamps, meaning feel-good stats have no place in a pitch deck.
“Don’t confuse fluffy numbers and vanity metrics with your go-to-market strategy.”
3 Black Founders Predict Little Will Change in VC in 2023
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A rising tide lifts all boats, but when free-flowing venture capital recedes, underrepresented founders are the first to find dry ground.
Dominic-Madori Davis spoke to three black founders to get their thoughts on the current funding landscape and the issues close to their hearts as we head into the new year:
Vernon Coleman, Founder and CEO, Realtime Sevetri Wilson, Founder and CEO, Resilia Abimbola Adebayo, Founder and CEO, Pinnu Analytics
The fundraising phases aren’t about dollar values - they’re about risk
Photo credit: Richard Drury (opens in new window) / Getty Images
Before a founding team approaches an investor, they need a clear idea of how their planned company will make money.
And also: how it will lose money.
Investors are open to ideas, but because they look at everything through the lens of risk, entrepreneurs need to develop a holistic understanding of where it exists in their business.
“‘For our company to be successful, these three things have to be right’ is a strong sentence in the initial phase of founding a company,” writes Haje Jan Kamps.
What does the projected increase in IT spending in 2023 mean for startups?
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The fact that so many CIOs and analysts believe IT spending will increase in 2023 may be good news for new SaaS companies hoping to weather this downturn, but “it’s not all rosy,” writes Ron Miller.
To ground those predictions, he surveyed several investors, industry watchers, and CIOs to get their take on “what’s in store for startups in 2023.”
