Friend launches Tello at TechCrunch, let’s give them a hand
Having launched many startups I know how hard it is to get initial momentum so it’s very important to get lots of feedback and encouragement early on.
Joe has done a great job of starting up (he’s a veteran so it’s a lot easier when you know what to do!) and getting funding and then finding a great technical partner and finally launching in double quick time. The last two parts are really hard, no matter how much experience you have ..trust me!
His startup is called Tello and is a great idea: It gives Businesses Consumer Feedback On The Fly just like those stickers you see on the back of trucks about their driving.
Its a simple concept: quickly rating service in all the places you buy from regularly to “shine a spotlight” on the good and bad people and also processes enabling that business to get easy feedback and make improvements. and boy do most of these big companies need to make service improvements…
We all know what its like to hold on the phone for 20mins and then have the rep drop the call on us…the list like this goes on and on…and on the other hand those really helpful people rarely get much praise, its a broken system.
Checkout their TechCrunch pitch:
You can also see the TC page here: http://t.co/EWCC115
If you think you can help by testing the app or are interested go visit them and try it out…
What to know about your first business trip to China
After 25 years in high tech I am making my first trip to mainland China (I have done business in Taiwan for years) so I thought I would make sure that I did my homework before the trip. In my opinion you always want to make the right impression the first time and that means being polite and abiding by the correct customs and etiquette when visiting a new Country.
It’s also fascinating how each culture and place can have totally different ways to do things and small things that can have a very big impact. One of the first things I learned is that like many Asian cultures the business card and it’s usage is very, very important. I will cover this issue first as you will need some time to get this part ready and it’s one of the most important things for a new business person trying to get started.
Business cards
For businessman and businesswoman who is going on a business trip to China, they are quick to realize that meeting a business partner without bring business card doesn’t give good impression of professionalism and friendliness.
The exchange of business cards is an important first step in business meetings in China. It’s absolutely OK to bring your business card in English as it is. But to most of your Chinese counterparts, reading your business card in Chinese will make you a good first impression.
Not that unusual right? Now here’s the rub. You need to get a Chinese “name”..!
Just like many Asians adopt a new name like “Fred” when coming to the US, we need to do the same when going the other way for the same and different reasons. The same reason is the pronunciation – its very important for both cultures to be able to “say” your name correctly and both parties have issues with each others language.
The other reason to have a “special” name (and the correct Chinese characters used on the card) is that a name means much more in China and getting the wrong translation of your first and last name may “come out wrong” or may have negative associations. This is very bad. So beware using Google to translate your card, I suggest using a proper naming Company like these guys: http://goodcharacters.com/
In China, the quality of a business card is important. A well-crafted business card wins respect and opens doors.
What about card etiquette?
OK so now you now have the correct name, the correct card with the correct “characters”, now you need to give out the card to people in the correct fashion.
Again, be very careful, unlike the western way to both handing a card and shaking at the same time you need to “present” the card with both hands with your name facing them so they can read it and receive the card the same way!
As you receive a card, take time to read it and make some positive comments before putting it in your pocket or purse. Always have your cards ready – maybe in the pocket of your suit coat.
If you follow this advice. Your Chinese counterpart will feel flattered. A little detail makes a long-lasting impression.
OK, so this is a great example of why you need to some research before visiting and hoping to do business with another culture, especially one that is more conservative where a long time is required to build trust.
Here are some other useful tips:
(thanks to my friends who are Asia experts)
* Do I need a VISA?
Yes, and you need to leave a week to get that done.
* What cities/areas are best for what in Tech?
Shenzhen and Guangzhou are more hardware hi-tech locations. Beijing and Shanghai tend to be more software and telecoms hi-tech. Hong Kong is only 45mins away from Shenzhen so this has easier export, access and western connections.
* What is the no. 1 cultural faux pas I should watch out for? Don’t want to offend anyone?
Don’t be late to meetings. Big cities in China are very open and friendly. You pretty much don’t need to worry about anything. Chinese like foreign visitors.
But avoiding political topics such as Tibet and Taiwan issues would be smart. Also Chinese ladies are not used to getting hugs from strangers. Hand-shaking is considered more appropriate when meeting for the first time.
* What is the usual business clothing expected for meetings and social? (Suit – jeans, in between)
Suit (and tie) for business meeting (they will think you’re not sincere if underdressed). Suit is good for any government meeting. But given the heat there, a jacket without a tie is fine. Most of the hi-tech people dress casually.
* How good is the English in bigger towns and what should I watch out for when trying to get around?
Usually English is spoken to some extent. You can pretty much chat in English with any young person you meet on the street of Beijing or Shanghai. But older generations don’t know English at all. If you need to ask for directions on the street, find someone who look like college students. They’re very eager to help out. You should have no problems speaking. English in hotels or resorts. Some cab drivers can speak a little bit English, but not much. When travelling bring your hotel’s card with you so that you can easily hand it to a driver to take you back to your hotel. Virtually none of the taxi drivers speak English.
But if you want to make progress in business take a Mandarin speaker with you for business meetings. If not then make sure they have a good English speaker.
* Is a special travel insurance policy a good idea in case of illness or medical issues?
Medical insurance is a must, on top of good business travel insurance. Hospitals are actually OK. If your insurance has world-wide coverage, you should be fine.
* Is crime on the streets a problem, or on public transport?
Crime is not a problem if you stay in the populated areas. But do keep your belongings around you at all times. If you are walking along the street and are approached by a normal looking Chinese woman who wants to speak English. She’s not just trying to learn English if you know what I mean! But other than that it’s really pretty safe. But do bring some cash with you at all times (4-5K RMB). It’s good to watch out pickpockets if you’re on subway, but they’re pretty rare.
* How do you avoid being ripped off by taxi drivers? Any airport scams to avoid?
Taxi industry is very tightly regulated in China. One or two complaints from customers can make them lose their license, so normally cab drivers won’t rip you off too much. The taxi stop at the airport is supervised by a special team. You’ll wait at the line and the operators will call the cab for you. Make sure you always get the receipt in case you left something in the car.
You should also think about getting a hotel car to pick you up this is usually like 2-3 times more expensive ($60) but is a much more comfortable ride after a 12 hour flight and they know where they are going.
If you have a lot of meetings, it would be better to hire a car and driver. Traffic is impossible and at some times of the day it could take an hour to get a taxi.
* What’s the best hotel chain for value/comfort?
Just get any 5 or 4 star, but make sure you are not stuck out away from the action. Central West in Beijing is best. There are a lot of Starwood hotels in China (Sheraton, Westin, St. Regis, W). The Westins and Sheratons are really great – avoid the Sheraton Great Wall in Beijing and stay at the Westin Chaoyang not the Westin in the Financial district. Any W Hotel is really amazing.
For value in Beijing I stayed at a Chinese hotel, much lower cost: Yulong Hotel, Fucheng Road 40,Haidian District. Local currency (RMB): 320.00 per night!
* What’s the roaming cell phone/internet charges like? Any special advice on saving money here?
Us carriers get hit with 2 bucks a minute roaming. Take a unlocked 3g phone and you can usually buy a local SIM in the airport. Often there are girls at kiosks selling these in the baggage claim area or outside of arrivals. These will give you a local number and great rates back to the US and of course locally. Some even have data plans.
* Are credit cards accepted everywhere? Best way to get currency?
China is more of a cash country, credit cards are becoming more common but are not in use as much as you see in the U.S. and Europe. Bring a bigger wallet or pouch… China is like Italy when they had the Lira. Cash is preferred, however, in international establishments credit cards work just fine. Regarding currency. Everywhere you go you pay the exchange rate. Personally, I use the Citibank teller machine either at the airport or around town and withdraw cash.
* What’s the best food and food to avoid? Best places to get a great dinner in general? (i.e. hotels or out)
Food in the Western hotels is really good. Often Sinophile Western chefs move to China because of a wife or something and they land up running the Western hotel restaurants. I’ve had some of the best Western food in Western hotels in China. If you are going for Chinese food, Sichuan and Cantonese versions of Chinese food will be the most familiar to you. (Chinese food is very regionally oriented). Beijing food is very plain and not great for the Western palate you may not like Shanghai food either! Chinese restaurants are good value. Go for high end local cuisine outside hotel for the best experience.
Don’t get your hopes up about choices of wine. Don’t drink Chinese wine despite what they are saying about being able to copy anything. Most wines in restaurants will be from Aus or NZ.
Do try the night market in Beijing. It’s a lot of fun and you can sample many styles of Chinese food (some of them can be really exotic and bizarre though). And you don’t want to miss Peking Duck. The best place to have that is Quan Ju De. This is a restaurant that have more than a hundred years of history of making ducks. Superb!
* What’s the best place to visit in Beijing if you can only have time for one? Hong Kong?
You should definitely do a day trip to the Great Wall – preferably during the week not the weekend. There are 4 locations that are the most popular. Badaling is cool because they have a slide to get you down the mountain after you are done. Moutainyu is probably the largest but farther away from Beijing. Normally most tours to the Great wall depart very early (6 a.m.) in the morning. Most popular entrance is Badaling. The further you walk along the wall the less crowded it will get. I wanted to get well off the beaten track and headed for Huanghua. You can also hire a private car for I believe 200 RMB for about 4 hours. Try to go with someone who is local, if possible, unless you are comfortable on your own. Have a map to hand.
Of course the other thing to do is visit the Forbidden Palace off of Tiananmen Square. It’s worth saying you’ve been there because it’s the most iconic site in China. But not as interesting in my opinion as the Great Wall.
In Hong Kong, go to the top of Victoria Peak. You take a funicular train up there and there are fantastic views up there. There are a couple of museums up there too.
* Any advice on a decent company to org a trip? or to help with meetings and other business related events? see www.variarts.com
I have tried to cover things not in the usual travel guide but do read these too!
So there is your quick primer on visiting China for business. There are many other smaller issues to watch out for like never pouring your own tea at dinner, and how to say thanks and what to do with chopsticks so I also suggest that you read one of the good guides on the country too.
So many details to get your Startup off the ground…
A colleague at Stanford, serial entrepreneur and friend Joe Beninato has a really great new blog based around his adventures on his 7th startup Tello.
His is an example of the many granular things that just need to get done when you startup and some of his advice that could short circuit some of your efforts if you are valley based:
In no particular order, here are some things to be aware of as you get your new company going:
1. A good lawyer. Lots of people think lawyers are evil, expensive, etc. The best startup lawyers are certainly expensive, but I think of them as great startup advisors who happen to have J.D. degrees. The advantage of startup lawyers is they’ve seen hundreds of times more term sheets than you, they’ve negotiated hundreds of times more business deals than you, and because of this volume, they know what’s “market” and what is not. This is true for convertible notes, equity financings, leases, etc. The best firms will defer some amount of their fees until you get funded if you convince them you are credible and/or working on a good idea, so in a sense, they are willing to take a risk on you. I suggest getting someone on board right away to get you incorporated, get your founder agreements setup, etc. I’m a big fan of Scott Dettmer and Mike Irvine at Gunderson Dettmer, Mitch Zuklie at Orrick, and Mike Sullivan at Pillsbury.
2. Incorporation. I recommend incorporating as a Delaware “C” corporation. Delaware is much more startup-friendly than California from a logistics perspective, believe it or not. For example, if you need to modify corporate documents, the turnaround time for California can be days or weeks, whereas with Delaware, it’s typically hours. And if you’re ever going to raise venture capital, LLCs and “S” corporations are most typically converted into “C” corporations at that point. Once you get going, you’ll need a Federal EIN (employer identification number) for most things like lease applications, payroll, etc. and all of this can be taken care of by your lawyers.
3. Founder agreements. One of the biggest mistakes made by founders is to fail to have the hard conversations about how to split the equity and what happens if things don’t work out. This most likely happens because a) the founders are friends and don’t expect hard times to test their relationship, and b) these conversations are awkward and difficult. I can tell you that even experienced entrepreneurs don’t like to have these conversations, and it can lead to ugly situations. Bite the bullet, be an adult, and have these hard conversations. I call it the “Founder Pre-Nup.” You both (or all) owe it to yourselves to think through how you’re going to split the equity up front vs. down the road. Sometimes it’s an equal split, but I would say that more often than not, it is not an equal split because of someone’s experience level, IP contribution, reputation contribution, cash contribution, etc. There are no hard and fast rules of thumb here. You should also think about vesting schedules, vesting cliffs, what happens if one of the founders leaves, etc. It might be tough, but you’ll be surprised how relieved you are when it’s over and everything is understood between founders.
4. Salaries and benefits. This varies by situation, but I’d suggest making some progress on the product or fundraising before putting this into place. If founders aren’t willing to bootstrap and invest a month or two of time in getting something off the ground, imagine what happens down the road when times get tough. Some people who have a paying job will need to keep it while getting the new company going nights and weekends. Most people can continue to keep their COBRA coverage from a previous job, and once you get funded, it may even make sense to just reimburse people for their COBRA vs. the time/expense of setting up benefits right away. Of course, by the time you get to 5-10 people, you’ll need to set this up, but defer it as long as you can.
5. Banking. I recommend getting setup with Silicon Valley Bank right after incorporating. While you can choose to work with any bank, SVB is setup to work with startups, and knows the issues that come up all of the time.
6. Office space. Some people think that getting an office is a waste of time, that everyone can work virtually from home and be as productive as they would be sitting in a room together. While that approach might work for some, I am not a fan. I am all for being lean and frugal, but I think there is something special that happens when a team is getting together daily in their own “place” to solve tough problems together. It’s a bonding experience that forges them together. They’re working together in groups and individually, and eating lunch together. I’m not saying that this can’t happen if you meet over Skype or in a Starbucks every day, but I think it’s more difficult. For me, some of my fondest memories of the startups I’ve been involved in are the earliest days of the company with just the founders in the first office. I think back to S3 and Bunker Hill Lane in Santa Clara. When.com and Broadway Street in Redwood City. Presto and Sand Hill Road. Those of you who were there with me know what I’m talking about. I think it’s worth the $1000/month to get a small office and get people together almost daily.
More here: http://startupseven.com/
How *not* to send an intro email to investors!
I often read Mark Cuban he has some really valuable insights for entrepreneurs.
When you are trying to hit up a potential investor you will only get one shot (if you are lucky enough to get hold of their email address) so make sure its a good approach.
Here is his pithy view on how to get attention and what not to do!
If you are an entrepreneur who is looking for capital and is sending letters or emails of introduction, leave out the Bullshit. Say who you are. What you have. What makes it different than the competition. What you want to accomplish. How you plan on getting there and how I can help. Everything else will usually hurt more than it will help
http://blogmaverick.com/2009/08/19/success-motivation-what-entrepreneurs-should-not-do/
How to create a motivational Dream Wall
One of the sales people that works for me was having a few troubles getting “psyched up” to make cold calls to prospects and we sat down to discuss how he was feeling. After a short while I decided he simply needed to do two things – to be clear on his personal and business goals and to have something to motivate him daily.
The daily motivation can be very important not just for sales staff but also small startup teams who often work alone or in small silo’s and after the honeymoon period has worn off settle down to many years of very hard work!
A Dream Wall (for those of us that are visually orientated) is great way of motivating yourself daily to what your deepest dreams and desires.
What is a Dream Wall
A Dream Wall can be whatever you want but generally it is made up of images of the achievements or goals you wish to experience in reality. These can be short or long term goals but they want to be orientated around “visceral” things or experiences that you can get into pictorial form.
For example in the image above we have places, things, experiences, homes, books etc that signify various goals. This can also be poetry, quotes, affirmations, spiritual sayings, pictures of loved ones, people you admire or a person you would like to have in your life or whatever makes you motivated and excited about your future!
The images are designed to really make the viewer excited and remind them of the “why” in their day. Why do you get out of bed every day? well this “wall” should remind you why!
So why bother to do this?
Well the process of creating the wall can be very valuable in itself, it makes you go through a goal setting process and to consider your needs, wants and desires. It helps you choose the really important ones and it reminds you about the “why”. Then it stands as a reminder from then on when you are lacking motivation or are having a hard time why you do what you do.
You will probably know that if you engage several of your senses into recalling something i.e. looking at a picture, writing down the experience associated with it, thinking deeply about it that your memory will be far stronger around that goal than simply putting it on paper. Then if you regularly review the images and words associated with your goal you are reinforcing that memory more and more.
So this is essentially a process of focusing you and then reinforcing yourself later.
Creating your own Dream Wall
To practically go through this process you can have a virtual or physical board (like a pin board). In my case I have it on my PC as an image that I can add and change the pictures I have found from my own photo album, or on the internet or in magazines. Once you have located these pictures, cut them out or print them out for the pin board or make a collage like above.
Then place them in a place where you can easily view them in all of their glory each day. This is now your own Dream Wall. The place where you come to look at your dreams.
“Seeing is believing” as the saying goes. The world is full of distractions, and it’s really hard to stay focused on your dreams. That’s why it’s so important to have reminders all around you of why you are doing what you are doing.
If you have limited space or are in an inflexible “cube” at work then why not type out some goals and stick them on your computer. Or make a photo collage of your family, goals and dreams and put it in a little frame on your desk.
How to use your Dream Wall
Don’t go to the effort of making this “wall” and then hide it away – it’s very purpose is to in your view all of the time, on the wall, on a desk, on your PC desktop or in view. It will not just remind you when you specifically look at it but also it will allow your subconscious mind to assist you while its in your peripheral vision!
Visit this wall at least twice a day, spending around 5-minutes per visit visualizing what you want in the future. Try and review each part of the wall, say a sunny beach home, and then shut your eyes and try and use each of your senses to feel, see, touch, smell and hear what it would be like sitting on your front porch in this beautiful new home you have just purchased. See the image in your mind in full color and see yourself in the image with the goal or desire. Breathe deeply and really get absorbed into the dream – believe it.
Each time you visit your Dream Wall you are imprinting upon your brain a positive and clear message of what you want from life. Through repetition this positive habit actually programs the brain with a positive expectation and a clear vision of what you expect from yourself. The brain then goes to work on seeking out and providing you with solutions and strategy’s for achieving what you want. The more you want it, the quicker your brain will find a solution for attainment.
Practice this daily and you’ll amaze yourself at how quickly and easily you can actually achieve your dreams in the real world.
The quickest and most direct route to achieving success is to know what you want out of life and just as importantly when you want it? The Dream Wall emphasizes this and helps keep you focused, true and determined to achieve your deepest desires in life.
Of course this is not a “miracle working” device – you need to do the work, the planning and goal setting to be clear on the “road” to these wonderful goals and to do what you must to achieve them! Below is my post on setting your goals and this should preferably be completed before your Dream Wall.
Set your life goals now to make sure you know what your business needs to deliver to you!
