2023: Which Way Will the Winds Blow?

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A girl drawing the number 2023 in the sand

Business leaders are wondering what 2023 will bring. The war in Ukraine, the lingering effects of the global pandemic, layoffs at major tech companies, inflation, rising interest rates, artificial intelligence, the collapse of cryptocurrency, the worry around a recession, and a host of other issues can impact your startup.  Enough to give an ulcer to the tech founder with even … Read More

Understanding the Startup Journey

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image showing the stages of growth from startup, through developing the playbook, to scaleup

When you are on a journey, it’s always helpful to have a map. It’s no different for B2B tech startups.  Through our experience, research, and interviews with leaders in the startup space, we have developed an easy way to understand the growth cycle of startups. There are three distinct phases for B2B tech startups, with each phase requiring a specific … Read More

Who Should Be Your First Sales Hire?

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the number one in a parking space

Quick. Think of a salesperson. What comes to mind? How do you feel about that person?  If you are like most of us, we’re suspicious of salespeople. They are the ones that try to get us to buy a car we can’t afford, pitch ethically questionable extended warranties, and seem to hover over us in certain stores.  Throw in the … Read More

How Do You Scale Sales at a Startup?

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Startup Valuation Curve

Scaling Sales at a startup is a three step process: Prove product/market fit by achieving founder-led sales and proving that someone will pay, Hire a Pathfinder salesperson whose role is to develop a predictable, repeatable, scalable, profitable Sales process (a.k.a. a Playbook), Build out the Sales organisation to implement the Playbook at scale. Note: your Sales leader for this stage … Read More

When Should I Hire My First Sales Rep?

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image showing "we are hiring"

You’ve successfully built and launched your product and made some initial sales. You’re probably like most Founders and looking forward to getting out of the Sales front line and wondering when you should hire your first Sales rep. If that’s you, then you’ve already passed two of the three major milestones to hiring your first Sales rep: Established product/market fit … Read More

The Right Five Journey (part 6)

Neil HartleyValue Creation JourneyLeave a Comment

a road disappearing into the distance

Regular readers will recall that our product development was outsourced to a Ukrainian firm called Go Wombat. We started the design phase of the project in December 2021 and moved into the development phase at the beginning of February. The goal was to complete the project by end of March, 2022. Then the invasion of Ukraine happened (something we’ve covered … Read More

Simple Startup Math

Neil HartleyValue Creation JourneyLeave a Comment

a pen and mathematical equations

My thanks to ex-colleague Greg Head for highlighting the often missing simple startup math in startup investor pre-pitches. He’s highlighting companies that are (generally) pre-revenue but who are articulating making it big without a supporting plan. On the valuation curve, he’s talking about businesses effectively at time zero and asking the questions: How are you going to get your first … Read More

The Right Five Journey (part 5)

Neil HartleyValue Creation JourneyLeave a Comment

a road disappearing into the distance

Welcome to part 5 of The Right Five journey, from concept to product. In an attempt to provide continuity between these posts I re-read the last one and noticed the comment, “in a world of [almost] unprecedented uncertainty”. That just got ratcheted up! Indeed, regular readers will know we outsourced the development of our product to a software development firm … Read More