When getting a fresh lead across your desk, determining the optimal contact model to get a conversation with a key decision maker is not an easy task. Witnessing this firsthand at OpenView Venture Partners with some of our portfolio companies, this sometimes can be one of the biggest bottlenecks in lead generation systems and is oftentimes not given adequate attention. Many times you can find yourself leaving messages for weeks with no call back. You should take time to figure out what the right approach should be and execute effectively against it (while learning and iterating based on results). If you are a sales manager, you must ensure your team members are all employing the same best practice tactics (as inconsistency is not good). If you are an individual salesperson, staying disciplined against your contact model and being organized is key.
As you are figuring out the correct contact model, below are a few things to consider:
The first day you make a call and leave a voice-mail, remember to follow up with an email. Statistics have shown the combination of a voice-mail and email in the same day lead to a much higher conversion than simply leaving one or the other.
Try calling the lead more than once the first day (while leaving a voice-mail just once). You don't want to be a stalker and call the lead 50 times, but a couple times is not a bad approach.
Determine the optimal amount of days between past messages left to reach out and make follow up attempts (it can be as short as one day or as long as 2-3). If you have much longer than one-week intervals in calling a lead back, you may find it difficult to get a conversation.
Don't give up calling a super hot prospect. Some leads may take 30+ attempts until you get someone on the phone. A lack of response does not always mean non-interest (people are often times busy!). Be persistent and patient -- it will pay off.
Use a CRM system to automate and track your calling approach. Excel does not cut it these days. Salesforce.com does a good job at managing the outbound contact method through tasks. Additional bolt on systems like Jesubi take it to the next level in terms of automating the flow of follow up calls and messages.
Have your best outbound callers mentor those on the team that may be struggling. Coaching/feedback from a peer who is in the trenches doing the calling day to day will be better received than by management teams who may not have been there/done that for ages.
Hopefully the above are a few insights that will have you start thinking more about taking your outbound approach to the next level.
If you are partaking in inside sales or carrying out an outbound lead generation system, having a rock solid pitch is necessary as you are speaking to a decision maker for the first time. It's easy to walk into a conversation and deliver what can be perceived as an incoherent and undirected pitch coupled with improper etiquette. Below are a few tips I found to be helpful for management teams of some of OpenView Venture Partners' expansion stage portfolio companies.
Set goals for your first call! Example goals are having a meaningful conversation with a key decision maker, confirming there is a solution/product fit with the company, ending the call with a definitive next step and leaving a professional impression. If you don't pick up the phone with a goal in mind, you can end up wasting everyone's time on the phone.
The first 90 seconds are critical, so don't blow it! During this time period you are either making or breaking the conversation. You need to demonstrate high energy and enthusiasm, state your main goal, determine you are speaking with the right person, deliver your 30 second pitch and determine whether the prospect has an internal goal that fits with the product or service you are offering. If you can accomplish this in the first 90 seconds, you will be in a good position to go into solution selling or end the call due to the lack of fit.
When you speak, always pay attention to the finer details. Speak confidently and have an upbeat and energetic attitude. Be conversational and friendly. People don't enjoy speaking with robots (especially those that cold call them). Also, make sure you are matching the prospect's tonality and pace. If you are speaking with a fast talking New Yorker, don't be slow and slurring with your words.
Maintain proper etiquette! Never interrupt the prospect when they are speaking, take interest in what they are saying, be courteous, complimentary, and always use first names.
These tips are just some of the basic items you should be thinking about as you are perfecting your cold calling pitch. In my opinion, if you are able to accomplish the above, this only gives you your ticket to the main event, which is when you need to enter into real solution selling (either during this call, a scheduled follow-up call or through a hand-off to a more senior salesperson).
I just finished up a meeting with an interesting expansion stage investment prospect where the sales organization was using outsourced lead qualification/ lead generation services to fuel their sales pipeline. Part of the operational support we provide at OpenView Venture Partners includes the ability to provide a service like this to our portfolio companies. The process is very complicated and, if not executed correctly, can lead to wasted time and money. If you are considering outsourcing this type of activity, below are some items to consider:
Ensure your outsourced provider is calling into a highly targeted list of prospects that is relevant to your product or service. You should have a defined segment and contact information for key decision makers within companies in that segment.
Make sure the pitch clearly speaks to the pain point of the person you are calling. If a prospective buyer is hyper -focused on ROI, don’t drown out your message with irrelevant facts. Make sure you work directly with your provider on the pitch and have them deliver it back to you. It should be short and concise. You should also listen to the voicemail script being left as well. These pieces are critical in generating both quality and quantity of opportunities.
Hold your provider accountable to measurable goals and have them report statistics on a weekly basis. You should pay close attention to calls, conversations and opportunities produced on a weekly basis. If you cannot get these statistics from your provider or they are unwilling to share, you should question what they are doing.
Clearly define what an opportunity is and hold your provider accountable against that standard. Ideally, a real opportunity should have a conversation completed with a key decision maker who has expressed both need and immediacy for your solution. If any of these items are lacking, it may not be a real opportunity and your investment may not be paying off.
The above are just some of the high level items you should focus on as you are pondering the route of outsourced lead qualification. If done correctly, a robust lead generation system can provide your sales team with great leverage and productivity gains. If steps are skipped or corners are cut, it can be a giant waste of time!
Central Desktop, one of OpenView Venture Partners' expansion stage portfolio companies, just announced that Central Desktop for Office will officially go into Full Release next Monday, August 16th. The product has been in beta for some time and is now ready for full launch.
Isaac Garcia, Central Desktop's CEO, says, "CD for Office can change, you could even say revolutionize, the way users collaborate on documents and files. If you are a heavy Microsoft Word, PowerPoint or Excel user, CD for Office will make document editing, sharing and collaborating with your team fast, easy and seamless." The new functionality should help the company in creating competitive advantage in the hosted collaboration market.
To kick off the launch next week, Isaac will be hosting two webinars to walk customers through the new product and its powerful features. You can participate by registering for one of the dates below:
Loyalty Lab, one of our expansion stage portfolio companies, recently launched a very impressive campaign with Green Giant Fresh that takes loyalty to the next level for CPG and brands. Historically, companies like Green Giant had difficulty establishing a relationship directly with their consumers. Once a consumer buys a Green Giant product in a retail location, there is little reason to go to Green Giant's website or have any further interaction with the product.
Loyalty Lab saw this problem and partnered with Zynga to offer a solution to Green Giant that allows customers who buy broccoli or celery in a store to redeem coupons for cash in Farmville. The result is a consumer who is actively engaged with the Green Giant brand continually in an online experience (Farmville) that many people enjoy. The more broccoli you buy, the more cash you have online to plant your own broccoli!
Campaigns like this pave the way for unique business growth strategies and as it relates to loyalty in CPG which helps in creating competitive advantage. For more details on the campaign, you can read the following New York Times article. For more information on Loyalty Lab, you can visit their website here.
I just read a recent book from Seth Godin called Linchpin that I thought was very insightful for management teams of expansion stage companies (or any individual in today's work environment) seeking better creativity, innovation and impact on their organization.
Godin keys in directly on the continual mental fight professionals have all the time: be risk averse, uncreative and fearful, where you are relying on what he calls your lizard brain to survive in the work environment and life -- or -- key into your daemon which is the higher-level opposing force in your brain that is the source of creativity, insight, selflessness, love and determination. As it relates to what people bring to the job, it is easy to be a lizard as continually doing the mundane and meeting the status quo of your role can be perceived as good enough and safe. However, for the greater good of organizations, relationships and ultimately personal and professional success, tapping into your daemon and being a Linchpin -- a person “who uses bravery, insight, creativity and boldness to challenge the status quo" -- will allow greater value creation and performance overall.
Not every organization can foster linchpins. If creativity is not endorsed, voices are not heard and the repercussions/negative feedback for failure is great, employees' lizard brain will dominate their activities and you will end up with a dictatorship culture with mindless drones.
As you are leading your team (or playing a critical role in it) and employing business growth strategies to achieve the defined mission and vision, ask yourself: are you being a linchpin and promoting an environment for linchpins to emerge? I don't know about you, but I am not much of a fan of lizards!
As start-up companies are looking for investors, often times management teams seek to go the route of an investment banker to help with the expansion capital raise. At OpenView Venture Partners, I have interacted with many bankers (some who are outstanding at their job and some who have no business representing investment opportunities). Based on my experience being on the other side of the table, below are things to watch out for if you are an entrepreneur looking for venture funding:
Stay away from investment banks that do not know your business or have not executed a transaction in your segment. Given that investors will be hearing the company story for the first time from the banker, they should be able to speak knowledgeably and intelligently about your business.
The investment bank should have solid relationships with VCs that invest actively in your space (or at least know who the target suspects are). You will have trouble getting traction fund-raising if your banker is targeting investors that don't know your sector and have no appetite there.
Get clarity upfront in terms of the process that will be run. Have the banker communicate to you who they will be contacting at what venture funds, what the prior relationship is, and what the angle will be in terms of how they pitch your business. You should also expect clear communication in terms of the status with each fund and next steps on a routine basis.
Make sure your banker is aligned with your motives for the raise. If you are looking for the highest valuation from any funding source, you want a banker that is aggressive at getting the opportunity priced up. If you are more concerned about finding the right partner with the right fit, be careful at picking a banker that is incentivized to only find who will come in at the highest price.
Your banker is perceived by the outside world as your partner. With that, be careful who you pick and who is representing you. You want to pick a bank that is extremely professional and can best represent your company. I can't tell you how many times I am turned off by an investment prospect because the banker does not have their act together or is sloppy and overaggressive.
These are just a few of the items entrepreneurs should think about as they are contemplating going the route of an investment bank. Raising capital is definitely a distracting process as you are running a business. An investment banker can often provide leverage as you are going through the process. Just be careful when choosing your partner (and ask yourself, do you really need an investment banker as they can complicate the process for no reason in some cases). The decision is bigger than you think.
I constantly get asked the question, “why, working in growth venture capital, do you still do competitive track and field?” It’s a pretty fair question. The training is brutal on my body and there is a degree of added stress with competition. As I am now one day away from what will be my 8th Club National Championships -- and most likely final meet of my track career -- I couldn’t help but reflect on the value the past 8 years of balancing competitive track and field with what expansion capital investing has brought me. I came up with the following:
1. Sprint training takes a high degree of focus and it helped keep me focused in all aspects of my life, including at the office. 2. Partaking in a physical activity helped me release stress during difficult times both at the office and at home. It was a way to release and reset. 3. The discipline I needed to compete at an elite level helped me focus on maintaining the necessary discipline in the other areas of my life. 4. The intense competition on the track and desire to compete at the highest level helped me strive to be the best at anything I spent my time on. 5. Competition constantly reminded me that great results are only achieved through hard work. Always think your competition is working at least as hard (if not harder) than you. Failing to put in the time will result in you being left in the dust! 6. Keeping in shape helped give me energy and stamina through long and difficult days at the office. I was going to work out anyway, so why not do it with a purpose! 7. It helped provide balance in my life.
I encourage everyone to find what their equivalent of track and field is (with my last meet coming soon, I have to find mine). Though it is extremely unrelated to any direct activities at OpenView Venture Partners, I find it helped contribute greatly to my performance.
We are at the halfway point of 2010. Needless to say, the year has been treating most people better than last. If you have been marching against your operating strategy appropriately this year, you should be at the point where you have reviewed your progress against last quarter and are setting goals for Q3. At OpenView Venture Partners, one thing we stress both internally and to our expansion stage portfolio companies is keeping focused against goals.
As management teams are defining their business growth strategies and setting their goals for Q3, it is essential that focus against the operating plan that was set at the beginning of the year is maintained. It is very easy to see an exciting new initiative to potentially undertake and then inadvertently steer the ship in a different course. With that, what one must ask themselves as they are setting their goals is: “Does this align against my 2010 strategy and will it allow me to achieve the vision I have set out at the beginning of the year?” If you find that he answer is “no”, you should ask yourself, “is this potential initiative defocusing my organization?” or “did I incorrectly define my strategy at the beginning of the year and need to reset?”
At the end, focus against a goal is key in order to generate results. Make sure you don’t lose focus as you are crossing the halfway point of 2010. You only have 6 months left to meet your annual targets!
Shacked -- a company specializing in product and development for iPhone, iPad and mac apps -- just launched a product called Flickpad which, I find, has done a great job of marrying some of the best of the iPad and Facebook. What exactly is it?
- It's an app that runs native on the iPad that is used to view your friends' Facebook photos - A user enters their Facebook login credentials into the app and instantly you start seeing friends' photos elegantly displayed on your iPad - You have the ability to easily flick pictures you don't want to view off of the iPad, and double-click any photo to see the rest of the album - Any photo you like you can easily save to your iPad so you can have them stored in your personal library
What Shacked did here was simple. They saw a consumer activity (photo sharing) that could be taken to the next level by a device that has phenomenal capabilities (iPad). With that, they created a simple app that connected both worlds in a seamless way, delivering an advanced user experience.
The marriage of Apple's slick interface with a sliver of Facebook's content here is brilliant. The management teams at both companies have employed some great business growth strategies that allow their platform to be open enough to allow third party developers to build on top of their technology and connect to their information while still keeping some elements off limits. The result is great competitive positioning by Apple and Facebook, coupled with rapid innovation through the relatively open app universe.
Unfortunately, I wasn't able to peel myself away from my desk at OpenView Venture Partners this week to make it over to E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo). However, I was able to follow the action online and see the latest product and development updates from the major console players. What seems to be the focus?
No surprise, Nintendo and Sony are making big pushes into 3d with Sony announcing several titles that will support 3d and Nintendo touting its new 3d handheld DS console. Sony also profiled its new Wii copycat, titled Move, which looks to be aiming at Nintendo's core audience.
The need to maintain differentiation, push innovation and improve competitive positioning is necessary in the heated console war. In the end, it will only provide consumers with great gaming experiences!
I will admit that I can be a dork and sometimes have a bit of fun with a plastic guitar or fake DJ turntable. Sometimes, there is nothing cooler than thinking you have incredible musical skills and can match a Metallica song note for note.
Red Octane (acquired by Activision) revolutionized the gaming world several years ago with Guitar Hero. Since then, Activision has been building on the series with several iterations and found itself in a battle with rival Harmonix in the music/video game genre. However, Harmonix is taking its product and development strategy to the next level with Rock Band 3 by narrowing the gap between smashing random buttons and playing actual music.
For the latest release of Rock Band, Harmonix is providing a 25 key midi keyboard where the hardest difficulty level will have players utilize all 25 keys and be very close to playing real music. New to this version will also be guitars with real strings (where one will be a full sized Fender replica).
I applaud Harmonix for their competitive positioning here -- by bringing innovation to what I consider a stale genre, pushing gamers that consider themselves masters of the plastic musical instrument to actually take the next step and be closer to a true guitar hero. Business growth strategies from management teams such as this one are necessary to surviving in a highly competitive console game marketplace (especially as many consumers are gravitating to web-based social gaming).
Pete Cashmore wrote today his thoughts on Apple TV and whether we will be seeing the Internet truly invade our television screen. I will admit, I am one of the very few who have purchased an Apple TV and live by it as a seamless device that centralizes all of my media in a single home entertainment center. For me, Apple TV is perfect, completing my ability to access media anywhere and in the most ideal fashion (whether through my shuffle while working out, via my iPhone in the car, through my iPad at work or through Apple TV while lounging at home).
Pete makes a number of great points on why Internet enabled television (whether powered by Apple TV or Google's new platform) will be more mainstream in consumer households (bringing apps to your living room, centralizing all of your media, etc.). However, the mass market of consumers probably will not see the value in spending more money on an additional set top box when they can play their apps on a brilliant iPad or stream their music from iTunes to their A/V receiver through airport express.
With that, what will be the needed catalyst to bring Internet to the TV for the masses of consumers? Pete mentions Apple looking to potentially partner with cable companies to integrate into the set top box is a possible angle. Rather than buy a new device that connects to your television (on top of a cable box and potential game console you already have) why not integrate it all into one?
I think there is a totally different angle that Apple (or others) could take as it relates to bringing Internet to the television and developing great competitive positioning. We are now seeing television displays offering wifi connectivity and apps straight out of the box. Hmmm...What would I do if I were Steve Jobs (and not a measly expansion capital investor)?
1. Abandon Apple TV product and development (though I love the device, it will never get mass market adoption - partnering with cable operators sounds like a nightmare)
2. Look at creating a killer LED display with wifi connectivity powered by an Apple OS that gives consumers the benefits of Internet functionality on their television while playing nice with cable and satellite operators. It would just be a large non-touch version of an iPad to hang on your wall that brings the best of both worlds! The controller could be your iPhone/iPad, a wii type controller or basic remote.
I am sure whatever Apple management teams have planned for this segment will be revolutionary as they continually deliver exceptional products to the consumer market. Looking forward to seeing what's ahead!
Sidekick studios, a company focused on social innovation whose product and development aims to use the internet in creative ways to redesign public services and make society better, just announced their latest project Buddy Radio. Buddy Radio is a device that lets patients with long term illnesses very easily broadcast their mood to family, friends and professional care workers via the turn of a knob on a clock like device.
With relative ease, individuals with long term illnesses or the elderly can announce how they are feeling (ex. dan is happy, dan is tired or dan is sad) through the device via twitter, facebook, sms, email and other mediums. The benefit is that loved ones and people that care about those with tough conditions can always stay connected and know what is going on through the new channels of communication now available with social media. The below video details some of the rationale behind Buddy:
Management teams that come up with innovative ideas like this that use today's technology (that is often confusing to many segments of the population) to benefit those that are struggling or could use support shows the incredible value and impact venture capital funding can have on the lives of people. I commend Sidekick Studios for their social innovation focus and hope products like Buddy Radio truly make a difference.
Senior management teams are always dealing with the age old problem of getting their employees to give 100%. When attempting to execute business growth strategies, you don't want your team giving a lackluster effort. How do you ensure you are fostering a culture of maximum effort amongst your leaders and employees? Mark Murphy's Hundred Percentersdetails some great strategies to ensure you are able to do this.
Mark gives some very good recommendations on how to foster a culture of leaders and employees that are giving their all to the success of your organization. The below are some takeaways I found:
Most employees do not give 100% at work. To get there, they need 100% leaders. These are individuals who are able to both challenge them with goals that stretch them, and at the same time know what motivates each team member. 100% leaders are not individuals that lead by appeasing, intimidating or browbeating. Ultimately, you will get the most out of your employees by truly connecting with them.
Approach feedback constructively. Employees make mistakes, and you should have a discussion with them in a nonjudgmental and nonthreatening way. Be graceful in bringing up the problem, eliminate any blame on the employee (the employee probably already feels bad, so placing blame is not helpful).
Know what motivates and demotivates your employees. These are called shoves and tugs. Find out what shoves your employees (what stresses them to the point of shoving them out the door) and what tugs your employees (what tugs at them to keep them striving). Do this by simply asking them. Knowing this will go a long way as you are attempting to get the most out of them.
Know your "talented terrors" which are those people who are knowledgeable, bright and extremely capable, yet have terrible attitudes and are an infection to the culture. Approach these individuals directly about their attitude and the need for adjustment. If their attitude is not adjusted, consider termination as it could be a huge detriment to your organization.
Elevate your hundred percenters by rewarding them and profiling them in your organization. If your employees see their behavior is rewarded and appreciated, people will look to emulate it.
These were just a few tidbits of knowledge in what I found to be a very good read. Helping manage a Boston Venture Capital fund I found the material to be very helpful. The best organizations will be built by teams that are giving 100%. Make sure you and your leaders are doing the right things to build these individuals.
Adobe just launched a full fledged ad campaign today targeting Apple and its firm stance against allowing flash on the iphone and ipad. Below is a sample of their campaign if you have not already seen it: This is clearly a desperate approach to get Apple consumers on the Adobe bandwagon. Will it work? Probably not...
I am an Apple enthusiast (have an iphone, ipad, apple tv, macbook air and macbook pro). Do I really care that I can't access flash on my mobile products? A little. Do I feel Apple is taking away part of my freedom of being able to freely experience the web? Kinda. Will it stop me from buying the next iphone 4G or new cool Apple device? No. Will it stop others? Probably not. Apple is driving such innovation and superior technology in the market that consumers are willing to accept their experiences to be limited in some manner because it is more than made up for with other features in their products.
Pushing flash out of the iphone and ipad is one of Apple's business growth strategies. They see the power and influence they have on the market and are exerting it as it relates to their competitive positioning. Sure, its a bit of bullying. However, its just business and consumers are rolling with it (and clearly have no issue given the sales figures Apple is seeing). Ultimately, I think Apple will win and that is why you are seeing desperate attempts from Adobe like the above. Moreover, with the HTML5 starting to emerge and put additional pressure on Adobe, they have reason to be scared. Personally, I don't think Adobe has an answer to the dilemma they are in and this is why they are resorting to this type of desperate influence marketing.
One of our expansion stage portfolio companies, Central Desktop, just announced the June launch of its Microsoft Office Collaboration tool. Central Desktop is a company OpenView Venture Partners provided growth capital to over two years ago. The company has been executing incredible business growth strategies that are allowing them to compete well against Microsoft Sharepoint. What does it mean for you reading this blog posting?
If you are a Central Desktop user you soon will be able to simultaneously co-author Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents in real time, as well as open and save files directly into the cloud.
The feature leverages technology from OffiSync and is compatible with any version of Microsoft Office. Once installed, it adds a new toolbar in Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint that enables users to open, save and edit files hosted on Central Desktop straight from your desktop application. The co-authoring feature allows more than one user to edit files, simultaneously, by tracking and syncing all changes and merging them correctly into one version.
The new feature should build on top of Central Desktop's powerful collaboration software. If you are a current Central Desktop user, check it out once released. If you are not using Central Desktop and you are looking for an online project management tool, go to their website and sign up for a free trial.
This month's Inc. magazine has a great article on communicating and listening to your employees. One key thing for management teams to consider when running a business is realize successful communication with your employees is a two-way street. You will have difficulty executing against your business growth strategies if you ignore this fact. Employees will listen more if they feel they have been heard. Below are some suggestions the article mentions:
Create formal feedback mechanisms: A suggestion box or some electronic method of soliciting constant feedback helps employees weigh in.
Take input seriously: If you don't take or acknowledge the input a direct report gives you, you won't be taken seriously. Note, just because an employee gives you input doesn't mean you have to implement it. However, you should acknowledge it.
Check management attitude: An employer/employee relationship will not be healthy if the employer shows hostility or is extremely defensive to being questioned.
Reward feedback: Harvard Business Review researchers have found that employees have difficulty weighing the immediate risk of speaking up versus the potential reward for their comments being valued and implemented. Developing a reward system that offers incentives to employees that speak up and offer feedback helps eliminate this friction.
A key thing to remember when running your business is understand your employees are the lifeblood of your company. All the venture capital funding and senior management horsepower in the world will mean nothing if you don't have a team to back it up. Make sure you have healthy relationships with them and ultimately listen to them!
At OpenView, we invest in companies looking for venture funding that are at the expansion stage. Many times, these companies are growing rapidly and need to hire senior resources to expand their management teams in order to scale. In several cases, we assist by offering recruiting support through OpenView labs (led by Diana Winings) to speed placement.
It's not all about the resume when hiring a new senior executive, and Nat Stoddard and Clair Wyckoff have a book titled The Right Leader that details many of the nuances that need to be considered when making a hire. The book focuses on what to consider as you are going through the executive selection process and building your senior management teams.
Often times, people can focus too much on capability and talent and neglect to consider culture, character and personality fit. Stoddard and Wyckoff explain, the main reason why new leaders fail is because they are unable to align with a corporation's culture.
Below are some recommendations that come from the book:
Get an objective outsider to study your culture so you can identify executives who will fit
Fully understand the background, cultural and strategic information from the current employees who will report to the new senior executive or CEO. If there is potential conflict, you should know this upfront before making a hiring decision.
Give the board enough data to make good decisions
Base much of the executive interviews on character and behavior traits in addition to core competency
Ask candidates how they handled certain difficult situations in the past. This will help you get a better sense of how they will perform on the job when faced in similar situations
Stoddard and Wyckoff describe a 25-step process that goes through the above in more detail. If hiring a new senior team member or CEO is something you plan on doing in the future and you are new to the process, I recommend picking up the book or going to their website. Of course, if you are looking for capital and this is a current pain point, OpenView definitely is able to help here.
If so, you should consider entering into Vator.tv's Splash competition to be held May 13 in San Francisco. I had the pleasure of attending their last Splash competition, put on by Bambi Francisco and her team, in February and found the event to be truly special. Seed to early stage companies looking for investors, operating executives looking for new insights on business growth strategies and top venture capital firms looking for the next big thing will find the Splash competition to be an event worth attending.
So, how does it work?
CEOs and/or founders of 10 companies, chosen by their peers and vetted by judges, will have the opportunity to present onstage and give a three-minute pitch in front of some 400 business professionals, comprising of executives from startups and large companies, angel investors, VCs, and the media.
How do you get selected? Create a profile on Vator.tv, the more comprehensive the better, and select participate in this competition. From there, members of the Vator community will vote on who should have the opportunity to present onstage at the Splash competition and have a chance to win the following:
Be profiled in a segment called Splash Box - an American-Idol-styled segment with four investors as panelists
Receive a magnum of Patz & Hall 2006 Chenoweth Ranch – Russian River Valley Pinot Noir
Receive $500 of cloud computing credits from Amazon Web Services. The top nine finalists will receive $100 cloud computing credits from Amazon Web Services
Bragging rights!
If you attend the event, you will also have the opportunity to hear Tony Hsieh (CEO of Zappos) and Gurbaksh Chahal (CEO of GWallet) speak on the success of their respective businesses.
If you happen to be in the Bay area May 13, check it out. Also, for 30% off, you can use the following coupon code (SplashOpenView). If not, I suggest at least hopping on Vator.tv and being a part of the community.
-KKF
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OpenView Venture Partners is an expansion stage venture capital firm, with a focus on high-growth software, internet, and technology-enabled companies. Much of the team's success has been driven by its active role in providing its portfolio companies with strategic value-add services and highly practical operating expertise. OpenView Venture Partners is based in Boston, MA, and invests globally.
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An introduction to OpenView, hosted by OpenView Venture Partners' Managing Partner and Senior Managing Director Scott Maxwell.
If you are partaking in inside sales or carrying out an outbound lead generation system, having a rock solid pitch is necessary as you are speaking to a decision maker for the first time. It's easy to walk into a conversation and deliver what can be perceived as an incoherent and undirected pitch coupled with improper etiquette. Below are a few tips I found to be helpful for management teams of some of OpenView Venture Partners' expansion stage portfolio companies.
expansion stage investment prospect where the sales organization was using outsourced lead qualification/ lead generation services to fuel their sales pipeline. Part of the operational support we provide at OpenView Venture Partners includes the ability to provide a service like this to our portfolio companies. The process is very complicated and, if not executed correctly, can lead to wasted time and money. If you are considering outsourcing this type of activity, below are some items to consider: 
Loyalty Lab, one of our expansion stage portfolio companies, recently launched a very impressive campaign with Green Giant Fresh that takes loyalty to the next level for CPG and brands. Historically, companies like Green Giant had difficulty establishing a relationship directly with their consumers. Once a consumer buys a Green Giant product in a retail location, there is little reason to go to Green Giant's website or have any further interaction with the product. 
marching against your operating strategy appropriately this year, you should be at the point where you have reviewed your progress against last quarter and are setting goals for Q3. At OpenView Venture Partners, one thing we stress both internally and to our expansion stage portfolio companies is keeping focused against goals.
Unfortunately, I wasn't able to peel myself away from my desk at OpenView Venture Partners this week to make it over to E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo). However, I was able to follow the action 
I will admit that I can be a dork and sometimes have a bit of fun with a plastic guitar or fake DJ turntable. Sometimes, there is nothing cooler than thinking you have incredible musical skills and can match a Metallica song note for note. 
e Cashmore wrote today his thoughts
Senior management teams are always dealing with the age old problem of getting their employees to give 100%. When attempting to execute business growth strategies, you don't want your team giving a lackluster effort. How do you ensure you are fostering a culture of maximum effort amongst your leaders and employees? 
One of our expansion stage portfolio companies, 
This month's Inc. magazine has a great article on communicating and listening to your employees. One key thing for management teams to consider when running a business is realize successful communication with your employees is a two-way street. You will have difficulty executing against your business growth strategies if you ignore this fact. Employees will listen more if they feel they have been heard. Below are some suggestions the article mentions:
that are at the expansion stage. Many times, these companies are growing rapidly and need to hire senior resources to expand their management teams in order to scale. In several cases, we assist by offering recruiting support through OpenView labs (led by 
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