By Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of some of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are StartupCFO, Harvard Business Review, Content Marketing Institute, MarketingSherpa, Forbes, and Fast Company.
How customers evaluate your product
If you sell to B2B customers then you know how hard it is to get that purchase order. It goes without saying that it helps to put yourself in the shoes of your prospective customer to try and see how they perceive your company and product. What would their concerns be? How would they go about evaluating this opportunity? Mark MacLeod shares a valuable framework for determining how customers think about a startup’s product.
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By Alexandra Reid
This is a story about a 70-year-old woman who wants nothing to do with social media but is doing it anyway, inspired by an article I read on ReadWriteWeb last week, “Why boomers won’t release their grip on technology.”
Please let me first point out that I know she is not of the Boomer generation. I’ll get to that later.
According to the article’s author, Brian Proffitt, we need to “Put away the cozy image of the little old lady knitting a sweater for the grandkids, or the distinguished gentlemen playing chess in a park, because the newest elder generation is not going to sit quietly in a rocking chair.”
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By Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of some of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are Forbes, Financial Post, iNova Capital, Inc., TechCrunch, MediaPost and Canadian Business.
Steve Blank’s most audacious guerilla marketing stunts
Author John Greathouse speaks with Steve Blank — professor, thought leader, author and leader within the Lean Startup Movement — to share his wily and creative feats as a creative marketing entrepreneur.
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This is the first article in a continuing monthly series chronicling the growth path of ..duo, a startup based out of Kelowna B.C. that creates simple keywords that use your name, brand, slogan or any other word combination as a shortcut to content on the web.
By Alexandra Reid
Our Francis Moran first met ..duo cofounder Daylin Mantyka while on Startup Canada volunteer duty at Accelerate Okanagan’s Jump:Start:Challenge, a pitch competition for technology companies and entrepreneurs. He was one of the judges who selected Daylin as a top entrant who would receive as a prize eight weeks of expert training, coaching and mentorship to improve her pitch and increase her chances of raising capital.
It was Daylin’s first pitch ever, and, while she had struggled to communicate this idea in the past, she felt she translated it perfectly at Jump:Start.
“It’s a simple concept, but it’s entirely new,” she said.
When asked on the phone what ..duo is all about, Daylin opted to first explain what it is not about.
“We’re not like a web address that can be lengthy and difficult to remember and pass around in conversations, and we’re not like QR codes with which most people have a love-hate relationship,” said Daylin.
So, what is ..duo?
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By Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of some of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are ReadWriteWeb, Fast Company, Forbes and VentureBeat.
Why you can’t settle for the “minimum” in your minimum viable product
Many startups scramble to create a “minimum viable product,” or MVP, to get a version of their product to market quickly for testing. It’s a great way to cost-effectively test a website or app with real users. But be careful. If your MVP is too minimalist, it could torpedo your company’s future.
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By Alexandra Reid 
