Mint’s Aaron Patzer talks startup strategy
Just a few days after selling his company Mint.com to Intuit for $170M, Aaron Patzer gave a candid talk detailing his approach to starting and growing a company. This is a must watch for anyone engaging the challenges of tech startups.
Mint CEO Aaron Patzer on Startups from Techcrunch on Vimeo.
Here are some of the highlights of the presentation, in which Patzer used Mint's actual numbers to suggest a model for startup-building:
Raising Money:
- Phase 1: Once you have a mature idea, raise $100,000 from friends and family to build a prototype
- Phase 2: Prototype complete, raise $1 million and launch an alpha into the market.
- Phase 3: Once you have some traction, raise $5 to $10 million to scale up.
Phase 1 Expenses (1st $100,000):
- Founders: $30,000/year
- Engineering 1st hires: $30,000-50,000/year
- Office: $400/cube/month
- Tech: $10,000
- Legal: Deferred payments for 0.50 - 0.75% of company
Phase 2 Expenses (seed round):
- Salaries: $50,000 - $90,000/year ($450,000/year for 5 people)
- Overhead: +20% ($100,000/year)
- Legal: $25,000 + $2,000/month ($50,000/year)
Phase 3 Expenses (Series A)
- Salaries + Overhead: $200,000/year/person
- COGS: many one-time expenses add up to about $150,000/month
- Legal: $10,000-$50,000/month
Enjoy.
Some Wordpress Themes
Here are a few themes I came across while treking thorugh the jungles of theme sites. They are in no way organized or comprehensive.
Some fun ones:
http://webrevolutionary.com/curious/
http://dirtybluemedia.com/portfolio/desk-space-wordpress-theme/
http://fresh01.co.za/2008/07/23/scruffy/
http://www.prelovac.com/vladimir/wordpress-themes/amazing-grace
http://www.prelovac.com/vladimir/wordpress-themes/amazing-grace
http://www.pagelines.com/demos/stationpro/ (75 bucks but nice)
http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/cordobo-green-park-2 (love this one)
http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/arras-theme ('magazine' layout featuring lots of media)
http://test.nattywp.com/preview.php?theme=business (45 bucks)
http://www.woothemes.com/demo/?t=32 (70 bucks, but you get another free. yay?)
Share and enjoy!
NIH (Not Invented Here syndrome)
In some recent research into forming an Open Source initiative, I came across 'Not Invented Here syndrome' . This was one of those cases where it turns out that there's a widely adopted idea encapsulating a thought process and pit-of-the-stomach feeling that I'd been having for years. It was a nice 'yes! I"m not alone,' moment to be sure.
I do recognize that NIH can be a problem, but incorrect diagnosis can be dangerous as well. If you or someone you love develops a self-conscious problem and needs some reassurance that building in-house is ok, I recommend reading this article by Joel before any further self-scrutiny. (I also recomend regularly reading other stuff from Joel and participating in the business of software discussions that he kindly hosts.)
When engaging a new project, we've almost always brazenly struck forth into the fray crafting and chasing our vision for what the project could be. In the end this has lead to some truly interesting and original sites that have wowed our clients but also a number of projects running over budget (the excess of which we absorbed almost without fail.) There's little doubt that we could have delivered a number of our projects more efficiently if we had relied more heavily on more of the open source (and other) options out there. On not a few occasions, well into extended development cycles, we've realized that we're probably reinventing enough wheels to build a tractor trailer truck. It's hard to objectively quantify at this point how these minuses have balanced out with the benefits of crafting a vision from the ground up, where the only compromise is your own skill and energy. Sometimes I've suffered it. Other times I've benefited from it. I'll abstain from any overarching self-conscious values based reflections that I may or may not have.
Sensational Seo is the way to go
Sensational Seo is the best way to check your site for seo compliance.
+1 to Firefox for opening itself up to the world of addons. +5 to the developers of firebug, the piece of software that has done more to improve both the quality and efficiency of my web work than anything else I've encountered. And now +1 to the folks behind Sensational Seo, who have written one of the first addon addons, bringing the best in seo page analysis into the firebug console. Now you can kick your feet up to the warm hearth of the detachable firebug console as you compulsively scrutinize your site for keywords, best practices and completeness. I also recommend running it on very successful sites like yours to see what they do.
HTML 5 – it’s time
After a long run up, it's finally time to start embracing HTML 5. With support in Chrome, Firefox 3.5, Opera, and Safari it is just around the corner. IE is sulking in the corner as usual, too good to join the party but there are already efforts such a fiks-html5 in public development that will bypass the iempetulence (consider the term coined).
Here are the specs for scanning and/or reference:
and here's some authoritative light reading:
- http://www.alistapart.com/articles/previewofhtml5/
- http://html5doctor.com/
- http://www.alistapart.com/articles/get-ready-for-html-5/
Stay tuned for tales of integrating HTML 5!
Who over what
Ever since I began strapping myself in for the 10-18 hour days in front of the glowing screens I've traveled widely over the internets. What a strange and wonderous place it is indeed. I've found a lot of things that run the gambit from vauable professionally through personally interesting and deep into blissfully escapist. Recently, however, it hasn't been so much the things I've been finding but the people I've been finding that have peaked my interest and inspired me to push through the more difficult professional situations and even provided some uni-directional compatriatism in a very interesting kind of way.*
As with all internet trends, I don't think I'm alone. I'm feeling this shift due to a mass of interview style podcasts and video shorts that are cropping up everywhere. So if you've seen the fringes of the podcasting and video interview segment world out there and like it, pull the thread. All these people are tight with each other; spend any time with one and you'll find connections to a dozen others. Many are extremely talented, honest and open people who genuinely put themselves through these mediums.
Here's a very short list of personality centered pod/video casts that I've been moving through.
- http://www.myextralife.com/appslappy/ - very light and entertaining podcast "for iphone, ipod touch and Apple app store addicts" founded by Scott Johnson who has a built quite a domain of cartoons and nerdy movie/game/culture podcasts at http://www.myextralife.com.
- http://www.havocinspired.co.uk/category/please-start-from-the-beginning/ - a series of interviews in which freelance-ish web/design people are encouraged to start from the beginning and talk about their careers.
- http://twit.tv/ - I don't know where to begin with this one. Leo Laporte has produced a staggering amount of content and built a whole network around himself. I have mixed feelings; while I have enjoyed some of the shows, I find Leo himself to be a little too much of a personality and not enough of a person. This judgment is probably due to some kind of mishandled envy of his success on my part... (EDIT: I have since listened to a few more of his podcasts with and determined that, yes, it is just my own insecurities. Leo Laport is an excellent host, striking the balance of candid and professional). but there is a lot there to explore and subscribe to.
- aaand then there's http://davidpogue.com/. What a screwball. I enjoy catching up with his videos every three months or so.
I'd love to hear who you listen to in the comments.
* - An example of the real engagement: just this last weekend one of the commentators that I listen to was hired by his dream company, a move that will require him to go off the air. This moved me to write a contratulations email that was as heart-felt as any that I've sent to people who I know and, well, know who I am.
Inside look into successful design shop
A List Apart is running a great article by Simon Collision, a driving force behind http://erskinedesign.com/. Simon gives an intimate account of how his shop began with just two people, ran into the traps and pitfalls indemic to such a venture, but then systematically overcame them with clear vision and sound operating priciples to move past the problems and grow to (what seems to be) a very successful six person shop. As half of a small business myself I closely identify with the challanges and am inspired by Erskine's solutions.
Read the full article here: http://www.alistapart.com/authors/c/simoncollison
Here's a video interview with Simon that looks interesting but is too long for me to watch right now because I'm eye-brows deep in one of the pitfalls that stems from setting out on the frontier: avoidance stemming from stress resulting in a dual whammy of lack of setting of clients expectations and allowing projects to run far over schedule due to lack of client engagement: http://www.colly.com/comments/starting_from_the_beginning/
Update: If you like the article on alistapart and are hungering for more check out the 9 part writeup on the Erskine website. Simon has a great passion for what he does and puts it out there with fearless abandon. If I had a hat I would tip it to him.
Resources: CSS for Readability
In design, some things should jump out at you while others should fall to the background. The readability of your site (or any copy) is probably the best example of something that should go unnoticed at the conscious level. Why? Because text is a medium for conveying information. It should get the word across while being invisible itself. Great readable text does this seamlessly, almost pulling the reader through the content. Good content in readable text will cause a reader to sigh and relax, or stand up with a smile and raise their arms in the air or even sometimes pause for a moment as if something has just whispered in their ear to find their life's problems and hardships unraveling toward a wondrous future.
Below are some sources for readable typesetting (fonts, lines spacing, color, etc..), some tutorials on how to design readable text and the occasional neat tool or site that is relavant in some other way.
Here's the best statement of style, including readability standards, I've found on the web. Yes, it's from http://www.alistapart.com. A must read anyone producing content - http://www.alistapart.com/contribute/styleguide/
Here are some other random ones: (I will add to this list as time goes on)
- http://www.legistyles.com/ has three nice styles to choose from.
- If you're just getting into CSS, here is a very clear and straightforward tutorial for CSS readability.
- The folks at http://readable-app.appspot.com/setup.html have a pretty neat idea. They put together a tool that allows you to decide upon a typeset that you like, then make a bookmark in your toolbar that will convert any page to that typeset. I don't forsee myself using the bookmark much but next time I'm trying to figure a font for something clicking through the style element may come in handy.
If you know of any resources, please leave them as comments. Thanks!
Contest anyone?
I have been talking with the creator of http://www.advertology.com about the possibility of starting up a mini web development competition. Here are the rules I've come up with so far. I'd like air out these ideas to let some of the stink out before throwing them down for the massive event. Please let me know if you'd be interested in entering such a competition or if you have any ideas/suggestions about it or if you'd like to play some frisbee anytime in the near future.
Rules
- The competition will run for a set amount of time. I say 4 months, but I may be off.
- Everyone will create a site containing the same subject matter to be decided via committee having:
- a decent amout of popularity (ie is being searched for) and
- some web commercial value (ie is associated with items that are selling on Amazon.)
- A maximum budget will be set, say $50, to be paid out of pocket or hustled from friend or family member
- Each contestant will hook up a google analytics account and share it with a centralized competition account so that everyone can see everyone's traffic, goals, etc...
Judging criteria
- Visitors, uniques, time on site, etc...
- Goal conversions
- Ad Revenue collected
- Commission profits, such as Amazon Affiliates revenue
Prize: deep fulfillment and lifelong well being.
Strategies for creating web traffic and revenue
If you're looking for a practical, down to earth resource for building a niche site and generating web traffic, check out http://www.doshdosh.com/. Rarely does a website do such an exacting job of focusing on a niche and expanding upon the subtitles therein without loosing focus on practicality. It's an inspiring site in both form and content.