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When people talk about the transformative innovations shaping business in the 21st century, you may hear them talk about the influence of automation or the impact of increasing globalization. But one of the most revolutionary aspects of the digital revolution often goes unmentioned: social media.

Because so many of us tweet and post and share day in and day out on our personal accounts, it’s easy to think that social media is… well… easy.

But social media has completely transformed the way businesses connect with their audiences. And as any Founder who has struggled and failed to drum up an online audience for their brand can tell you, effective social media strategy is deceptively hard to get right. It takes a delicate balance of str...

In January 2016, after 8 years in the British Military, I left to enter our crazy world of startups. Over the past 8 months I have pivoted three times from my original idea.

That’s a lot in a short space of time but it has helped me find product market fit. I can attribute some of this speed to my military background. There is a lot of advice out there from the military to business and vice versa but here are some direct lessons I believe the military can teach the Pre Seed Startup:

The Why

No soldier is going to follow you to into combat unless he/she knows why they are doing it. When I started my first company KitShare (an Air BnB for surfboards, skis, etc) because I had no employees I hadn’t given it much thought until an investor asked ...

When you’re looking at grants for nonprofit startups, you’re looking at an area that’s crowded with a lot of competition. But, if there’s one thing startup entrepreneurs are known for, it’s tenacity.

The reason there’s so much competition is, a) there are a limited number of grants and, b) grants — unlike other forms of funding — don’t have to be paid back. Sounds appealing, doesn’t it?

But if there’s one field that’s very familiar with grants, it’s the nonprofit field. Here’s an overview of how to secure grants to start to nonprofit startup, as well as a few types of grants for starting a nonprofit.

What is a nonprofit?

A nonprofit is an organization that puts their social mission before profit. In contrast, a social enterprise is a for-p...

Here’s the short version:

I created Startups.co as my dream job. There wasn’t any magic to it – but I had to be painfully honest about how I really wanted the rest of my life to play out.

This is how I did it.

Imagine this: as of today, you are now working at your dream job.

What would that look like?

Get really detailed with it: How would every hour of the day go? What would you get to do? What would you never, ever, ever, ever have to do again? Have you written all of this down and made a plan around it?

Yeah, neither did I – for about 18 years in a row.

And then I did, and it was the most profound and relatively simple change I ever made. So much so that I have dedicated the rest of my life to helping my fellow Founders alig...

For a growing product startup, there is no better triumph than seeing your product on the shelves and online store of a billion-dollar retailer. It provides incredible social proof, validates your concept, and shows you’ve got what it takes to scale into a profitable business.

Unfortunately, for many startup founders, there exists a veil of mystery over what it actually takes to stand out to retailers in a crowded sea of established product companies and competing product startups.

Fortunately for you, we have the inside scoop from Rick Rommel, a partner at Sprosty Network and founder of RetailXelerator. Rick is a former Best Buy SVP, and was founder of its Exclusive Brands private-label business. He spent a decade both selecting and develo...

I was fortunate enough to travel to San Francisco for a week in early May and on one of my evenings I attended a pitch night which was moderated and judged by 500 Startups. These tips don’t just apply in the startup-world, but also apply for any type of persuasive presentation environment. Here’s what I learned:

1. Tell a story

I’m sure you’ve heard this a thousand times. However, what does that mean? For starters, when you’re explaining your product, don’t be so transactional — e.g. try not to explain your pitch as follows “if you struggle to track your logistics when you go for traveling, use our app.” It won’t help you to connect with your audience, it won’t help your audience remember your solution, and your audience won’t be able to r...

Truly, it has been a busy and productive year! Here at Startups.co, we will be taking it easy, spending time with our families and drinking way too much ‘nog until the New Year.

While we are on this short hiatus — lets take a stroll down memory lane and review the top 17 articles that we published in 2017.

Read them all at once, or portion them out like a kid trying to make Christmas candy last until Easter. Either way — we won’t judge. Enjoy!

1. How to Write a Business Plan For Investors (That They Will Love)

A good business plan should do more than explain what your company does, how you earn money and what you want to do. It should also tell a persuasive story and illustrate the many ways that your company and product are Grade-A Awesom...

Today isn’t just about our new site launch – it’s about why we launched it. For those of you that have been following our story for the past few years, you know that we’ve grown our startup platform quite a bit, helping over a million startups get from idea to launch.

Most of what you’ve seen has focused on our products, whether it’s Fundable for raising capital, Clarity.fm for finding mentors, or Launchrock for acquiring customers.

But behind the scenes, we’ve been working on something far bigger: our community.

Bringing the startup community together has always been our greatest goal. This site launch has given us the opportunity to make it happen, and offer our vision for a new voice and a fresh narrat...

So, you’re launching a startup. Big goals obviously aren’t an issue. You want 10x customers! You want to 4x your retention rate! You want to be the next Facebook or the Airbnb of X!

The big stuff is what entrepreneurs are good at. But it’s in breaking those big steps down into smaller, actionable ones where we tend to trip up. I’d even go as far as to say that the inability to break big goals down into smaller business goals and then into short-term objectives is one of the main reasons that the majority of startups fail.

Sound familiar?

So, how do you go from big goal to smaller goal to actionable steps you can start taking right now? The process is going to be different for every startup, of course, but here’s how to start.

Name the big g...

I often see entrepreneurs searching for domains that enable them to stuff their URLs with keywords. Thanks to William Shakespeare, most people don’t think a name is worth much as long as their businesses do what they’re supposed to.

But think about it: The titles of books, movies, and bands are all representative of the things attached to them. Names mean something, and they shouldn’t be slapped on as mere afterthoughts.

Tips on Establishing a
brand identity for startups

For a decade, our business was called Domainsatcost.ca. It followed all the “best practices” we commonly see — it was rich in keywords, search-friendly, short, straightforward, descriptive, and geographically situated. Yet it lacked something very important: an identity. R...