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Without a doubt, reading and learning is one of the most essential ingredients to becoming a stronger entrepreneur. As a learning enthusiast who travels everywhere with a paperback, I’ve recently joined the ranks of Blinkist downloaders. Unfamiliar with the name?

Blinkist allows you to quickly digest books by offering condensed versions of hot sellers in the form of voiceover narratives. It’s great for entrepreneurs who can’t seem to keep up with Bill Gates’ penchant for reading 50 books a year. I prefer the feel of a traditional book, but it’s a nice stopgap when I’m short on time.

When I do have a few hours over the weekend, I turn on my meditation app and block out some “chill” time. (Thank you to my loving wife who und...

In a world where business moves at the speed of the IOT, and where data and passwords are more readily available online, entrepreneurs have a new obstacle to address: the protection of their intellectual property.

While corporations have the resources to hire top cyber security teams and implement software solutions that protect their collateral, criminals are increasingly taking an interest in small and medium sized businesses. The new targets have equally marketable data, designs and digital information that have value for criminals, and for foreign governments.

The question to ask: Is your business at risk?

The technology industry and foreign policy

In 1986, China began a program that has been loosely referred to as “shadow innovation”...

Nancy Duarte is a pro when it comes to presentations. Not just giving presentations, but starting them, finishing them, and every step in between. Author and co-founder of Duarte Designs, Nancy Duarte is a seasoned veteran when it comes to incorporating storytelling into speaking and creating connections with an audience.

The below video is the ninth part in a series of 10 in which Nancy shares the key components to making a successful pitch using creativity and critical thinking. Find out what she has to say:

Nancy Duarte’s First 3 Clients

In 1987, after working and saving money for a whole summer, Nancy Duarte”s husband bought a Mac. He had a vision: he was going to get behind the technological movement and use his newly acqu...

Working with virtual assistants has become increasingly popular over the past several years, as small business owners, entrepreneurs, and busy people everywhere have acknowledged the need for additional help but wanted to avoid the cost and hassle of hiring in-house.

In his book The 4-Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss outlines the benefits of passing off the repetitive tasks that you don’t have time for- or simply don’t enjoy to a virtual assistant.

But, there are several factors to consider in order to find the virtual assistant that’s best for you.

1. Define Your Specific Needs

So, you know that you have too much on your plate and you need help. That’s great, but if you had an amazing assistant start today, what exactly would you delegate to th...

The rise of the Growth Hacker
The new job title of “Growth Hacker” is integrating itself into Silicon Valley’s culture, emphasizing that coding and technical chops are now an essential part of being a great marketer. Growth hackers are a hybrid of marketer and coder, one who looks at the traditional question of “How do I get customers for my product?” and answers with A/B tests, landing pages, viral factor, email deliverability, and Open Graph. On top of this, they layer the discipline of direct marketing, with its emphasis on quantitative measurement, scenario modeling via spreadsheets, and a lot of database queries. If a startup is pre-product/market fit, growth hackers can make sure virality is embedded at the core of a product. After pr...

Crowdfunding is an incredible tool for entrepreneurs seeking capital at any stage of their business. Startup businesses can validate their idea through a rewards crowdfund, giving them great traction to share with potential investors through a follow-on equity crowdfund.

A successful rewards crowdfunding raise (typically offering pre-orders of a product), is becoming a common precursor to raising equity investments from prominent angel investors seeking an equity stake in the company.

Angel Investors and Equity Crowdfunding

Before crowdfunding, angel investments were often found within an entrepreneur’s own network. Family, friends, and close business associates were all pivotal in an entrepreneur’s search for capital, due to a ban on the p...

I believe in 5 years most designers won’t approach creating a brand the way they do now, and for good reason…

Creating a logo and all of the associated branding material requires a lot of experimenting.

Experimenting requires repetition and repetition wastes time.

As a brand designer myself, I wanted to quickly preview variations of a logo, typefaces, colors, and patterns all together on a variety of collateral items. I also wanted a way to then easily output these assets in ready-to-use formats that didn’t require hours of production work.

These tasks are tedious and could very easily be driven by software…not endless clicks of my mouse.

This is why we built Emblem.

Emblem was created to not only help non-designer types get started on thei...

Over the past few years, I’ve had the opportunity to have a first-hand look at several marketing plans, budgets and strategies — quite a few, of which, that have been weak and sub-optimal.

I’ve noticed an alarming trend within small businesses and startups across all industries: After experiencing a small degree of success from their current efforts, they get complacent. Teams that were once innovative and curious go on autopilot — pre-allocating funds to the same channels they’ve always used to connect with their audience.

In the beginning many startups experiment with a myriad of marketing channels, ad placements and creative direction to figure out what works for their target market. But, after a few short years, they s...

If you understand how venture capital firms work, it’ll be pretty easy to know what a venture capital group invests in.

Every company starts with an idea, but when it comes to writing checks, venture capital groups tend to look for ideas that have already turned into operating companies.

Venture capital groups are not just broad market investors that put their money wherever there is a potential cash upside. They specifically look for high risk, high growth industries and opportunities where there is a lot of M&A and IPO activity. They need their investments to become liquid in a short period of time, so companies that are just profitable aren’t good enough. They need to be purchased or taken public for them to matter to a v...

Alexander Graham Bell once said, “Before anything else, preparation is the key to success. Since we’ve already entered a new year, I hope that you’ve been making your goals in preparing for 2017. Sure, you may not finish or complete every goal but your goal will put you in a better position to handle any uncertainty that is thrown your way. But, what exactly are the type of goals you should start planning for this year?

HERE ARE 12 SMALL BUSINESS TREND PREDICTIONS THAT DESERVE YOUR UNDIVIDED ATTENTION.

SMALL BUSINESSES WILL GO GLOBAL.

Globalization is a hot topic — especially following Brexit and the election of Donald Trump. While it may do damage to some industries and sectors, there’s no denying that it’s also going to prese...