About Social Media Today
Posts by Gust Blog Subscribe 
10 Key Risk Factors to Minimize for Startup Success
Image via TheRiskAlliance.com You have probably heard plenty of times that being an entrepreneur is a risky business, and investors talk all the time about reducing the risk. Yet everyone seems to have their own view of key risk drivers for...
7 Entrepreneur Attributes that Imply Execution Ability
Shark Tank photo by Sarah Hummert for Daymond John After the idea, it’s all about execution. In fact, it’s not clear that even the idea is all that important. Most investors tell me that an A entrepreneur with a B idea is much more fundable...
10 Entrepreneurial Lessons From the 'Gang of Four'
Gang of Four CEOs image via FastCompany.com Every startup, as well as mature business, needs to learn as much as possible from Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google, who have set the standards for fast growth and success in today’s business world....
Big Obvious Failure is Better Than Long Slow Lack of Success
Steve Blank has a good post today called Failure and Redemption, which he introduces with this: "We give abundant advice to founders about how to make startups succeed yet we offer few models about dealing with failure. So here’s mine."...
Don't Let Early Adopters Distract Your Market Focus
Image via Stock.xcng For most new high-tech products, the first customers are always “early adopters.” The conventional wisdom is that early adopters are the ideal target for new products, to get business rolling. I see two pitfalls with...
How to Maximize Results in the Art of Persuasion
Howard Gardner photo via TheDish.org Being a good entrepreneur means being able to effectively convince an investor that you have a great idea, persuade partners that your approach is right, and convince potential customers that the...
Startups Need the Right Team Mindset to Survive
Image via Facebook.com Since the days of Henry Ford, mass production has been the Holy Grail of business, rather than build-to-order. Too many businesses haven’t noticed that we have come full-circle, where mass customization is required now to...
Baby Boomers: Essential to Your Startup?
Richard Branson image via Wikipedia The buzz from startup executives, especially high-tech ones, has long been that startups are no place for Baby-Boomers (1946-1964) – you must have the high energy and crazy determination to work 20-hour...
10 Steps to Raising an Angel Round of Investment
1. Understand your business. It sounds obvious, but the majority of entrepreneurs who pitch me have obviously never thought through many of the major issues surrounding their companies. You should know EVERYTHING about your business, product,...
10 Ways to Keep Angel Investors Hovering
Every new startup I know dreams of being funded early by one of the 318,000 active Angel investors in the USA alone. But many entrepreneurs don’t realize that Angels are also extremely discerning in the projects that they will invest in, rejecting...
Building a Startup is Navigating an Obstacle Course
Image via Facebook It would be no fun if starting a business was simply plotting a straight line between your idea and success, with no challenges along the way. Zigging and zagging amongst the obstacles is the fun part of being an entrepreneur,...
10 Perspective Checks on Your Startup Aspirations
Image via Facebook.com Every entrepreneur needs to be honest about their strengths and weaknesses, and realistic about their reasons for choosing the startup route. For any entrepreneur, even the best business opportunities, if entered for...
