Traction

If you are just starting out, are you ready to potentially do this for the next decade? In retrospect, a lot of founders feel they picked their company idea too quickly, and they would have picked something they were more passionate about if they had realized it was such a long haul. A startup can be awesome if you believe in it: if not, it can get old quickly. (Location 345)

Most marketers fail to realize that quality is no substitute for quantity. Both Rick and Sam made it a point to say there’s no shortcut to creating quality content. If what you’re writing isn’t useful, it doesn’t matter how hard you try to spread your content on Twitter. It just won’t spread. (Location 1551)

A key feature of these tools is their ease of use: prospects simply go to the site and enter a domain name or Twitter handle. (Location 1887)

You need to understand why a potential partner should want to work with you. What are their incentives? Just as you evaluate potential partnerships in terms of your core metrics, they will be doing the same. (Location 2022)

Unfortunately, not every partnership will end up working. Thus, it makes sense to build a pipeline of deals. Charlie O’Donnell, partner at VC firm Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, suggests maintaining a large list of potential partners: Create an exhaustive list of all of your possible [partners]. Don’t ever list Condé Nast without listing every single other publisher you can think of. Make a very simple spreadsheet: Company, Partner Type (Publisher, Carrier, Reseller, etc.), Contact Person/Email, Size, Relevance, Ease of Use, and then a subjective priority score. That list should be exhaustive. There’s no reason why any company shouldn’t have fifty potential business development partners in their pipeline, maybe one hundred, and be actively working the phones, inboxes, and pounding the pavement to get the deals you need to get—be it for distribution, revenue, PR, or just to outflank a competitor. The latter is totally underutilized. If you go in and impress the top fifty folks in your space, it makes it that much harder for a competitor to get a deal done—because you’re seen as the category leader. (Location 2025)