Investor Connect Podcast

On this episode of Investor Connect, Hall welcomes Yao Huang, Managing Partner at Division One Capital. Located in Seattle, Washington, Division One Capital is a fund that provides capital to minority-owned businesses so they can grow and realize their potential. They exist to help minority communities, their people, and businesses prosper. Every business, company, or brand needs capital in order...

Product Development Priorities Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. There are many features to add to a product and never enough resources to do all of them. Consider these points in prioritizing your product development: Look for lost sales to find high-priority features to work on. Focus product development on custom...

MVP Mistakes Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In developing a minimal viable product avoid these mistakes: Trying to create your vision fully in the MVP. The MVP will be a greatly reduced version of the envisioned product. Taking customer feedback literally. Customers will provide feedback and ask for specific feat...

Product Features Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. The features of your product will determine your competitive position in the market. For any market, there is a baseline set of features that customers will expect. To enter the market your product must provide these basic services. To beat the competition your prod...

Product Adoption Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product adoption raises awareness about the product and drives users to sign up for it. A strong product adoption process generates more customers, reduces churn, and increases customer loyalty. Product adoption comes in stages as follows: Awareness -- first make yo...

Product Experience Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product experience is the customer's engagement with the product. Consider these customer touch points in developing the product experience: Sign up -- this is the stage customers commit to the product and join. Make sure you have an easy signup process that state...

Thank you for joining us today for our TEN Capital Fundraise Launch Program. In this program, we help startups prepare for a fundraise. We provide templates, tools, eGuides, and advice to founders who are working towards raising funding. We'll kick off the session with a short overview on a fundraising topic, then we'll answer questions from the founders. I hope you enjoy this episode. ___________...

Product Research Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Before building your minimum viable product, you'll need to research the space. Here are some key points to consider: Know your customer and their problem very well. Many founders start building a solution to a problem that they only know superficially. Talk to at l...

Product Research Best Practices Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In researching your product include these best practices: Always be researching when talking with prospects and customers. Focus on the audience and their needs and not the product and its features. Identify the customer journey and how your product f...

Product Innovation Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Innovation is a part of product research and development. Product innovation provides a competitive advantage, opens new markets, and increases sales to existing customers. Determine how much you will spend on product innovation. Set a budget for people and time t...

Product Development Challenges Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development in a startup brings several challenges. Here's a list of key challenges to overcome: Picking the right problem to solve. There are many problems to solve so it's important to select the right problem up front. You'll need a compelli...

Minimum Viable Product Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development begins with a minimum viable product. In building your MVP, set constraints with respect to development time and selling time. In software development, it takes six months to build the product and six months to sell it. If you can't build i...

On this episode of Investor Connect, Hall welcomes Martin Tobias, Managing Partner at Incisive Ventures. Located in Seattle, Washington, Incisive Ventures is a $10M pre-seed fund currently seeking limited liability partners. They focus on technology companies that reduce friction at scale, targeting high-friction industries like Fintech, supply chain, vertical SaaS, and health and fitness. Martin...

Source of Failures in Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. There are many challenges in product development. Here's a list of failures points to watch out for: Inexperienced developers who mean well and work hard but lack the experience. Hire for the skills you need rather than try and build the ski...

Challenges in Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development brings many challenges to the startup. Here are some key points to watch out for: Funding takes time to raise so focus your product development on MVPs and draw as many lessons to be learned as you can from each one. Building a p...

Outsourcing Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Many startups outsource their product development. Here are some key points to consider before outsourcing: Outsourcing gives you access to additional skills and resources you may not be able to hire yourself. It can also lower your costs as you pay f...

How to Reduce Costs in Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development often runs over budget. Here are some steps to reduce costs: Start with good planning and define the goals clearly. Many projects launch with unreasonable expectations. Track the progress using metrics to know how you ar...

Tips for Success in Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. It takes a plan and persistence to bring a product to market. Here are some tips to make your product development successful. You'll need to bring passion to the project to see it all the way through. Use Minimum Viable Products to test out th...

On this episode of Investor Connect, Hall welcomes Michelle Seiler Tucker, Founder, and CEO of Seiler Tucker, Inc. and EXIT RICH Podcast. Located in New Orleans, Louisiana, Seiler Tucker, Inc buys and sells businesses. They help business owners with the valuations of their businesses so they can sell for the most profit and find the right buyers for their businesses. Michelle holds the M&AMI (Merg...

Product Development Using IDEO Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Startups can use the IDEO method to build out their product development process. Here are the steps: Observation -- observe the user and their pain points. Ideation/brainstorming -- turn the observations into product ideas and use brainstorming to gene...

Product Development Team Dynamics Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development requires a team approach. Here's a list of key points to consider: Assess the skills of each team member to understand the group's capabilities. Set goals for the team before the project sprint begins. Lack of clarity causes conf...

Product Development Best Practices Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Product development is an important function in a startup. Here are some best practices to consider: Maintain focus on the user. Involve other stakeholders in the process such as sales and marketing. Metric your product development process to know...

Lean Startup Approach to Product Development Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. The lean startup approach seeks to discover a product and business model that works. Unlike big companies which have a large staff to maintain an existing product line, the startup has little to no staff and works on finding new business...

Product Development Plan Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Here's a checklist for launching product development for your startup: Research the industry for trends and competitors in the space. Talk with prospective customers about their pain points. Consider not only the product to be built but the revenue to be gen...

On this episode of Investor Connect, Hall welcomes Mike Millard, Operating Partner at Ecliptic Capital. Located in Austin, Texas, Ecliptic Capital is an emergent, early-stage innovation fund focused on pre-seed, seed, and Series A investments. Ecliptic Capital invests in companies that use science and technology as a lever to disrupt lagging industries and cultivate multiple market adjacencies. Th...