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Archive for Christopher Harris

Archived

Growth (6)
January 16, 2008
Recently I was asked to define the one thing that’s most important to a business.  My answer is two words: competitive advantage.Technology, Patents, and SecretsThere are a lot of people who mistakenly believe that proprietary technology, patents, or trade secrets are the hallmark of breakaway businesses.  This is only sometimes true.  Most of the time it’s only true for a little while.  Huge drug companies today are starting to panic because their drug patents are expiring and the competitive f ...view entire post
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December 27, 2007
Recently I wrote a piece about how to get The First Five Customers, which are so critical for a B2B business.  One of the main issues addressed in that piece was the issue of the perceived risk the customer has in choosing you over their alternatives (including doing nothing!).This issue of overcoming a customer’s risk aversion to your product or service is not confined to B2B, B2C companies encounter it all the time.  In fact for new offerings of all shapes and sizes, customers generally resist ...view entire post
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December 12, 2007
Thomas Edison’s famous quote, “Genius is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration” is the embodiment of a startup.  There is often a lot said about the value of overcoming adversity – but I think the context of this advice is often too dramatic.  The real stresses of starting a new business come from the combination of chronic day to day failures and rejection combined with the acute disasters and fire drills.Managing this stress is quite possible – but it’s important to know it’s there and that it ...view entire post
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December 5, 2007
Customers are obviously the only reason your business exists, or will exist, or will continue to exist. I mentioned before in What’s In It for Them to consider things from your customer’s perspective. This is just as critical to consider before starting your business as it is during your business growth.Don’t start without customers In preparation for this article, I’ve been trying to think of a single reason it’s “ok” to start a business without a real-life customer ready in waiting for your p ...view entire post
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November 7, 2007
Business to Business (B2B) startups can have an easier time getting funded than other types of businesses, most notably Business to Consumer (B2C) ones.  This is for the simple reason that B2B sales end up coming down to something easy to put on a PowerPoint – an ROI.  This isn’t always true, because many web based B2C companies can be started with very little capital, but it’s a gross generalization I’m going to run with for now, please just bear with me.Business Models and Business MiragesAny  ...view entire post
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October 24, 2007
We speak to a lot of entrepreneurs like you every day.  One of the questions we like to ask is – “What’s keeping you up at night?”Roughly one in five tell us that their biggest worry is getting their product or service to market before the competition can react.  Another fifteen percent or so of startups say their biggest concern is getting their adoption rates up high enough to break even on their fixed costs.Yet these founders, as well as many others with similar “this needs to get done or we ...view entire post
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