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Startup Secrets Sandbox
  • Pages
    • Welcome to YOUR Startup Secrets Sandbox
      • About Startup Secrets
      • About this Sandbox
      • FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions
      • Creative Commons Attribution
    • Customer Value Proposition
      • Synopsis: Customer Value Proposition
      • Frameworks
        • DEFINE the Problem or Opportunity
          • MVS - Minimum Viable Segment
            • Beware: Don't Overlook Your MVS
            • Demandware case study & video
            • MVS compared to a beachhead
          • 4U
          • BLAC and White
            • BLAC and White moves
              • Market timing
            • YouTube: A Case Example of BLAC and White
            • Netflix, Spotify and JioCinemas in India
          • Whole Problem
        • EVALUATE the Solution
          • 3D
          • Gain/Pain
          • DEBT
            • Apple Pay case example from WSJ
          • Whole Product
            • Tesla DEBT
          • Partnerships
            • Strategic partners
        • Assemble Your Value Proposition
        • YOU: Founder-Market Fit
        • Applying Your Value Proposition
      • Customer Value Proposition AI
      • Slides
      • Video Recording
      • Articles
      • Worksheet / Canvases
      • Example Tools
        • Customer Discovery & Interview Script
    • Customer-Centric Business Model
      • Frameworks
        • Business Model as a Disruptor
        • CORE
        • Multipliers and Levers
          • Products that SLIP
          • Package for Pull
            • Bundling
              • 4 Myths of Bundling
              • Bundling Tooklit
              • Podcast
          • Co-Create a Win-Win
            • Acquia's Story
          • 3Up
        • Customer-Centric Models
        • RSVPD
      • Workshop Slide Deck
      • Video Recording
      • Business Model Examples
        • Stories and a Startup Secret from decades of business model innovation
    • Build a Product That Scales Into a Company
      • Perspective: Building Products into Companies
      • Frameworks
        • The Product-Company Gap
        • Design for Product-GTM Fit
          • Value Proposition
          • Minimum Viable Segment
          • Repeatable Products
        • Architect Your Business Model
          • Products that SLIP
            • Simple to Install and Use
            • Low to No Initial Cost
            • Instant and Ongoing Value
            • Play Well in the Ecosystem
          • Package for Pull
          • Whole Product Partnerships
      • Slides
      • Video Recordings
      • SLIPPERY related to PLG
    • Vision, Mission & Values: Create an Authentic Culture
      • Frameworks
        • Founder-Market Fit
          • What are you uniquely qualified for?
        • Elements of Culture
          • Vision
          • Mission
          • Culture
            • Values
        • Operationalize Your Culture
          • Communicate
          • Reinforce
          • Evolve
      • Slides
      • Video - What It Takes: Vision, Mission, Culture
    • Hiring and team building
    • Go to Market
      • Framework - GTM overview
      • Video and Slides - GTM
    • Perfect Your Fundraising Pitch
      • Workbook: Perfect Your Fundraising Pitch
      • Frameworks
        • Business Overview
        • Team
        • Key Problem & Opportunity
        • Solution
        • Vision: Why Now? AND For The Future.
          • Balancing Vision and Execution
        • Traction & Proof Points
        • Business Model
        • Market Size
        • Competitive Landscape
        • Fundraising Needs & Milestones
      • Slides: Getting Behind The Perfect Pitch
      • Video: Getting Behind The Perfect Pitch
      • Article: Elevator question
    • Funding strategies to go the distance
      • Funding Market Fit
      • Questions arising
    • Personal Entrepreneurship
      • Problem solving
        • Elon Musk, Tesla, SpaceX
      • Are you curious what mindset it takes to be a successful founder?
      • Have you got what it takes?
      • Roadmap to success
      • People First
      • Mutual Mentorship
        • Peer Mentoring (Founder-to-Founder)
        • Mutual Mentorship (Mentor–Mentee Relationships)
        • Master Mentorship (Mentoring the Mentors)
        • Mentorship Resources for Startups
      • Founders Can't Scale: Fact or Fiction?
      • 3 Examples of Why You CAN Afford to Fail
    • icon picker
      Glossary for learning
    • How to comment in Coda
      • What is Coda?

Glossary for learning

From time to time I use terms or even invent them to provoke people to learn!
This will be a place that I try to make it easy for readers to look them up, consider why I’ve used or invented them, comment on them, improve them or just reject them for plain old English!

Coopetition

Coopetition is a business strategy that involves collaborating or partnering with competitors in areas where they can potentially benefit from each other, while still maintaining competition in other areas. It's a blend of the words 'cooperation' and 'competition'. This strategy is often used to expand markets, share resources, and increase innovation. In the startup world, coopetition can come into play when looking for partners to provide leverage in your , in for distribution for and even in designing your strategy.

Improvation

Improvation means taking ideas that were not new but deserved refining and reapplication. For example Apple is a great example of an Improvator. Here are just two cases of their improvation.
Xerox’s GUI and Mouse which they brought to the Lisa and then the Mac.
Touch technology, which they refined and introduced as multi touch for the iPhone, making it game changing for smart phones.
Both these and many other examples prove It's not always about inventing something completely new, but can instead be about improving and combining or even just reapplying or repackaging existing ideas in a way that adds enough value to compel customers to buy.

Incrementality (avoid this!)

The mentality of just incrementally improving something versus truly innovating to create a breakthrough. Why fall into incremental thinking when you can innovate and create distinct value with
thinking?

Story-selling

One of the most powerful things you can do is tell stories that connect with your audience, emotionally. Correctly shared, with facts not fiction, these can be the best soft selling means for people to connect with you, and self identify why they want to work with you, invest in you, or do business with you.
Think before you sell, consider finding a way to educate your audience instead.Story tell in a way that enables you to be bought not sold.
If you’re selling a product this may seem counterintuitive, but it’s just complementary with the tradition way of selling FAB, (Features, Advantages, Benefits) because the story provides the proof of their benefit.
Powerful, emotional, factual stories can share your FAB far more effectively and memorably than your fact sheet ever will! That is also why customer references are so important because they are the stories that provide proof of your customer use of your product, validating it works!
This is the essence of story-selling.

Whole Problem

This is an important concept for startups to help map and roadmap solutions, products and business build.
A "Whole Problem" is a comprehensive understanding of all the pain points and issues your target customers face. This includes the root cause, all related challenges and dependencies between the various problems.
Think of this as s systemic review of the problems a person or a customer and their business face. It applies equally to social and mission oriented ventures where there may be complex interplays between parties that can cause intransigent problems.

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