PR sounds a lot cooler on TV. Who doesn&rsquo;t want to be as badass as Olivia Pope?

In reality, she&rsquo;s more of a crisis manager than a PR agent, but she still orchestrates exactly how her clients should speak, who they should be speaking to, and how they should behave in order to convey a certain message to the world. Essentially, that&rsquo;s what PR does (on a far less dramatic scale). PR, or public relations, is about finding ways to disseminate information about an organization to affect public perception.

With fewer resources and time on their hands, most startups put PR on the back burner. But there are scrappy ways to approach PR to get you the notoriety you are craving. Read on to understand the difference between traditional marketing and PR, why PR is important, and how to form and implement a short and long-term PR strategy.
<h2>What&rsquo;s the difference between PR and marketing?</h2>
On the surface it can seem like marketing and PR are kind of the same thing. They both encourage people to buy products or services, right? While that&rsquo;s true, and <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/simple-guide-pr-startups-john-moorwood/">marketing and PR do have overlap</a>, the main difference is that marketing can involve paying for exposure to an intended audience. This can be in the form of social ads, PPC activity, TV commercials, billboards, or even direct mail. PR, on the other hand, is generally thought of as &ldquo;earned&rdquo; media exposure. Essentially, you&rsquo;re only featured in certain publications or outlets because your product, your people, or your customers are impressive to readers. Reporters need to feel like there&rsquo;s enough to your story that everyone needs to hear about it.&nbsp;
<h2>Why do you need PR?</h2>
The overall consensus is that earned media (PR) lends more credibility than paid media (marketing). If you think about it, who would you rather believe一a company telling you they&rsquo;re a big deal or a publication you trust telling you a startup is a big deal? <a href="https://techcrunch.com/">TechCrunch</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/">Business Insider</a>, or <a href="https://venturebeat.com/">VentureBeat</a> carry significant weight in the minds of consumers and investors. You can say your product is cool until you&rsquo;re blue in the face and still not get very far.

With a pub&rsquo;s seal of approval, people immediately take notice. This can have an enormous ROI&mdash;we&rsquo;ve all heard stories of website traffic or free trial signups 10x-ing in one day. People put stock in certain media outlets and even in individual writers, particularly those that cover niche topics.

It&rsquo;s important to note that the best kind of PR is real news. Publicizing something when it&rsquo;s not up to snuff is a huge mistake. Not only will it tarnish your reputation among customers and prospects, it&rsquo;ll put you straight onto journalists&rsquo; blacklists. Make certain you are comfortable with what&rsquo;s being said and you have the receipts to back it up.&nbsp;
<h2>Building a startup PR engine</h2>
The secret to realizing PR success is about establishing short- and long-term habits that help you nail down an enticing elevator pitch, get your name out there, build relationships with writers, and continue crafting interesting stories as your company scales.&nbsp;
<h3>Before you start</h3>
It&rsquo;s tempting to want to jump right in, but there are few things you need to nail down before you even start developing your PR strategy. This includes your:
 
<ul>
<li aria-level="1">Audience - Who do you want to speak to? It&rsquo;s probably potential customers, but who else? VCs? Partners? Potential employees? Each of these audiences has different preferences and habits, which should influence the types of journalists or content creators you want to get to know.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Key message - There should be a <a href="https://respona.com/blog/startup-pr/">driving force behind your PR</a>. Think of the main message you&rsquo;re trying to get across for each audience you&rsquo;re targeting. Ensure that this key message is at the crux of each article when it gets published.</li>
</ul>
</ul>
<ul>
<li aria-level="1">Founding story - Everyone likes a good backstory. Make sure you&rsquo;re able to eloquently and succinctly describe the founding story in a way that props up your key messages and mission.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Website and landing pages - When people hear about you, guess where they&rsquo;re going first? Your website. It should be in tip-top shape before you reach out to journalists or PR sites. Be sure to have some fact sheets, customer testimonials, and case studies readily available as well.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Professional headshots - This one sounds silly, but every reporter wants images to break up their text. Make it easier on them by having these pictures on hand.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Google alerts - Google alerts are free and are a super useful way to keep track of your competition, find new media outlets, and connect your company to emerging issues or stories. Set up keywords related to your company and industry, as well as ones that your audience might be searching for.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Short-Term</h3>
Let&rsquo;s say there&rsquo;s a game-changing product launch or fundraise quickly approaching. You don&rsquo;t have time to build rapport with writers and cold outreach is rarely fruitful. What do you do?

First, lean on your network. Do your investors or fellow founders have any writer contacts? What about your friends and family? Do any of them freelance for relevant publications? You never know, if you have a compelling enough story, there might be someone who is willing to give you and your company a shot.

Next, submit ideas to free sites. There are <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateharrison/2014/01/15/3-simple-ways-to-get-free-pr-for-your-startup/?sh=504f19802e34">tons of PR sites out there these days</a>. Here are some that are accustomed to more last-minute pitches:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1"><a href="https://www.helpareporter.com/">HARO</a> - Help A Reporter Out (HARO for short) is a platform that allows you to pitch your story to over 75,000 journalists and bloggers at once by <a href="https://app.helpareporter.com/reporters/queries">submitting a short form</a>. HARO also enables you to list yourself as an expert source, meaning your quote could end up in a really popular piece. HARO is free, but you can pay $19/month for a premium plan which gives you first access to journalists&rsquo; requests and premium support.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1"><a href="https://muckrack.com/">MuckRack</a> - MuckRack is a Public Relations Management (PRM) platform that connects you with bloggers and journalists and measures the success of your PR efforts. For the full platform experience, it costs $200/month, but MuckRack has other options like submitting one-line, tweetable press releases for $1 per character. Pro-tip: use tinyurl to reduce characters.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1"><a href="https://www.newswire.com/">Newswire</a> - If you already have a press release typed up and ready to roll, consider using Newswire. It costs $199 for a one-time distribution to Google News, targeted trade publications, and a <a href="https://cdn.newswire.com/assets/other/distribution-pdfs/Newswire_Distribution_Network.pdf?_ga=2.128835980.1042634315.1626819341-1324909307.1626819341">whole host of other news sites</a>. After the release goes live, you&rsquo;ll also get a detailed analytics report of the results.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Long-Term</h3>
The key to a sustainable PR engine is forming an outstanding journalist network. Whenever you need an extra PR boost, you simply dip into your Rolodex and pick the best person to tell your story. Of course, building up this pool of contacts isn&rsquo;t an overnight thing. Dedicate time to:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Creating a Contact List - You don&rsquo;t want to talk to just any journalist. You want <a href="https://www.criminallyprolific.com/pr-for-startups/">a list of contacts who can cater to the audience</a> you came up with in the &ldquo;Before&rdquo; section. Figure out where your audience hangs out online. What are they reading first thing in the morning? What types of articles do they forward to their colleagues? Once you determine what those publications are, you need to find the email addresses of journalists that cover your beat. Try <a href="https://awario.com/blog/best-free-or-cheap-pr-tools-for-startups/">using Hunter</a> or LinkedIn Sales Navigator.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Making connections - After you have a healthy list, it&rsquo;s time to make connections. Start small by retweeting their Tweets or leaving insightful comments on their articles. If you want to do a warm intro email, make it quick. Explain who you are, why your company is important, and how you can help them source intriguing story material. Whatever you do, don&rsquo;t be obnoxious. As Neil Patel says, <a href="https://neilpatel.com/blog/guide-to-public-relations/">make friends, not contacts</a>.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Writing killer pitches - Journalists are seasoned veterans, especially in the tech industry, and nothing turns them off faster than a cookie-cutter email. Just imagine how many of those they get per day! Your pitches need to be concise, yet spark their curiosity. Go back to your key messages, value prop, and founding story. What is truly unique about what you&rsquo;re doing, who you&rsquo;re serving, or how your product was built? Is there some way to tie your company to a burgeoning trend that&rsquo;s of particular interest to this specific journalist? Explain what&rsquo;s in it for them, and tailor your story around that. Help them first so they can help you.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Putting it on the calendar - Again, sounds like a no-brainer, but <a href="https://www.growthmarketingpro.com/important-pr-tips-startup/">schedule set times</a> for following up. Reporters are busy, just like you. They may not see your initial emails or submissions, so feel free to follow up in a few weeks. At the same time, continue to take small actions to let them know you&rsquo;re impressed by their work. Building trust takes time, so fit it into your routine.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Tracking your success - Not every pitch will work out, even with the reporters you know the best. Keep track of which pitches work and which don&rsquo;t. Try to find patterns among the ones that didn&rsquo;t work well, and improve upon those in your next batch of reach-outs. As an aside, if a writer declines, do not pressure them. Respect their time, requirements, and interests. Being deferential now can pay off in the future, since they may think of you the next time they hear about a similar topic. Plus, writers talk, so don&rsquo;t be the annoying person they gossip about.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>

The hardest part of PR for startups is figuring out how to express what your company does and what makes it unique in a way that grabs journalists&rsquo; attention. What makes this even more competitive is that many companies hire outside firms to do this work for them. But remember, you&rsquo;re in it for the long haul. By getting the wheels turning on your PR strategy early, you can win over journalists, customers, and investors with little monetary investment.

With fewer resources and time on their hands, most startups put PR on the back burner. But there are scrappy ways to approach PR to get you the notoriety you are craving.

Public Relations for Startups

This past March, Indeed.com released survey results indicating that more than half of current employees are feeling burnt out, with <a href="https://www.indeed.com/lead/preventing-employee-burnout-report">over two-thirds attributing the burnout to the ongoing pandemic</a>.&nbsp;

Prolonged burnout can have serious consequences&mdash;both for individuals and their teams. <a href="https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health/in-depth/burnout/art-20046642">Symptoms of employee burnout</a> include increased cynicism and difficulty engaging at work. Oftentimes, this leads to decreased productivity and a lack of job satisfaction.&nbsp;

Burnout and mental well-being in startups are even more precarious than in traditional work settings. Tight deadlines combined with fewer resources, a lot of ambiguity, and a high likelihood of failure place substantially more stress on startup teams and founders. With all this in mind, it is important to set up guardrails early on to ensure you and your team are paying attention to mental health. Here are a few of our recommendations to alleviate burnout and reduce mental stress across your organization:

<h2>Require paid time off every quarter&nbsp;</h2>
Startups are known to provide unlimited PTO policies, but few people take advantage of the benefit. Managers and founders need to enforce PTO. Require a minimum number of days off per quarter, and set up quarterly reminders to check in on people who have not taken any time off. Lastly, make sure people truly disconnect from work when on PTO - this means setting up out-of-office messages and muting Slack. When you&rsquo;re taking time off, don&rsquo;t apologize for it.

<h2>Knock it off with the Zoom happy hours</h2>
Along with the pandemic, zoom happy hours need to end. While fun the first one or two times, post-work team events over video conferencing tools have gotten out of hand, and are doing more damage than good. Most people already spend hours per day sitting in front of their webcam; the last thing they want to do is spend another hour listening to one or two people run a conversation. As a better solution, give people time to unwind and give everyone credits for Drizly or Grubhub to grab drinks or dinner on their own terms.&nbsp;
<h2>Get everyone together &ndash; safely</h2>
Get your team together for something as simple as lunch or in-person meetings. Facetime is still extremely valuable in this remote-first world. At the end of the day, people stay at a company because of their co-workers and managers. If your team has gone fully remote, do this at least once per quarter. Of course, this recommendation comes with the major caveat of having appropriate safety measures.&nbsp;
<h2>Compensation isn&rsquo;t just about money&nbsp;</h2>
Salary and equity are still the core form of compensation for most companies. But a quick way to stand out is to offer expanded ancillary benefits. Some of the largest stressors today involve healthcare and childcare. Consider no-premium health insurance coverage and expanded child care offerings through things like a <a href="https://www.fsafeds.com/explore/dcfsa">DCFSA</a>. Top firms are even offering subsidized daycare and after-school programs. This is not viable for every firm, but there are other creative options like giving new parents a years-worth of diapers. And for those without children, doing things like sending your employees <a href="https://www.livelyroot.com/collections/plants-as-gifts">a new desk plant</a> or paying for subscriptions to meditation apps and at-home exercise programs can be game-changers.
<h2>Limit communication outside of work hours to emergencies only</h2>
This is a tough one for startup founders and operators. While speed is the name of the game in the startup world, you need to keep things in perspective. Constantly pinging team members on weekends and in the evenings may move the needle in the very short term, but it will erode team morale over time.
Mental health is important for the entire company, but for founders especially. Carrying the weight of people&rsquo;s livelihood on your shoulders takes its toll. If you are a founder, you should work with an executive coach to help you through the tough times of the business. What&rsquo;s even better is working with a professional therapist to discuss personal challenges that evolve from your startup stress. Don&rsquo;t be shy about opening up and finding help when you are struggling.

Tight deadlines, limited resources, a lot of ambiguity, and a high likelihood of failure place substantial stress on startup teams.

Improving Mental Health at Your Startup

Burnout and mental well-being in startups are even more precarious than in traditional work settings. Tight deadlines combined with fewer resources, a lot of ambiguity, and a high likelihood of failure place substantially more stress on startup teams and founders.

Interviews are a time for candidates to talk about themselves, their achievements, and their hopes for the role that they are interviewing for. However, interviews shouldn&rsquo;t be one-sided. They can serve as a tool for figuring out if the job and the people at the company are the right fit for you.

There are questions that you need to ask before joining a startup that provide more insight beyond the job description. At a startup, you have to consider other factors like risk, company culture, and the future trajectory of the business.&nbsp;&nbsp;

Here are some questions we like to ask before joining a startup:
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">
<h2>Where is the company now, and what direction do you see the company going in the long term?</h2>
</li>
</ol>

Startups operate in a very dynamic space. The team, as well as the product, can go down completely different and unexpected paths within a short period of time. It is important to establish a clear sense of where the company is today (in terms of funding, growth, product roadmap, team, leadership, etc.) and where it&nbsp; plans to be in the future. While all plans are subject to change, this question allows you to understand what you might be getting yourself into and how this plays into your future career trajectory.

<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">
<h2>What motivates your team?</h2>
</li>
</ol>

People&rsquo;s belief in their own product is crucial to gauge before joining a startup.&nbsp; It is essential to be around people who are forward-thinking and self-motivated against all odds. This question can provide insight into the culture of the company and what types of people are running and supporting the work being done. Are people motivated by the same ideas, or are they driven by personal motives that just happen to move the needle on the same end goal?

<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">
<h2>What are the current challenges the company faces? And how will this new role address those challenges?</h2>
</li>
</ol>

It is important to know about the positive growth companies are experiencing, but it is also essential to understand the shortfalls and struggles of the company.. You cannot understand a company&rsquo;s challenges simply by looking at their website, so this question explicitly brings to light what still needs to be worked on. Plus, people who work at startups wear a lot of different hats, so this question forces the interviewer to provide a specific perspective on their expectations for someone in your potential position.&nbsp;

<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">
<h2>What are the biggest risks involved in this company and how do current employees reduce those risks?</h2>
</li>
</ol>

Working at a startup is risky. Transparency about&nbsp; potential risks (financial, career etc.) are all the more necessary when joining a startup. Risks take on different forms and some might not be as observable to employees as others. Spelling out what risks you should expect can help you prepare for uncertainties that lie ahead. Additionally, learning about how current employees interpret those risks provides an idea of the type of environment you will operate in. Are people constantly working to make sure everything is in line? Are people always ready to pick up extra work when things take a turn for the worse?

<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">
<h2>Where do you guys typically hang out for lunch?</h2>
</li>
</ol>

Despite the risks, challenges, and structure of the company you are interviewing for, you are ultimately going to be working and extensively interacting with the set of people who are currently there. Learning about small, but fundamental interactions such as lunch breaks can allow you to understand more of the culture that the firm operates on and the types of people you will be spending at least eight hours of your day with. Do people generally bring their own food to eat on their own time? Or is there more of a collaborative community where people go out and find places to eat together?
 
Once you reach the &ldquo;do you have any questions to ask me?&rdquo; stage of the interview, it is important to ask unique, hard-hitting interview questions to your prospective employer. Not only can tough questions provide you the answers you need to make a decision about the role, they also set you apart from other candidates.

Interviews shouldn’t be one-sided; they should serve as a tool for figuring out if the job is the right fit for you.

Questions to Ask in an Interview That Don't Suck

Once you reach the “do you have any questions to ask me?” stage of the interview, it is important to ask unique, hard-hitting interview questions to your prospective employer. Not only can tough questions provide you the answers you need to make a decision about the role, they also set you apart from other candidates.

LTV, or lifetime value, is a benchmark for the health of a business, no matter the industry or model. A high LTV can indicate <a href="https://www.bigcommerce.com/ecommerce-answers/what-is-customer-lifetime-value-and-why-is-it-very-important/">brand loyalty, good product-market fit, and viable unit economics</a>. In contrast, a low LTV could suggest issues with customer retention, product selection, or even marketing. Steadily improving lifetime value will grow your bottom line.

According to HBR, a 5% increase in customer retention can <a href="https://hbr.org/2014/10/the-value-of-keeping-the-right-customers">increase a company&rsquo;s profitability by 25% to 95%</a>. To achieve those kinds of results, it&rsquo;s crucial to understand LTV and start incorporating it into your startup metrics as soon as you start collecting customer data. In this piece, we&rsquo;ll define lifetime value, explain why a healthy LTV is essential to your business, and offer a few tips for calculating LTV and fitting it into your reporting cadence.

<h2>What is lifetime value?</h2>
Think of lifetime value as the sum of money a customer will bring your company for the duration of your relationship. Take a second to pause and think about your personal LTV for your favorite coffee shop, clothing store, or gas station. Yikes for you, good for them!

Of course, there are other places that you&rsquo;ve only patronized once in your whole life, right? So LTV varies from customer to customer. As a business, you want to reduce the number of customers who are &ldquo;one-and-dones&rdquo; and draw in prospects who will stick around and bring you the most value over their lifetimes.&nbsp;

Several things influence LTV (customer satisfaction, product-market fit, etc.), so many companies use LTV as a point of reference and start digging in when the number goes up or down. While calculating the total number of orders for each customer seems simple, it gets more complex as you start to consider the unique ways your business operates and how it might grow and change in the future.
<h2>How do you calculate LTV?</h2>
Depending on who you ask, you might get a different answer for how to calculate LTV. That&rsquo;s because how much data you have and how you structure your business have a lot to do with it. However, as a baseline, <a href="https://useinsider.com/what-is-customer-lifetime-value-clv-and-why-does-it-matter/">the simplest way to measure LTV</a> is:

<blockquote>
Average Order Total ($) x Average Number of Purchases (per year or month) x Average Retention Time (years or months)
</blockquote>

The formula represents the lifetime value of your average customer in dollars. The more orders you have to go off of, the more accurate this number will become. This is where eCommerce companies have the edge over SaaS companies with much longer sales cycles (at least at first). It&rsquo;s also important to note that this basic LTV formula <a href="https://www.forentrepreneurs.com/saas-metrics-2-definitions-2/">does not consider profit margins or the costs associated with acquiring each customer</a>.

LTV can drastically differ from customer to customer, so companies <a href="https://www.profitwell.com/recur/all/calculate-customer-ltv">segment their customers into targetable personas</a> (age, gender, product purchased) and see how the average LTV changes. Groups with low LTV are prime candidates for customer research. For example, you might find that one of your products works particularly poorly for a certain segment of your customer population because of its specific characteristics.&nbsp;

You might&rsquo;ve also heard the term <a href="https://mailchimp.com/clv/">&ldquo;CLV&rdquo; or customer lifetime value</a>. CLV is essentially LTV, just at the individual customer level. Sometimes, companies will include acquisition cost and profit margin to make the number more precise:

<blockquote>
(Lifetime Value (Order Total x Number of Purchases x Retention Time) &times; Profit Margin) &ndash; Acquisition Cost
</blockquote>

Regardless of what method you choose, LTV can help you brainstorm better promotion, retention, and acquisition strategies.&nbsp;
<h2>Why are LTV and CLV important?</h2>
Once you&rsquo;ve nailed down your <a href="https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/valuation/cac-ltv-ratio/">method of calculating LTV and CLV</a>, you&rsquo;ll be ready to delve deeper into how each lever (order value, purchase frequency, and customer lifespan) affects your business outcomes. To pull out more details from your LTV calculation, here are some questions you can start to ask:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Why are order values high/low? Is there some kind of messaging that&rsquo;s convincing people to buy more expensive products?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Are we making or losing money in the long-term by offering free samples or discounts?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Are we spending an awful lot on customer acquisition on Facebook and Google but only getting low LTV customers to convert?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Should we implement a loyalty program to keep our high LTV customers around and bump low LTV customers up a level?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Who is our most valuable segment, and how can we acquire more of those customers?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">What do our customers think of our product quality? Are they running out of our product and buying more or simply not coming back?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Should we consider a subscription program to hit our retention goals?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Are there signs that we might need to expand our ideal customer profile to include other types of prospective customers?</li>
</ul>

If you want to get really fancy, you can start to forecast LTV. Keep in mind that you need several years&rsquo; worth of data for <a href="https://medium.com/bcg-digital-ventures/grow-margin-based-marketing-2-0-bd5de5ce30f3">sophisticated modeling and LTV prediction</a>. But if you can manage to do it, it will help your finance team with <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/dec-29th-2020-become-a-financial-quarterback">FP&amp;A</a>, your product team with new launches, and your marketing team with enhanced segmentation.
<h2>How does lifetime value fit into other company metrics?</h2>
LTV is informative, but it becomes even more powerful in the context of other metrics your startup will be tracking. Here are just a few:
 
<ul>
<li aria-level="1">Customer acquisition cost - Otherwise known as CAC, refers to the cost of gaining a new paying customer. Typically companies compare LTV to CAC as a way of determining whether their marketing spend is reasonable. If a company&rsquo;s LTV:CAC ratio is less than 1, they&rsquo;re not doing so hot. There could be issues with the customers they&rsquo;re bringing in, or they are spending too much money on acquisition, or both. If the LTV:CAC ratio is greater than 1, the company is generating value, but more could be done. An <a href="https://firstmark.medium.com/a-crash-course-on-the-subscription-metrics-that-matter-with-freshlys-cpo-3ccd7b0add67">LTV:CAC ratio greater than 3 is often considered healthy</a>.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li aria-level="1">Revenue retention - Your net revenue retention (NRR) is the percent of recurring revenue from existing customers during a set period. LTV comes into play because it encapsulates the purchase frequency (more applicable to consumer goods) and the average order value (more applicable to SaaS and subscription businesses with consistent purchase timing but flexible order value). Breaking out NRR from LTV can help you figure out whether to focus your efforts on more conversions, upsells, and cross-sells.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li aria-level="1">Churn rate - If you recall, customer retention is a major part of the LTV equation. So if your churn rates start to skyrocket, you&rsquo;ll feel it in your LTV. A quick way to think about this is to measure your customer lifetime as 1/churn rate. Let&rsquo;s say you&rsquo;re looking at a monthly churn rate of 4%. In this case, the customer lifetime will be 1/.04, or 25 months. If you can get that down by one percent, your customer lifetime will extend by 8 months (33 months - 25 months). If your average order value, purchase frequency, profit margins, and CAC stay the same, that means you&rsquo;ve gotten a massive boost in LTV.</li>
</ul>
<h2>LTV in the early days of your startup</h2>
Frankly, it&rsquo;s hard for early-stage startups to pay close attention to LTV. With things constantly changing, it&rsquo;s hard to tell what might be moving LTV up or down. And to do even the most basic calculation, you need customer data. That said, LTV will matter in the future, particularly in relation to CAC, if you&rsquo;re <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/product-led-growth-what-is-it-and-how-do-you-do-it">going the product-led growth route</a>. So now that you know what subcomponents you need to calculate LTV and CLV, make sure you have a plan to capture the proper customer data points over time. Not only will LTV help you identify ways to strengthen your business model, it will also help you attract the highest value customers and develop the best products in the market.

LTV is a benchmark for the health of a business, indicating brand loyalty, product-market fit, and viable unit economics.

What is LTV, and why does it matter?

LTV, or lifetime value, is a benchmark for the health of a business, no matter the industry or model. A high LTV can indicate brand loyalty, good product-market fit, and viable unit economics. In contrast, a low LTV could suggest issues with customer retention, product selection, or even marketing. Steadily improving lifetime value will grow your bottom line.

You&rsquo;ve got a golden idea, a solid product, and maybe even a few customers. You think this thing has legs, and you are ready to go after it. Suddenly you realize that running a startup isn&rsquo;t just about building products late into the night. How will you pay people? How are you going to manage the company finances? How do you keep track of your cap table?&nbsp;
Searching for the right tools today can feel like sifting through a landfill. Most google searches provide four or five advertisements before returning what you want, and every other website discussing startup financial stacks is getting kickbacks for writing a 1500-word piece on the latest hot finance tool.&nbsp;
To help you hit the ground running, we have done some legwork for you. Here is our unsponsored, opinionated, self-tested startup financial stack.

<h2>For Managing Your Cap Table: <a href="https://carta.com/">Carta</a></h2>
Carta is hands down the best cap table management tool out there. Incumbent software platforms like Capshare are sloppy and challenging to use. The best part is that Carta is absolutely free to start. Just upload your documents, issue certificates, and boom, you have a cap table!
Cost: Free until you need a <a href="https://a16z.com/2020/02/13/16-things-about-the-409a-valuation/">409a</a>

<h2>For Managing Your Accounting: <a href="https://quickbooks.intuit.com/">Quickbooks</a>&nbsp;</h2>
Quickbooks is the industry standard for accountants. Full stop. If you haven&rsquo;t run your own books before, we strongly recommend sticking with the industry leader. Not only is Quickbooks online great to work with, it offers deep integrations with every other tool you could imagine.&nbsp;
Cost: $25 a month

<h2>For Running Payroll and Benefits: <a href="https://justworks.com/">Justworks</a></h2>
Many PEOs require at least 5 employees to be eligible for insurance. If you need insurance day one, there is no better option than Justworks.&nbsp;
Cost: $49 a month per employee
<h2>For Handling Bookkeeping: <a href="https://pilot.com/">Pilot</a></h2>
Pilot offers a handful of fractional CFO services. The first thing you will need is help with bookkeeping. At $599, Pilots bookkeeping service is a steal and gives you peace of mind. Our favorite part about Pilot is its direct integration with Quickbooks, giving you the ability to scale up to more sophisticated financial needs when you are ready.
Cost: $599 for bookkeeping a month
<h2>For Keeping a Checking Account: <a href="https://mercury.com/">Mercury</a></h2>
SVB gets a lot of airtime and does a good job marketing to the startup industry. But honestly, Mercury wins out. Easy virtual card issuing, simple account setup, no wire fees, and no monthly fees make Mercury a no-brainer.
Cost: Free!
<h2>For Managing Team Expenses: <a href="https://getdivvy.com/">Divvy</a></h2>
Divvy sits at this weird crossroads of accounting, expense management, and corporate credit. Luckily, with easy integrations to Quickbooks, Divvy offers its core feature set for free. Expense management is incredibly simple to setup, and, when you are ready, Divvy offers credit lines and other premium features.
Cost: Free!&nbsp;
<h2>For Modeling Runway and Burn: <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/business/compare-all-microsoft-365-business-products">Microsoft Excel</a></h2>
Your finance stack would be incomplete without the beloved Excel. While we strongly recommend using Google Workspaces as your email and cloud directory provider, you still should get your team access to Microsoft Excel.&nbsp;
Cost: $12.50 a month per employee&nbsp;


With this stack, you will be spending around $1,200 per month for a 10-person startup. Of course, this will scale as you grow. You should anticipate spending several thousand dollars on CFO services from Pilot and your 409a valuations by Carta.&nbsp;

Finding the best accounting and finance software for a startup can be a challenge. Here is our finance tech stack for your startup.

The First Time Founders Finance Stack

First Time Founder Finance Stack

For consumers, picking out a new beauty product, wrench, or mouse is relatively easy. For eCommerce marketers, getting consumers to pick their product is very hard. And for startups, influencing customer decisions matters. Without an adequate marketing strategy, eCommerce startups won&rsquo;t get the traction they need to sustain their business. Fortunately, there are some tried and true ways to market an eCommerce startup that you can build on iteratively over time. Below, we define eCommerce marketing and outline 6 strategies to get started.
&nbsp;
When you boil it all down, eCommerce marketing is about making consumers aware of your online store, convincing them to convert, and reminding them to purchase again. While simple in theory, eCommerce marketing is tricky in practice. There are so many eCommerce stores now, making price and value comparison easy and competition stiff. To stand out from the crowd, <a href="https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/ecommerce-marketing">you need a comprehensive strategy</a> involving social media, original content, and paid campaigns. And all this must be tailored specifically to your target audience. However, when done well and early, eCommerce marketing can change the trajectory of your startup.
<h2>6 ways to get started with eCommerce marketing</h2>
Starting your eCommerce marketing journey can be overwhelming. Luckily, there are some dependable methods of boosting your online presence and <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/unconventional-customer-acquisition">driving customer acquisition</a>. Let&rsquo;s dive in.
&nbsp;
<h3>1. Sell great products</h3>
No matter how hard you try, it&rsquo;s difficult to kill the marketing game without great products or services. Even the most compelling copy, best paid ad strategy, and coolest influencers can&rsquo;t make up for a dud of a product. If customers fall for that trap once, they won&rsquo;t be fooled twice. So to attract and retain customers, you need an excellent product(s).
&nbsp;
But let&rsquo;s say you have that. Shouldn&rsquo;t <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/product-led-growth-what-is-it-and-how-do-you-do-it">product-led growth</a> start to work its magic? If only it were that simple! The way to double or triple your growth is to focus your marketing efforts on the products that are in the most demand. After all, if customers aren&rsquo;t even searching for your product, how will you ever capitalize on them?
&nbsp;
eCommerce merchants are experts at figuring out which of their products are&mdash;or, more importantly, could be&mdash;in most demand. Experts look at similar <a href="https://www.business2community.com/ecommerce/10-first-steps-take-marketing-ecommerce-startup-01853924">Amazon bestsellers, join communities on Reddit, watch trending items on Etsy</a>, browse Pinterest, and monitor certain hashtags on Instagram. Consumer research helps you identify what&rsquo;s popular, what the white space is, and shows you how marketers and consumers talk about each product. This can give them <a href="https://www.ecommerceceo.com/ecommerce-marketing/">ideas for new content, SEO keywords</a>, and more.

Lastly, make sure you have a sound pricing strategy. If your target audience doesn&rsquo;t feel your pricing reflects your product&rsquo;s actual value, they won&rsquo;t return. Research your competitors and <a href="https://www.bigcommerce.com/blog/ecommerce-marketing/#executing-an-ecommerce-marketing-plan">test out different options</a> to find your sweet spot.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
<h3>2. Nail down your persona(s)</h3>
Once you&rsquo;ve determined which products to focus on, it&rsquo;s time to figure out who you want to buy them. Identifying who your customer is and what they care about will serve as a foundation for the rest of your strategy. A good way to start developing a profile is by asking the following questions about your ideal customer or set of customers:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">How old are they?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">What&rsquo;s their gender?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">What is their purchasing power?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Where do they hang out online? (Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Reddit, Pinterest)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Where do they live in the world?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">What else do they buy that&rsquo;s in a tangential market?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Why would they buy your product?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">What problems do they have with similar products (and why would yours be a better fit)?</li>
</ul>

Home in on the problem you&rsquo;re solving for each persona. Fixing the customers&rsquo; issues should be the central theme for any content, ads, and social media posts. Understanding what makes your customers tick prepares you to appeal to their pathos, logos, and ethos. The rest of the information you collect about your customers can personalize your copy, highlight your product on the right platforms, and <a href="https://welpmagazine.com/a-complete-guide-to-marketing-strategy-for-ecommerce-startup/">form partnerships with other complementary brands</a>.
&nbsp;
<h3>3. Create a sound content strategy</h3>
According to Google, <a href="https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/consumer-insights/consumer-trends/shopping-research-before-purchase-statistics/">53% of shoppers say they always research</a> before they buy something. Guess what they are reading? Content. Educating consumers on your product, the space you play in, and other related products only help people better understand what you offer. Another advantage to content is that it can establish your company as a thought leader. If your content is good enough, people will reshare articles on other platforms, generating even more site traffic. In addition, content can open the door for future upsells and cross-sells. Once people convert, they&rsquo;ll probably be interested in and read about your other product offerings, so make sure your site is a valuable resource.

Plus, content is a great way to <a href="https://www.coverwallet.com/business-tips/digital-marketing-for-ecommerce-startup">amp up your search engine results page rankings</a>. By inserting pertinent keywords and presenting relevant information, you can get users what they are searching for, fast. This isn&rsquo;t just about blog posts, either. Think about how you can guest post on other blogs to gain backlinks, beef up your product descriptions and landing pages, and create free content that people can download in exchange for their email address. With the right SEO strategy, you can move up the results page, leading to more clicks. The best part is, those clicks are free. Yes, you have to pay someone to write for you, but you&rsquo;re not wasting money on paid campaigns that may or may not work. Having said that, SEO is a long game. To get those top spots, you need to be publishing excellent content often.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
<h3>4. Use social media to your advantage</h3>
Social media is a fantastic way to <a href="https://justcreative.com/best-ecommerce-growth-strategies/">get brand recognition quickly</a>. If you can build up a large following, more and more people will reshare your posts, bringing you more and more attention. For eCommerce marketing, Instagram, Youtube, and now TikTok are the social media platforms of choice. All three are very visual, giving you the chance to show off your products&rsquo; look and feel. Instagram is a particularly solid choice because you can create shoppable content that enables visitors to add products to their cart and buy instantly. And once they make a purchase, many consumers decide to tag your company on their social media accounts, further advocating for and legitimizing your business.&nbsp;

Some eCommerce marketers also dip their toes into influencer and affiliate marketing. With influencer marketing, you get &ldquo;famous&rdquo; people or brands to promote your product on social media and pay them an upfront fee. We&rsquo;ve seen this in traditional marketing before (remember <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jJun_1dII0">Icy Hot with Shaq</a>?), but this method is even more specific because you target celebrities or communities that your ideal customer follows. Affiliate marketing is similar, but instead of paying at the beginning of the campaign, you pay them a commission based on the number of new customers you get. This can be a more affordable and cost-efficient way to extend your social media reach.
&nbsp;
<h3>5. Email isn&rsquo;t dead</h3>
While you might think that email isn&rsquo;t a worthwhile marketing tool anymore, think again. McKinsey found that email marketing is up to <a href="https://digitalagencynetwork.com/email-marketing-still-effective-strategy/">40 times more effective than social media</a> and makes the buying process three times faster. Email marketing is a time-tested strategy for reaching, nurturing, and retaining very specific audiences. With an email list of highly interested prospects and current customers, you can showcase:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Product photos</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Witty or fun brand language</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">New blog posts</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Newsletters</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Free informational content</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Social proof (customer reviews or posts on social media)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">New product releases</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Product bundling packages</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Personalized product recommendations</li>
</ul>

What is more, email is a great place to experiment. Try out different ways of communicating with your audience. Add in gifs or emojis to spice it up. Use new taglines and captivating photos. Host a giveaway or <a href="https://bettermarketing.pub/low-cost-e-commerce-marketing-strategies-for-startups-ef957e423d6d">ask directly for audience input on a new product line</a>. With the right mix of fun, exciting content, and strong calls to action, you can get prospects and customers excited to receive your emails and, ultimately, get them to convert.
&nbsp;
<h3>6. Paid campaigns</h3>
We saved paid campaigns for last since startups are always strapped for cash. That said, growing your social media presence, building up your search engine rankings, and getting email campaigns to work can take a while to get going. So if you do have some money to spare, pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns can be fruitful. Their sole purpose is to drive traffic to your site in short bursts of time. Since PPC campaigns can get pricey fast, work them into other elements of your strategy. For example, you could promote a landing page that asks customers to sign up for an email list, download free content, or follow you on social media. From the Facebook or Instagram ad, you&rsquo;ll get more site traffic, email addresses, and followers. In the end, all three can fuel the sales flywheel.

<h2>Don&rsquo;t forget analytics</h2>
The 6 steps summarized above are important, but analytics is your eCommerce marketing superpower. Gathering the outputs from all of your campaigns and combining that data with sales data (who buys what, when, and for how much) and customer behavior data (email open rates, social media engagement) can help you sharpen your strategies and lead to greater personalization. And personalization is your silver bullet.

BCG finds that companies that use personalization are seeing <a href="https://www.bcg.com/publications/2017/retail-marketing-sales-profiting-personalization">revenue increases ranging from 6-10%</a>. When you update someone&rsquo;s name in an email subject line, suggest products tailored to the person&rsquo;s behavior, and show content relevant to an item they checked out on your website, you show them that you aren&rsquo;t just marketing to the masses. You care about them, specifically. Add a quiz to your website to get even more valuable information (see <a href="https://www.madison-reed.com/">Madison Reed</a>, <a href="https://www.forhims.com/">Hims/Hers</a>, and <a href="https://www.thirdlove.com/">ThirdLove</a> for examples). Not only will a survey increase the chances someone will buy a product that&rsquo;s well-suited to them, the results will give you insight into other products they might be interested in down the line.

As you embark on your eCommerce marketing journey, try these out and let us know how it goes!

Without an adequate marketing strategy, eCommerce startups won’t get the traction they need to sustain their business.

6 Ways to Get Started with Marketing for eCommerce Startups

eCommerce marketing is about making consumers aware of your online store, convincing them to convert, and reminding them to purchase again. To stand out from the crowd, you need a comprehensive strategy involving social media, original content, and paid campaigns.

An employee's first few days at your company are formative. Providing a structured onboarding program and making new hires feel welcome sets a tone that will carry forward through the rest of their time at your startup.&nbsp;

With attrition risk at an all-time high according to SHRM [link], doubling down on new hire success is an effective first step in a long-term employee engagement and retention strategy. Drive your team culture forward by providing new team members all of the resources and instruction they need to make an impact on day one.

By segmenting the onboarding process into three buckets, you can define consistent checkpoints for new hires to keep them on track. The goal is to set your new hire up for success -- don&rsquo;t let them down. Here is a punch list of things to make your new hire onboarding memorable and successful.
<h2>Pre-onboarding</h2>

Onboarding starts the moment your new hire accepts their offer letter. To set yourself up for success on Day One, follow these steps:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Set internal expectations - The hiring manager and team should structure all the measurements of success for your new employee. This includes laying out the first projects to be completed by the new hire and checkpoints at which they should be evaluated. In most cases, this can simply be a job description (hopefully you have one of these written already).&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Send a welcome email - A welcome email should go out within a week of the offer being accepted. Be sure to include all of the relevant Day One information such as time to show up (and the address!), dress code, whether to bring lunch, any forms of ID needed for paperwork, etc. This email is also a great opportunity to start the onboarding process. Send along any marketing or sales materials that might help the new hire get up to speed with what the company has to offer.&nbsp;</li>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="2">Bonus Tip: Send a second email 24 hours before their start date to remind them of any last details regarding their first day.</li>
</ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Send out their swag pack - There are few things startup employees love more than some awesome swag. Whether you send fanny packs or snapbacks, get everything together for your new hire. If you are a remote team, send the swag via express mail so it arrives precisely on their first day.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<h2>Day One</h2>

The first day on a new job is full of nervous handshakes, anxious note-taking, and a ton of new faces to remember. Make it as easy as possible for your new hire to get acclimated by having a full day scheduled for them as soon as they get in the door. Your first day calendar should include the following:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Meeting a buddy - Having a buddy can help new hires navigate internal matters such as HR or Payroll, get introduced to team members, and establish friendships, making the entire transition process so much less stressful. Make sure to select someone who represents your startup well and will make your new hire feel welcome.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Tackling the paperwork - Setup a time slot(s) for the new hire to meet with HR to complete any relevant paperwork first thing in the morning. Getting this done early means it won&rsquo;t disrupt learning sessions later in the day.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Enjoying a eam lunch - Who doesn&rsquo;t love a free lunch? If you are a remote team, send team members UberEats credits or offer reimbursement and have the team hang out on a group Zoom. For those in the office, this offers a great chance to show off the neighborhood and get out of the office for a little bit.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Scheduling a hiring manager 1-1 - &nbsp;Even if the hiring manager's schedule is jam-packed, new hires should take precedence over nearly anything else going on at the company. If you are a remote-first organization, it is a good practice to set up multiple 1-1 touch points on Day One -- once at the start of the day and once at the end of the day. This provides your new hire a good set of bookends to their first day at the company.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Setting up training meetings - Get at least 1-2 afternoon training sessions on the first day from subject matter experts (SME). Setting these up on day one sets a precedent for getting things done and throws the new hire into the thick of it right away.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Telling them when it&rsquo;s OK to leave -&nbsp; You would be shocked at how late a new hire will stick around their first day twiddling their thumbs. Make sure they understand the work culture around hours of business.</li>
</ul>

<h2>The First Couple of Weeks</h2>

Day one jitters wear off quickly. By the end of the first week, your new team member should know the tools and teams they will be working with. Within the first week, you should set some goal posts for accountability to guide your new hire to success.&nbsp;

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Give them a concrete completable task - Explicit direction to tackle a small, easy win will make them feel accomplished as a new hire immediately. This can also bring an added benefit of self-driven training. For example, software engineers could be assigned a small bug to fix. This forces them to set up their environment and checkout code from the company repositories -- each of these steps being critical to a successful workflow for an employee.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Expanded SME and cross-team training -&nbsp; Get your new hire in front of different teams and educate them on what people do at your org. This should cut across sales, engineering, marketing and finance. If you are on a hiring blitz, it is best practice to batch new hires together so SMEs and cross functional team leaders can schedule group training sessions.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Happy Hour! - Get everyone out of the office for a little bit and grab a drink. For many, this will help break this ice a little better. Don&rsquo;t make this too formal or overthink it, but make sure the invite is explicit enough so that new hires feel welcome.</li>
</ul>
<h2>The First Couple of Months</h2>

It is hard to quantify the impact of a new hire until at least a few weeks, if not months, have passed. But within the first few months, you should at least be able to establish long-term guard rails for your new hire. A few suggestions for the first few months:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Set up annual goals and OKRs -&nbsp; Explain your team's process around OKR/KPI tracking to ensure the new hire understands the team's core focus. Demonstrate to the employee what success looks like in their new position by walking them through high-quality samples of work. Establish the framework by which they will be evaluated in the review process (if you don&rsquo;t have a review process, <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/dec-1-2020-review-performance-reviews">maybe it's a good time to start thinking about one</a>!).</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Survey the new hire for feedback - What better way to improve your onboarding process than to get feedback from someone who just went through it! Even informal feedback during a 1-1 is hugely beneficial for your process and shows to the new employee you care about the onboarding experience.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Automate future touch points - Tools like <a href="https://www.teamgather.co/">Gather</a> can automate touchpoints with new (and existing) team members around fun topics like&nbsp; upcoming birthdays or serious ones like monthly reminders to complete KPI reports. Gather has several playbooks to <a href="https://www.teamgather.co/people-operations-playbook?moments=onboarding">run your entire onboarding process!</a>&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Setup Some Continuous Touch points - On your calendar, schedule relevant meetings for the future. This should include consistent 1-1&rsquo;s between the new hire and their hiring manager, skip-level 1-1s (or CEO 1-1s), and any cross-functional meetings that are part of the new hire&rsquo;s range of responsibilities.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
 
Even minor attempts at structuring an onboarding process will pay dividends.&nbsp; Failing a new hire by not providing a smooth onboarding process will increase your attrition rate and be a drag on the broader team.&nbsp;

An employee's first few days at your company are formative. Providing a structured onboarding program and making new hires feel welcome

Running an Effective Employee Onboarding

An employee's first few days at your company are formative. Providing a structured onboarding program and making new hires feel welcome sets a tone that will carry forward through the rest of their time at your startup. With attrition risk at an all-time high according to SHRM [link], doubling down ...

What do you think of when you hear the word &ldquo;offsite&rdquo;? If &ldquo;snoozefest&rdquo; or &ldquo;waste of time&rdquo; are the first words to come to mind, <a href="https://www.inc.com/antonio-neves/4-ways-to-to-run-an-offsite-that-wont-become-a-snoozefest.html">you&rsquo;re not alone</a>. It&rsquo;s easy for company offsites to devolve into extra-long status meetings complete with cold coffee and mini water bottles. It&rsquo;s also common for offsites to swing in the other direction, a little too fun to get any work done (peep the latest WeWork documentary).

So, what qualifies as a happy medium, and is it possible to achieve? When done right, your offsite can inspire, motivate, and align your teams towards shared goals and prepare them for times of high growth. In this piece, we cover the elements of a successful offsite so you can establish a process for hosting unforgettable and productive gatherings every year.&nbsp;
<h2>Nail down your goals</h2>
The first, most important thing you need to do is crystallize your goals. These objectives should center around what you hope to accomplish at the offsite. Objectives can be broad since you ultimately want participants to comprehend, accept, and act on them. Offsites are costly, so it&rsquo;s essential to get your attendees to rally around shared objectives before you even go. <a href="https://hbr.org/2019/07/6-tips-for-running-offsites-that-arent-a-waste-of-time">Here are a few ideas</a> to get you started:

<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Promote reflection on last year&rsquo;s performance and facilitate structured discussions around how it can be improved this year</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Work together to establish critical priorities and KPIs that the entire team commits themselves to</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Generate a plan for achieving strategic goals with the help of leaders from multiple teams</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Build rapport among remote team members who have never met each other or rarely worked together, even in the office</li>
</ul>

Of course, when you craft your agenda, you&rsquo;ll want to delve into more specific topics, such as &ldquo;sales strategies to hit $X in revenue by the end of next year&rdquo; or &ldquo;solidify the roadmap to launch X new product.&rdquo; But having broad objectives can help your participants feel like they can engage in more thoughtful, creative discourse and will make the offsite a team-building event as well.
<h2>Get feedback ahead of time</h2>
Not everyone will be present at the offsite, but <a href="https://fundersclub.com/blog/2017/04/27/guide-to-offsites/">that doesn&rsquo;t mean their opinions shouldn&rsquo;t be heard</a>. Think about sourcing an informal SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis via a Google form. Ask department heads to send surveys to their teams a few weeks ahead of the offsite so you can share results with the group ahead of time. Of course, you may not use all the input you get, but it doesn&rsquo;t hurt to hear your employees out. It makes them feel good that leadership cares about what they think and gives them the chance to express themselves. If particular trends are popping up, add them to the agenda. At the very least, employee feedback will get your offsite attendees&rsquo; creative juices flowing.
<h2>Set an agenda</h2>
Agendas are like OKRs一you may not like them, but you have to admit they are usually effective. First, agendas can timebox your discussions. Sometimes topics can get heated, and agendas help you end the conversation, take a break, and return to the parking lot later, keeping things moving along. <a href="https://www.techstars.com/the-line/advice/6-tips-for-an-impactful-virtual-team-offsite-lessons-learned-from-the-techstars-community-team?utm_source=hootsuite&amp;utm_medium=&amp;utm_term=&amp;utm_content=&amp;utm_campaign=">Agendas also ensure that you cover everything you want to</a>. With so many things happening, it&rsquo;s easy to forget about the more minor, but still important, initiatives and go home without talking about them at all. Use your SWOT results as a jumping-off point, adding in other topics leaders want to address.

Not only do agendas keep everyone on track, they also give people a chance to plan out what they are going to say. This is particularly helpful for more introverted folks on the team who want to think about their responses to big questions and brainstorm some strategies for large projects beforehand. Plus, people need downtime, and agendas can help schedule breaks as well. In addition, agendas allow you to delegate tasks, like ordering meals, designating discussion leaders, and assigning notetakers.

Send the agenda at least a week ahead of your offsite to get everyone on the same page and to give yourself ample time to make changes. You might even review the agenda with each person individually to ensure it captures what they want to get out of the meetings. Lastly, compare your agenda to your goals to ensure you hit on everything. It sounds like a lot of work up front, but the time you put into your agenda <a href="https://medium.com/ideo-stories/eight-tips-on-running-a-great-team-offsite-14d8d42a91bb">pays dividends in terms of people&rsquo;s participation and creativity</a>.&nbsp;
<h2>Limit the number of people</h2>
Having too many people at your offsite is a recipe for disaster. Multiple viewpoints is a good thing, but not if it details the agenda. Many founders suggest <a href="https://www.atlassian.com/blog/inside-atlassian/how-to-facilitate-successful-offsite-meetings-human-dynamics">a group of 5 - 10 people</a>, starting with the executive team. From there, try to map potential attendees to your main offsite objectives and consider having diversity in terms of expertise, tenure, and role. You might have some hard decisions, but narrowing down the invite pool to the people with the most relevant input will make for better, more efficient sessions. By the way, this doesn&rsquo;t mean that the outcomes of the offsite should stay a secret among attendees. Set aside time at the end of the offsite to figure out the best way to disseminate the right information to the right employees.
<h2>Get out of the office</h2>
It&rsquo;s tempting for startups to hold offsites at their office to save money, but that&rsquo;s a mistake. Even the word &ldquo;offsite&rdquo; implies that you should be getting out of the office and into a new environment. Think about renting a short-term space, a hotel conference room, or even an Airbnb in a stunning location. It&rsquo;s an investment, but your employees will be excited to get away for a few days and enjoy each other&rsquo;s company. That said, <a href="https://www.inc.com/alexa-von-tobel/how-to-run-an-effective-team-offsite.html">the place you choose should limit distractions</a> so that everyone feels productive and focused. Ensure the spot is accessible to everyone and bring materials like whiteboards, markers, sticky notes, flip charts, notepads, and pens. Something else to think about is picking a location you can return to year over year. This makes offsites feel like a fun tradition, and who knows, maybe you&rsquo;ll get a discount.
<h2>Talk about your people</h2>
&ldquo;Talk about your people&rdquo; sounds like a gossip fest, but that&rsquo;s not what this is about. If you&rsquo;re planning for the next few years, you&rsquo;ll need to talk about current performance, company culture, hiring strategies, preventing burnout, increasing retention, and more. Discuss feedback you may have gotten from direct reports. Do people feel recognized and rewarded? Do they feel compensated for their work? Do they want to come back to the office or stay remote? Is there any tension between teams that need to be addressed? Have attendees come prepared to talk about the individuals on their team, with identified attrition risks and individuals who are good candidates for more strategic roles. Each person <a href="https://review.firstround.com/use-this-startups-playbook-for-running-impactful-virtual-offsites">should have a pathway for success</a>一whether that be at your company or elsewhere.
<h2>Infuse some fun</h2>
Don&rsquo;t forget to make the offsite at least a little fun! You don&rsquo;t always get so much time together, so make the most of it. Depending on where your offsite is, consider ending the day with a beautiful hike, a nice dinner, a scavenger hunt, or some karaoke. Fun activities don&rsquo;t need to be relegated for the evenings, either. Maybe you have a chef teach everyone how to make a delicious lunch, or you make time for mini-massage breaks between sessions. Whatever you do, make sure it doesn&rsquo;t feel like your usual office culture. The whole point of an offsite is to stimulate people&rsquo;s brains, foster some team building, and get everyone jazzed about the future of your company.
<h2>Wrap up with accountability</h2>
Your offsite can&rsquo;t be all talk一there has to be an execution plan. End the offsite with an exercise in which everyone assigns roles and responsibilities to each new project or priority. Ask yourselves how you&rsquo;ll hold each other accountable, whether that&rsquo;s monthly or quarterly check-ins, presentations, or something else.

Be sure to compile and share notes from the closing session so that leads can review the information and disseminate pertinent sections to their teams later. These notes will also assist you if you need to present an overview of the offsite to the Board and CEO.

So that you&rsquo;re not leaving everything until the end, tack on 10-minutes to the end of longer sessions to recap and write down action items. Not only does this make wrapping up go faster, it also forces participants to reflect on what they learned and what they&rsquo;re taking away from each session.&nbsp;

With adequate planning, input from employees, a killer location, and fun activities, your offsite can feel completely different than a long day at work. When everyone brings their A-game, offsites are the most valuable few days of the year. Let us know if you have some offsite tips一we&rsquo;d love to hear them!

Company offsites can inspire, motivate, and align your teams towards shared goals and prepare them for times of high growth.

The Anatomy of a Good Offsite

Most employees would accuse procurement departments of being overbearing bad cops, shooting down most purchase requests, and trying to find every gap in security questionnaires. Well-designed vendor procurement and management processes do companies a huge solid. They help cut costs, set companies up for successful compliance audits, and mitigate future risks.
Although you may not think your startup needs procurement or vendor management policies now, <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/79798">you&rsquo;ll be glad you established them early</a>. Building a framework for vendor selection early on will lead to better profit margins and prevent wasted time on rip-and-replace projects. This article will cover the difference between vendor procurement and vendor management, the benefits of instituting vendor guidelines from the get-go, and some ideas for putting policies into place.&nbsp;
<h2>What&rsquo;s the difference between vendor procurement and vendor management?</h2>
Vendor procurement and vendor management go hand-in-hand, but they aren&rsquo;t the same thing. Vendor procurement is a method of <a href="https://zipordering.com/en/procurement-process/vendor-procurement.html">assessing potential vendors, lowering purchase costs, and ensuring that companies enter into contracts with minimal risk</a>. Procurement involves arranging and listening to demos, testing out proof of concepts, and entering into pricing negotiations when it comes time to buy. Procurement reads the fine print and works closely with legal teams to ensure the company is protected if anything happens to the vendor (i.e., gets hacked, goes under, etc.). When a product or service comes up for renewal, procurement is responsible for getting the most competitive continuation rate.&nbsp;
Vendor management is about <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/vendor-management-procurement-whats-difference-agostino-carrideo/">getting the most bang for your buck</a>. For long-term contracts, this means understanding which employees are using each product or service and whether or not their expectations are met. When the product or service is not up to snuff, vendor management works with the vendor to get reimbursed for poor service or to find ways to optimize the tool&rsquo;s use. Vendor management is also responsible for determining whether or not vendors are upholding security and compliance best practices and proposing potential renegotiations or cancellations based on a vendor&rsquo;s quality of service. Vendor procurement and vendor management processes need to be complementary to make fulfillment efficient and effective.
<h2>Benefits to proper vendor procurement and vendor management</h2>
Your organization will reach a tipping point where the ROI gained from implementing vendor procurement and management policies is worth the trouble of creating them. Here are a few reasons why you should at least think about these policies sooner rather than later:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Business continuity and risk management - Imagine if your email went down, Slack no longer worked, and Salesforce wouldn&rsquo;t load. That&rsquo;s a bad situation, but what if it got worse. What if your product is built on multiple APIs and one of them crashed? What if you hosted client data on cloud servers that were hacked? Or, what if Shopify had a bug where customers couldn&rsquo;t complete their purchases for several days? In each of these situations, you could lose time, tons of money, and customer trust. Procurement and vendor management processes can at least partially alleviate your worries by proactively analyzing security practices, reviewing SOC audits (if they have them), and scrutinizing SLAs.</li>
</ul>
&nbsp;
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Cost savings - After a big fundraise, it&rsquo;s tempting to tell employees they can buy whatever they need whenever they want to. But reckless spending won&rsquo;t fly past a certain number of employees and sets a bad precedent for the future. Introducing procurement and vendor management at the outset makes you frugal, buying only the products you truly need at bargain prices. Over time, you&rsquo;ll become a better negotiator, and you might even make friends with your vendors. If you treat them well and send referrals their way, vendors will be more likely to offer you rebates, early access to releases, and other perks. Procurement and vendor management processes also add visibility into company spending patterns, surfacing opportunities for vendor consolidation, bundling discounts, and <a href="https://boringstartupstuff.com/newsletter/the-cash-flow-manifesto">cash flow management</a>.</li>
</ul>
&nbsp;
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Projects professionalism - Most startups aim to IPO or get acquired by a large enterprise. And if you&rsquo;re like most startups, you need to pay attention to your vendors. During due diligence processes, analysts will want to know why you bought certain products, who is using them, what part of your product relies on external tools, and whether you have contingency plans if something goes awry. The same line of questioning applies if you&rsquo;re selling into Fortune 500 companies. Sometimes you need to prove your financial viability and dedication to security even before you schedule a demo. And it&rsquo;d be a shame if you can&rsquo;t get past their procurement evaluation process because of your own. Consider using a service like <a href="https://safebase.io/">Safebase</a> to convey the current state of your security, compliance, and procurement practices.</li>
</ul>
&nbsp;
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Increased efficiency - Startups buy tools and services to save them time. That&rsquo;s why it&rsquo;s critical to publish guidelines for vendor evaluation and management. Picking the right vendor and finding ways to cut costs the first time around maximizes employee mindpower without sacrificing quality. Formalizing procurement and vendor management in and of itself makes your staff more productive. They don&rsquo;t have to guess what steps to take before signing a contract一it&rsquo;s standardized and easy to follow. Once processes are in use, your team will find and plug gaps, making policies more streamlined as your company expands.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<h2>Getting started with vendor procurement and management</h2>
Vendor procurement and management don&rsquo;t have to be arduous. The key is to start simple with these five tips:
&nbsp;
1. Make a purchasing checklist - At a startup, no one has time to go through a million-step process, and not every purchase has to be approved by the CEO. So your purchasing checklist should outline the fastest way to get to a justifiable purchase. To start, nail down <a href="https://medium.com/@ProcureDesk/purchase-order-process-for-your-startup-complete-guide-7886284ec99d">what employees can purchase on their own and from where</a>. Create a set of preferred vendors with preferred pricing and substeps for buying hardware versus software. Next, explain how to pay. Will employees use their own card, or will you make them use a company card that gets you special billing arrangements? End with a timeline for reimbursement and steps to upload the receipt to a central repository.
&nbsp;
2. Establish an approval process - For larger purchases, you&rsquo;ll need to settle on an approval process. Will employees simply ask their boss to approve a purchase, or is there a threshold where a committee evaluates the new product? For the latter, make security, compliance, and cost criteria explicit so that employees can do their research ahead of time. Teach them to ask about SLAs, customer service hours, and anything else that may affect performance or the final price.
&nbsp;
3. Compile a list of all vendors - It&rsquo;s impossible to manage vendors you didn&rsquo;t even know you worked with, so make a list. This list can be as simple as a google sheet with the name of the product, a description, the vendor&rsquo;s account manager, number of internal users, and cost. In tandem, create a folder in google drive to store contracts and SOC audits.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
4. Review your list regularly - Once you feel your list and folder are complete, schedule annual or bi-annual reviews. <a href="https://www.business.com/articles/procurement-tips-small-business/">Not every product will live up to expectations</a>, so use these sessions to let users vent about each product. Did the vendor violate any contracts? Was there poor execution on a consulting or design project? Should you cancel a contract altogether or explore alternatives before the renewal period rolls around? Even if people enjoy using a product, take a moment to examine the ROI. Are you really getting the best value possible? If not, consider reducing the number of licenses or paying for a lower-tier package.
&nbsp;
5. Use a vendor to help - Vendor procurement and management may not naturally be in your wheelhouse, and that&rsquo;s ok. There are <a href="https://welpmagazine.com/27-best-procurement-startups-taking-the-industry-by-storm/">plenty of burgeoning startups</a> that can assist. When picking procurement and/or vendor management software, make sure it comes with reporting and analytics capabilities. Not only will this help refine your processes over time, it will also help you forecast and budget more accurately.
&nbsp;
<h2>It's Never Too Early To Establish Vendor Management Processes</h2>
Vendor procurement and vendor management usually sit on the back burner. After all, it&rsquo;s much more fun to think about viral marketing, product development, and hacky sales tactics. But hopefully, your company will grow faster than you anticipate, racking up expenses that make your cash burn skyrocket. Rather than paying attention to the fun stuff now and worrying about that later, think about non-disruptive ways to evaluate vendors and track their use today. Because saving money now is like starting to invest when you&rsquo;re 20 years old一<a href="https://www.scmsp.com/RafaelMarreroWhite%20paper-SpotswoodConsulting.pdf">the dividends will pay off</a>.

Well-designed vendor procurement and management processes cut costs, set companies up for successful SOC2 audits, and mitigate future risks.

Vendor Procurement and Management at a Startup

Well-designed vendor procurement and management processes help cut costs, set companies up for successful SOC2 audits, and mitigate future risks.

Cash is the lifeblood of an early-stage startup. Improperly managed cash flow will take down a startup before it's had the chance to grow. Don&rsquo;t assume that your team will be able to raise another round if the bank account runs dry. An optimized cash flow management process from the outset will prevent you from ending up in the <a href="https://startupgraveyard.io/">startup graveyard</a>. Here is our cash flow manifesto.&nbsp;
<h2>Establish Spending Habits Early On</h2>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">In the early days, spending should be formally reviewed weekly. This process can be moved to a monthly reconciliation process once the business has established consistent revenue and operating expenses. But in the early days, this meeting will emphasize how important cash is to the business.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Until your revenue and operating expenses are growing in predictable tandem, rely on zero-based budgeting. Zero-based budgeting is a method by which all expenses need justification before cash will be allocated.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Use corporate spend management tools like <a href="https://www.brex.com/">Brex</a> or <a href="https://getdivvy.com/">Divvy</a>.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Clearly communicate corporate policy in easily accessible, readable documents. Ensure all employees understand what, and how, things are to be paid for during ordinary business.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<h2>Automate Accounts Receivable</h2>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">While accounts receivable (AR) are technically considered an asset on the balance sheet, they are a potential point of cash flow risk for a company. Automate follow ups on all outstanding invoices and provide clear ways to receive payments. Depending on the market you sell into, consider simple payment processing via <a href="https://stripe.com/">Stripe</a>.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Negative cash conversion cycles can act as a cash flow flywheel. Cash conversion cycles represent the time between when an invoice for a service or good is paid and the time required to pay for providing such service. In other words, negative cash conversion cycles imply you are able to keep cash on the books for a longer period of time. This is a good thing and will allow you to re-invest cash sitting on your balance sheet before having to send it out to a vendor.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Avoid perpetual discounting when possible. It is a good idea to offer early customers and partners discounts in exchange for working with your new company, but avoid overbearing language that might lead to a long-term drag on your top line. Oftentimes startups feel they lack the leverage to raise prices, but in reality, customers willing to pay $1 dollar will generally be willing to pay $2. Keep discounted contract periods to brief and clear timelines and set a standard of raising prices annually.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<h2>Be Tactical About Accounts Payable&nbsp;</h2>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Accounts payable (AP), often considered a liability, can also be a boon for a startup if managed properly. When negotiating with vendors, ask for payment terms as far out as possible. As a general rule, you never want to be paying anything sooner than Net 30 (30 days from invoice date) and you certainly do not want to be paying COD (cash on delivery). Personally, I always seek a minimum of Net 45 terms and occasionally push my luck by requesting Net 90 or Net 120.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Request invoices for all services rendered or purchased when available. This may not always be available, but don&rsquo;t shy away from asking for special treatment from a vendor.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Build Cash Reserves&nbsp;</h2>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">If you are raising a round, allocate 3 months of burn (Payroll + Rent + OpEx) to your balance sheet for a rainy day.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Forecasting cash flow works up to a point. To be of any value, modeling future cash flow must account for different scenarios.&nbsp;</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Seek being <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/aord.html">default alive</a>. This does not need to mean running at profitability. It simply implies you should focus on keeping burn rate low enough to last you in the order of years and not months.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Get Professional Help</h2>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Try working with a bookkeeper from day one. Companies like <a href="https://bench.co/">Bench</a> and <a href="https://pilot.com/">Pilot</a> can be great stand-ins before you are ready to make a full-time hire. At the very least, rely on bookkeepers to provide you with a cash flow analysis monthly.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Spend time educating yourself on the <a href="https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/accounting/three-financial-statements/">three financial statements</a> and accounting basics. As a resource, I strongly recommend the courses available at <a href="https://www.asimplemodel.com/">A Simple Model.</a> While outsourcing some work can be beneficial, at the end of the day, the leadership team of the startup (specifically the CEO and CFO) is responsible for the financial well-being of your company. Do not assume your accountant or bookkeeper is taking care of everything or you will find yourself in very dangerous waters.</li>
</ul>
Build process from day one around managing cash flows. Set a weekly meeting to review your P&amp;L, implement corporate spending policies, and automate where possible. Invest in financial literacy immediately, it will pay dividends. Don&rsquo;t forget that cash is king.

Cash is the lifeblood of an early-stage startup, so improperly managed cash flow can take down a startup before it's had the chance to grow.

The Cash Flow Manifesto

Cash is the lifeblood of an early-stage startup. Improperly managed cash flow will take down a startup before it's had the chance to grow.