DISQUS

Adam Rifkin · 3 years ago

I agree that helping local merchants and small businesses get online is a great goal -- and an explosive market!

Clint, the company you mention in your article reminds me of a startup called MerchantCircle in approach and scope. (They also raised venture funding, and are backed by BankAmerica, Disney, and Rustic Canyon.)

Some nuggets I got from MerchantCircle: The Yellow Pages business is a $15B/year business; 60% of searches are local; and 80% of local merchants currently are not online.

MerchantCircle now signs up thousands of companies a day; that early success indicates to me that there is a tremendous need for such services, and a lot of value will be created for businesses and consumers of local advertising as a result.

Ann Onimus · 3 years ago

merchantcircle signing up thousands of companies a day? somebody is drinking the koolaid...

Jeff Clavier · 3 years ago

Not my litmus test.

adam · 3 years ago

presume that the site is way better than reachlocal funded by VPVP

David Scott Lewis · 3 years ago

I couldn't agree more with Clint. Of course, sales is not everyone's cup of tea, so modify it for the C-level appropriate for yourself.

For me, it's more of a Guy Kawasaki thing: If you don't get jazzed by evangelizing the company, you're not the right candidate. For someone like myself (and Guy), this means getting on stage, writing articles, you name it. (I'm an ENFP borderline ENFJ, so what else would you expect?) For others, it might mean spreading the word in their particular user communities. Hey, it could even mean preaching at a party!!

With this refined (and expanded) definition of a litmus test, would you agree that this is a valid litmus test, Jeff?

karoake · 3 years ago

This reminds me of a india based site (people2meet.com), still incomplete, that provides
a forum for local reviews (they call it recommendations). Based on such such review of a local retailer, one of my friends actually bought a PC from them. Needless to say, that vendor was absolutely thrilled.

carl rahn griffith · 3 years ago

absolutely agree - a very pragmatic (and all too often overlooked) way of looking at a new business proposition and its feasibility.

Jeffrey Sarment · 3 years ago

I agree with DSL. One question though, what is an ENFP and a ENFJ? [I guess that's actually 2 questions :o)]

Vikram · 3 years ago

Using this creiterion, you wouln't have invested in Google or Yahoo or any of the companies that didn't have te business model nailed down when they got started.

Clint Chao · 3 years ago

I'm not so sure that's true, Vikram. Boy, I wish I was first the VP of Sales at Google... ~$500M in sales in 2002 and ~$1B in 2003, only 4-5 years after it was founded.

I'll have to admit that back then, I was wondering if the world needed another search engine - but I’m sure the founders had a vision and technology differentiation that enabled them to separate themselves over the others. Only having the best technology, however, doesn’t guarantee you a win. But winning the most customers does - 100% of the time, and that’s what they did.

While I hope that I wouldn't miss something like a Google or Yahoo with this process, as a VC, the important thing isn't the companies that you don't invest in - the only thing that matters is what you do invest in, and to do everything possible to help them become the next Google.

Nige · 3 years ago

>>One of my most recent (but unannounced) >>investments is in a company that made me want >>to start knocking on doors.

I don't know about anyone else but I'm intrigued to find out more about the company you invested in? If anything to see if i agree. When can you release more details?

Larry Chiang · 3 years ago

Clint, I love an even more community college flavored litmus test: 'would I want to rep this product locally?'.

My bar for taking meetings is 1) is s/he a passionate registered user, 2) are they able to set aside their pedigree, vaseline rubbed, ivory colored glasses, and 3) do they consume mainstream goods/services.

Now that I'm on the pure entrepreneurial side of the table, evaluating a "candidate" for VP of sales (or sales rep) requires the above three for quid pro quo / reciprocal interest