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Pitching Your Idea

September 26, 2015 0 Uncategorized ,

I spent today watching college entrepreneurs give elevator pitches to potential investors. After watching business ideas all day, I have a few observations:

  1. Funding is not a rare commodity, but validated, vetted business ideas are.
  2. It’s vitally important to know the pain you’re solving for your customers. If you can talk to them, do it. If you feel the pain, make sure you’re not the only one.
  3. Scale, and your ability to multiply a business model to scale, matter a lot.
  4. Huge dreams are okay, but only if you can prove you have the ability to execute on them. How do you prove this? Partner with credible people who bring high-level skills to your team. If your idea is stupid, but you’ve been able to talk five PhD-level experts into leaving their jobs to join your team, I will take a hard look at it.

The talented student entrepreneurs I saw today encouraged me about the future, and reminded me that taking public steps toward your dreams is a great way to get closer to success.

What are some of the best and worst pitches you’ve seen?

Pricing Magic: Coming Soon!

September 9, 2015 2 Uncategorized

Entrepreneur Working on her Pricing PlanAll entrepreneurs have to make decisions about pricing. We’ve learned some lessons the hard way, and we’ve talk hundreds of entrepreneurs to price for profit – the easy way!

We’re producing a kit that distills our pricing best practices into an easy-to-follow video, an e-book, and a worksheet to help you with pricing.

We’re really excited to let you in on the secret. Want to hear when it’s ready?



Why Craft Startups?

September 9, 2015 0 Uncategorized

Why do we think of starting companies as a form of craftsmanship? Great question!

Humans are made to make things. We do it for fun, for pay, and to express our humanity. Craftsmanship is the perfect blend of art, science, and genius. Entrepreneurship is a craft: the meeting of creativity (art), practices (science), and inspiration (genius). We can help you become an entrepreneurial craftsman: someone with the skills, knowledge, and tools to create the business of your dreams!

Each of the products we offer contain some portion from each element: art, science, and inspiration. Without the art, there’s little room for employing the skills of creativity. Without the science, the material is just a lot of feel-good fluff. Without the inspiration, the art and science can be a grind and you forget why you’re doing this. We want to make people who who are both empowered AND inspired, who engage in the entrepreneurial process because it’s a beautiful expression of what it means to be human.

New Products Coming

September 7, 2015 0 Uncategorized ,

Welcome to Shinn Business! We’re working on Startup kits for different kinds of businesses, checklists to help your business start with a great foundation, and moneymaking ideas to help you take your business to the next level. We love empowering entrepreneurs!

Our first product is ready: it’s a presentation and a toolkit to help entrepreneurship educators run microbusiness experiments, taking the results back into the classroom. Check it out here.

While we work on new products, fill out this survey to let us know how we can best serve you. Or fill out the form below to get in tough with us. Happy enterprising!

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