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Reading List for Entrepreneurs W46 – Selected

Ok, the US election provided plenty of distractions, which got me to thinking about improving our focus with Selected by Sesamers. I guess it’s quite normal to try many different ideas when you’re launching a new product but it comes at the expense of performance. We’re a small team and we always need to be cautious about the time we spend on new ideas and offerings.

A key aspect of our work is to keep engaging with our audience further. It’s hard to build a community and it doesn’t scale well. At least in the beginning. While we have over 20,000 active subscribers on Startup Sesame’s newsletter, our community – and if you’re reading this you’re probably one of its members – is around 200 people – so 1% of our total audience. David Spinks and The Most Famous Artist tell us more the business of communities.

This week’s reading list covers several resources:

  • That will help you build a better content business
  • How to lead your team to a distraction-free environment and ensure everyone remains productive when working from home is the norm.
  • What’s hot in Climate Tech and
  • How to become a better moderator.

There also a few fashion and science gems that I just too good to not share. Did you know Cyberpunk fashion has become BIG among the Chinese Gen Zers?

Book

With a systematic approach, author Steph Smith walks you through her best practices on how to set up, create, and scale content on the interwebs.

If you’re reading this, clearly, some of them are working.

Standing Out in 2020: Doing Content Right
Currently sold: 1749 copiesThe Internet has created an age of infinite leverage. Anyone can reach thousands (if not millions) of people in a matter of months. But with easy access comes competition. So the question becomes: how do you build a successful blog in a world where millions of other people…

Management

In this podcast, NFX General Partner James Currier sits down with Nir Eyal, author of Hooked and Indistractable to analyze what high performing teams are doing right in a world full of distractions.

The Psychology of Focus: How Great Teams Find Traction Amid Distraction

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Working from home used to be the dream. Now that we’re 9+ months into it, it’s pluses and minuses are starting to become quite apparent. How do you best keep your teams focused and on track with the distractions of home life?

How to Build a High-Performing Remote Team During a Pandemic
For many of us in tech, we’re going 9+ months strong working from home. We miss seeing colleagues in person, there may be distractions galore in a home office, and there’s no clear end in sight. How can leaders keep employees engaged and effective during these challenging times?
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Venture Capital

If the U.S. Presidential election showed us nothing else, Climate Change is now back on the agenda at The White House. It’s on The Valley’s list too.‌

Why investors are betting on Silicon Valley’s second climate boom
Silicon Valley stands on the brink of another potential renewable energy boom, but investors are nervous about the next big bust.
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Product

“Authenticity consists in having a true and lucid consciousness of the situation, in assuming the responsibilities and risks that it involves, in accepting it in pride or humiliation, sometimes in horror and hate.” — Jean Paul Sartre

This says it all.

The Building in Public How-To Guide
At Chapter One, we like to say we invest in cults. But what does that really mean? Here are a few examples from our portfolio: Cults, excellent marketing, or simply a strong brand community — call it…
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Marketing

“The only way to scale community is to distribute control; it’s empowering others to take on roles of leadership in order to grow.” – David Spinks.‌

David Spinks: Building Community with Business (and Belonging) in Mind
This is your Community, Daily.
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  • Link: yenfm.substack.com/p/david-spinks-building-community-with
  • Source: Yenfm

Niche. It’s a thing. Matt lays out a road to a $1M ARR in 12 months.

How to Build a Niche Community to $1,128,306 ARR in 12 Months.
Yesterday the TMFA Community made $3,091.25 in 24 hours. In theory, 12 months from now, my community will generate $1,128,306.25 in annual reoccurring revenue, and I will be free to do and make whatever the fuck I want. Amen.
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  • Link: ‌‌themostfamousartist.medium.com/building-a-niche-art-community-to-1-128-306-25-aar-in-12-months-fbba77499e3c
  • Source: Medium

Much like a number of you, I’m always looking for ways to be a better communicator and especially, a moderator. Preparing for my session with Dr. Jen Schradie for the Selected Salon, I picked up some great tips from Matt Abrahams.

Fashion

A self fulfilling prophecy? China’s Gen Z is embracing the Cyberpunk aesthetic, and turned the original cynical cultural expression into a symbol of social progress and techno glamor. And brands are jumping on board

Why Is Post-COVID China Embracing A Cyberpunk Aesthetic?

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Science

Holographic models for the very early Universe are compared against cosmological observations and found to be in line with the standard cold dark matter model with a cosmological constant of cosmology.

In other words, we MIGHT be living in a hologram.

From Planck Data to Planck Era: Observational Tests of Holographic Cosmology
We test a class of holographic models for the very early Universe against cosmological observations and find that they are competitive to the standard cold dark matter model with a cosmological constant ($mathrm{ensuremath{Lambda}}mathrm{CDM}$) of cosmology. These models are based on three-dimen…
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Events 2 days ago

Last week, I spent three days at Bits and Pretzels in Munich — a startup-focused event with a distinctly Bavarian flavor. Think Oktoberfest meets startup conference, complete with dirndls, lederhosen, and more beer than you might expect. As someone building an AI-powered event platform, I went in with a specific mission: Observe how startups actually market themselves at events. Here’s what I discovered: GoodBytz: The power of good demos What they did: Robotics startup GoodBytz set up a booth where its robots prepared kaiserschmarrn (a traditional German dessert) all day long. Why it worked: Nothing beats seeing a product in action. While other booths had brochures and demos, GoodBytz’s robots were actually cooking. The smell, the movement and the end result stirred together an experience that people will remember and talk about. The lesson: If you have a physical product, show it in action. The old writing adage generalizes well: Show, don’t tell.  Let people see, hear and touch the product. WeRoad: The bathroom hack What they did: Posted “Missing Investor” flyers in bathroom stalls with QR codes pointing to their website. Why it worked: Pure genius. Every startup at the event was looking for investors, but the “Missing Investor” headline, while a bit on the nose, proved irresistible. Plus, bathroom stalls are one of the few places where people have 30 seconds to actually read something. The lesson: Think about where your target audience’s attention will remain undivided. Sometimes, the most effective marketing leverages the most unexpected places. Emqopter: Visual impact matters What they did: Designed a bright orange booth that displayed their drone prominently. Why it worked: In a sea of grey, white, beige and brown, Emqopter’s bright orange booth was impossible to overlook. The drone was real, too, and proved a real conversation starter. The lesson: Your booth is competing with hundreds of others. Make it visually distinctive and ensure your product is the hero. Quests: Community building using the product What they did: Created a busy, branded booth with accessories (toy car, traffic cones, a bulletin board) and used their anti-loneliness app to build communities among founders at the event. Why it worked: Quests used their product to solve a real problem right at the event, and the busy booth design generated energy and curiosity. The lesson: Use your product to solve a problem at the event — if it’s possible, of course. Demonstrate your value in real time. Dyno: Event-themed marketing What they did: Distributed branded electrolyte packs with the tagline “Your hangover ends. Your pension lasts – with Dyno.” Why it worked: Dyno aligned its messaging perfectly with the Oktoberfest theme. Every attendee was thinking about beer and hangovers, so Dyno’s goodies were quite relevant. The tagline was clever, memorable, and directly addressed a pain point most people at the event might have to deal with later. The lesson: Tailor your marketing to the event’s theme and culture. The more you tie your messaging and product to the context, the more memorable you become. So, what did I learn? Event marketing is about more than just showing up and setting up a booth; you have to understand your audience and create experiences that people will remember. Here’s what really struck me: most startups and even big companies don’t know how to leverage events properly. They book the booth, show up and hope for the best; maybe they bring some branded pens and a pop-up banner. Then they’ll go back home and wonder why they spent €5,000 in exchange for 50 business cards that never convert. The startups that stood out at Bits and Pretzels understand something fundamental: event ROI isn’t about booth size or location; it’s about strategy, creativity and planning. None of the startups above improvised on-site, or planned something the night before the event in their hotel rooms. They laid everything out 4-6 weeks before the event. A solid pre-event strategy is what separates successful event marketing from expensive booth rental.  But what matters most for early-stage startups is that you don’t need a massive budget to stand out. WeRoad’s bathroom stall hack probably cost €50 to print the flyers. A standard booth package at Bits and Pretzels would go for €3,000 to €5,500. The ROI difference is staggering when you compare the cost per meaningful conversation. That’s the difference between simply spending money and investing smartly. Building Sesamers has taught me that helping startups find the right events is only half the equation. The other half is helping them understand how to maximize ROI once they’re there. Good props aren’t a marketing expense; they’re opportunities to meet customers, investors and partners, and strike up engaging conversations.

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