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Ben’s List 37

Entrepreneurship

4 Types of Documents Founders Must Have in Their Fundraising Data Room (and a Few Additional Tips)

“One way to build a reference list is by including the contact details (email addresses and phone numbers) of relevant individuals. However, I suggest founders only share names, affiliations, and LinkedIn profiles of references and offer to provide contact details upon request. At any point in time, a founder might have 10 or 20 people going through their data room; if they’re all contacting the same references then people will get frustrated!”

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Source: DocSend

Everything you need to know about Mexico’s startup scene

“And now, you may be wondering why you haven’t heard more about Mexico’s startups and VCs. Right?! I wondered that too for a quick minute and then I realized it’s because Mexico is an underestimated market. Yeah, much like there are underestimated founders & GPs, there are also underestimated markets.

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Source: GIPHY

Psychology

The Art of Not Taking Things Personally

“When we encounter emotions and behaviours that don’t make sense to us, it’s often because we don’t have all the information. And in the absence of information, we tend to assume the worst.”

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Photo by Norbu Gyachung on Unsplash

Community

The Four Dirty C-Words of the Internet

“These c-words are a safe place to hide, and what all new projects need — companies, books, products, etc. — is courage to name what they are and what they want to become. Don’t set yourself up for failure by using fluffy words like content and community. Working around this language will make your ideas stronger and give them a fighting chance to resonate in the world.”

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Screengrab from the article

Events

A million reasons you should go to Web Summit 2021

“None of us woke up one day and said let’s just throw away the past 10 years of building a company and focus on this new thing. However just like any story there was a tipping point. A crucial moment in the history of Treblle. A significant point in time where all of the stars aligned with our ideas and our desires. For us that tipping point was Web Summit 2020.”

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Screengrab from the article
  • treblle.com/blog/a-million-reasons-you-should-go-to-web-summit-2021 :: Vedran Cindrić

Creators

The creator economy is failing to spread the wealth

“What’s happening now with the creator economy mirrors all of the previous waves of digital media economies built before it via social media, blogging and websites.

  • New platforms have long offered hope of empowering smaller voices, only to see the top creators reap the most benefits.
  • Internet theorist Clay Shirky famously dubbed this phenomenon the ‘power law distribution’ in 2003.”
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Illustration: Rae Cook/Axios

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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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New Materials 3 days ago

Lios Group, the Irish startup behind SoundBounce, was a winner of JEC Composites Startup Booster 2018, and has been making significant strides since taking home the award.

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New Materials 1 week ago

Tree Composites aims to accelerate the energy transition with innovative composite joints.

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