startup marketing

Many people discount the importance of brand at startups. I hear founders giving excuses that range from “it’s not necessary for MVP” to simply “it’s fluffy stuff.” Naturally, when I ask them to define their brands, they respond with a list of product features. Very few understand the concept and others don’t really care. Should they?

Short answer: yes.

But the real challenge is thinking about brand in a way that makes sense for startups. Having started a tech company, I can appreciate the myriad of priorities that founders face each day. I can also understand why it’s difficult for them to care about something that’s very qualitative and has no immediate ROI.

Much of the startup world operates on the just-in-time attitude of only doing something when it’s absolutely necessary. If it doesn’t put out a fire, it can probably wait until later. The problem with this approach is that it’s not very forward-thinking. By the time you realize something is wrong (eg your tech was built poorly, you made some bad hires, your company lacks purpose), the problem runs much deeper than you think and may be too late to reconcile.

Branding is something you do for the long run. It may not help you right away, but it will create a strong foundation for the future.

UNDERSTANDING BRANDS

To create a strong startup brand, you first need to understand what a brand is. The American Marketing Association’s official definition of brand states that it’s a visual identifier (eg name, logo, design) of a product or service. However, the general consensus among advertising and other creative agencies is that brand is much more. It encompasses not only a company’s appearance, but also the emotions and opinions that surround it.

From the company perspective, I would define a brand as follows:

A brand is a promise to your customers that is differentiated from competition. (POV: company)

The promise refers to a pledge to deliver a certain set of benefits to your customers. It can be both functional (we offer feature x, y and z) as well as emotional (we make you feel x, y and z). As most startups are built on the future promise of something great, brand is already baked into their DNA.

The promise is compelling only if it is differentiated from competition. The problem is that many consumer web products today are functionally on par with each other. So claiming better features may fall on deaf ears, but creating an unique emotional hook may resonate with your audience.

From the customer perspective, I would define brand as follows:

A brand is the sum total of your perceptions about a company. (POV: customer)

In this definition, the focus is on perceptions, or what your customers think about you. Perceptions are important because they are a reality for the people who hold them,  whether or not they are really true. The sum of these perceptions forms the overall customer experience. Some people think that customer experience only relates to the product, which is simply not true. Any interaction with the company influences perceptions, so must be taken into consideration.

Think about the signals your company gives to the outside world: the quality of your investors and founding team, the events you host, even the co-working space where you sit. They all influence the way people think about you, creating perceptions that are either beneficial or not. As you build these perceptions over time, they become more ingrained in people’s minds but also harder to change. Just look at the uphill battle Microsoft has to fight despite decent products like Photosynth or Surface. 

CREATING STRONG BRANDS

Now that we understand what brands are, let’s explore ways to create a strong ones. As with most marketing efforts, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Each company is different and each company has its own unique assets that can contribute to building a promise. However, most companies think about similar things when creating their unique proposition. To keep things simple, I organized these strategies thematically into the five building blocks of brands.

1. WHAT YOU BELIEVE

Building a strong brand always begins with a sense of purpose. Why are you doing what you’re doing? What problem are you trying to solve? How you expect to change the world? You can answer these questions in a variety of ways, such as articulating your values, drafting mission and vision statements or creating a brand manifesto. To make your beliefs compelling, they must come from your heart and be embraced by everyone in your company.

Examples

Holstee made a huge splash in social media when it launched its poster-sized manifesto that encapsulates its beliefs as a company: “This is your life. Do what you love, and do it often.” The manifesto (pictured above) nicely articulates the company’s purpose and is one of its best-selling products.

Fab understands brand more than anyone else in the startup world. Their entire reason for existence is to make you smile (vs. just selling products), which sounds eerily similar to Apple. The reason Fab does this credibly well is that everyone in the company believes in a set of core values. 

Skillshare created a beautiful video about curiosity, the driving force of learning and the inspiration behind its business. Why did it spend money on a video? To let its stakeholders know that they’re serious about education and to bring the idea of intellectual curiosity to life (in a way words cannot).

Fitocracy is on a mission to empower everyone to reach their next level of health and fitness. This statement is a major drive of the company’s product roadmap and informs day-to-day interactions with their community. 

2. WHAT YOU SAY

Of the most salient aspects of brand is its verbal communications, which includes language, message, vernacular and tone. Together, these elements define the brand voice. If you look at your operations you’ll see that you communicate everywhere, from site app copy and support messages to confirmation emails, social media sites and other marketing collateral. The key to effective communications is maintaing a consistent voice, so it’s best to have one person oversee these efforts.

Examples

Flipboard uses emotionally-charged words like “surprising,” “amazing” and “stunning”” to convey the beauty of its product.

LaunchRock conveys a message of guiding startups through their earliest stages of growth. This reflects an expanded vision and product strategy from when it first launched as a simple splash page.

AppSumo communicates all new deals via a personal, authentic review written by a member of its staff. It doesn’t get any more real than this - these guys really believe in what they’re selling and stand behind each product. 

Foursquare has check-ins, Pinterest has pins, Facebook has likes, Highlight has highlights and Google is a verb. As these examples suggest, the most ownable vernacular ties closely to a unique product feature.

3. WHAT YOU DO

The most compelling way to bring your company’s words to life is through actions. Actions make ideas real and tangible. While most are not actual requirements for your core business, they’re extremely important because they define the company culture. Think about the behaviors, customs and idiosyncrasies that make your company unique (eg team lunches, volunteering, GSD), and then amplify those with the most meaning. They will help you convey your values to the outside world and attract key talent to your team.

Examples

Warby Parker donates a pair of glasses each time a pair is purchased, creating a massive amount of goodwill around its product (“I can buy a stylish product AND help people in need”). Supporting a larger cause is core part of the company’s offering and is one of the drivers of Warby Parkers early growth.

Bonobos is know for its exceptional customer service and even has a motto: “People before profit.” Some companies take a similar pride in customer interactions, with some founders even sharing their emails and phone numbers with new users upon signup.

Google and Zappos find culture so important that the former hired a Chief Culture Officer and the latter a Chief Happiness Officer.

Wanderfly offers all employees (regardless of experience) 4 weeks of vacation to give them time to travel, which helps fuel their passion for the business.

Uber was unfairly criticized over surge pricing during Hurricane Sandy, but decided to accommodate people’s needs by offering cabs at regular rates (and swallowed a $100K loss).

Fab lets all employees pitch new products to sell on its site, creating a collaborative attitude around its core offering.

4. HOW YOU APPEAR

This building block refers to the visual aspect of your brand, but is often confused as its only component. It includes the company name, logo, and design elements (fonts, styles, colors, symbols) which together inform the brand personality. Using visual branding in a strategic way can make your company instantly recognizable and create familiarity in its presence, leading customers to prefer it over others. Remember that your brand’s visual appearing should be consistent both within and outside your app. There’s nothing that screams amateur more than a crappy looking Facebook page or Keynote presentation.

Examples

Instagram and Cinemagram have gorgeous logos that stand out in app stores and draw people’s attention away from competition. Logos, like product ratings and descriptions, are considered to be one of the key drivers of consideration on app stores.

Duolingo uses a cute owl named Duo to provide helpful advice to people as they learn a new language. Duo underscores the fun, friendly nature of the brand which contrasts the serious, formal attitude of its competitors. Be careful with mascots, however, as some have not turned out so well (ahem, Clippy).

Lyft, the car-sharing service, uses a pink moustache on its car grilles to build interest in the service and promote a sense of community among riders. It’s not surprising that ad guru Alex Bogusky is the company’s advisor.

Pinterest has a killer name that is filled with meaning (pinning + interest graph) and rolls right off the tongue, while Coursekit changed its name to Lore because it believed that its old name did not properly reflect its new ambitions.

Codecademy and other startups risk brand dilution by keeping the generic and overused Lobster font. 

5. WHAT YOU MAKE

The last and perhaps most obvious part of the brand experience is building a great product that solves a real human need. Of course, it’s not as simple as it sounds. First, the product needs to be sufficiently different in the eyes of customers. Building me-too features that people don’t care about or those that are interesting challenges for developers is not the right approach. Second, the user experience needs to be great. Having a solid UX means that people will quickly understand the product and easily find what their looking for. Lastly, the product needs to be reliable and function properly. Persistent downtimes and bugs that never get fixed never engender positive feelings. 

Examples

Spotify built its success on a rock-solid music streaming service that plays songs almost instantaneously from anywhere.

Milewise offers a unique type of flight search that combines cash and points, something no other travel site else can claim.

Path and to-do list app Clear have built their brands on beautiful interfaces that are delightful to use. 

Twitter’s famous fail whale almost brought down the company in its early days, while Tumblr’s persistent downtimes still cause a lot of frustrations.

When creating a startup brand, it’s fairly common to transfer your personal brand equity as a founder to your company. Adam D’Angelo and Charlie Cheever did this at Quora, Dave Morin at Path and Noah Kagan at AppSumo. Perceptions take a long time to build, so piggybacking on something that already exists its a great way to jumpstart your efforts. At some point, however, your company should become its own independent and standalone brand, so make sure the spotlight isn’t always on you.

WHY BRANDING?

Branding’s end goal is to create a strong emotional and psychological relationship with your audience. Once you’ve developed this relationship, it will give you permission to do things that otherwise would not have been possible. A strong brand can:

- Attract early supporters when others don’t believe in you
- Get you free marketing from rabid fanboys (eg foursquare)
- Buy you forgiveness and time when you screw up
- Allow you to price your product at a premium 
- Help you seduce investors (eg Rap Genius) 

Some people say that strong brands are only important for lifestyle companies. It’s true that these particular firms must pay more attention to the nuances brand, because managing perceptions is much closer to their core business. But that doesn’t mean a functional tool can’t be a great brand, either. Remember how Dropbox made file-sharing - the most vanilla of tech products - into something people cared about?

Using the building blocks above, think about the brand elements that will help your startup stand apart from others. Then choose a few beliefs, words, actions, appearances and product features that will have the most impact in the market. Provided that you make an honest effort and stay true to yourself, you’ll reap the benefits for years to come.

If you have great examples of startup branding, please share them in the comments below.

An important question arose during my marketing fundamentals class, and again when I wrote my post about key message:

How do you communicate to a two-sided market?

This is a particularly challenging question in the startup world, as many tech companies serve two sets of customers. For example, Skillshare, Lore and Codecademy serve students and teachers. Uber serves commuters and cab drivers. NewsCred serves three: journalists, publishers and brands. The list continues with companies like SideTour, Flipboard and Seatgeek, all of which have multiple audiences.

From one perspective, you could argue that communicating one message to both customer groups is correct, because marketing is all about consistency. The problem here is that the customer groups are usually very different people, making it difficult to craft a one-size-fits-all message for both. You risk diluting the message to the point that it’s no longer compelling. 

From another perspective, you could argue that each group requires its own individual message. The problem here is that each message may not reflect your broader communications goals. You’ll be tempted to say whatever you feel and change your words as often as you please (rationalized by the need to better serve your customers), leading to a muddled value proposition. 

The answer lies in a combination of these two approaches.

You should craft individual messages to each group to account for their unique differences. However, these messages must ladder up to a larger key message that conveys your startup’s broader value proposition. 

Communicating to a two-sided market is essentially an exercise in message architecture. Imagine a hierarchy with the key message on top and individual, audience-specific messages below it. For each individual message, you may also include a few bullets points (proof points, in marketing parlance) to support their claim. The architecture should normally run two levels deep unless you have an audience that needs further segmentation - something that’s not very common.

Creating a strong message architecture is fairly advanced stuff, so don’t take it lightly. To achieve good results, you’ll need understand the nuances of language and craft statements that articulate subtle differences. If you’re not comfortable with highly conceptual thinking, ask one of your friends in communications for help. 

That said, here is how I would define the message architecture for a few startups with multiple-sided markets:

Skillshare
Key message: Skillshare empowers you to define your own education.
Message 1 (students): Skillshare lets you learn about things you love.
Message 2 (teachers): Skillshare transforms your passions into shared knowledge. 

Theme: defining education in your own terms

Uber
Key message: Uber gives you complete control over private transport. 
Message 1 (commuters): Uber lets you call the shots on every ride. 
Message 2 (cab drivers): Uber helps you make the most of your time and business.

Theme: independence, control
Note: Uber’s key message was inspired by this awesome post on Quora.

SideTour
Key message: SideTour promotes extraordinary local experiences.
Message 1 (participants): SideTour lets you discover the world through the eyes of locals.
Message 2 (hosts): SideTour turns your passions into enriching experiences. 

Theme: extraordinary experiences

NewsCred
Key message: NewsCred is the champion of high-quality journalism.
Message 1 (journalists): NewsCred makes your work more valuable.
Message 2 (publishers): NewsCred raises the quality of your business.
Message 3 (brands): NewsCred lets you create high-impact content strategies.

Theme: promoting quality throughout the ecosystem

Flipboard
Key message: Flipboard enriches content everywhere.
Message 1 (readers): Flipboard lets you experience content in a beautiful way.
Message 2 (publishers): Flipboard makes it easy to amaze your readers.
Message 3 (advertisers): Flipboard makes advertising delightful.

Theme: an immersive experience
Note: To unify its message across different audiences, Flipboard uses an arsenal of emotionally-charged words throughout its website including surprising, beautiful, amazing, stunning, delightful, and incredible.

As you can see from these examples, the key message sets the tone for all other messages. It acts as a true platform - broad enough to allow for a variety of interpretations, and focused enough to provide you with clear direction. This is one of the reasons why I recommend that startups take the key message so seriously.

As you create your own message architecture, here a few things to keep in mind:

- Start with the motivations and needs of your different audiences. You can’t craft a good message unless you understand who it’s directed to (topic of a forthcoming blog post).
- Think about themes and concepts that appeal to both (or multiple) customer groups. Some common examples include empowerment, control, value, and discovery. 
- Use emotional language. You’ll quickly find that emotional commonalities are much easier to find than functional ones.
- Keep the key message audience-agnostic. Craft it to appeal to the broader category, and use audience-specific messages to highlight the differences.

Appealing to a two-sided market is much harder than focusing on just one audience. But a solution does exist if you build a proper message architecture. There’s no question this will take some time, but it’s definitely worth the effort. You’ll find that your marketing initiatives are better organized and your message comes through with the maximum impact.

Articulating a key message is one of the foundations of marketing. If you think of marketing as the communication of ideas to various groups of people with the goal of changing their behavior, then understanding what to convey to them is the first and most important step in the process. It’s only after you articulate the “what” that you can execute the “how,” or the creative side of the discipline.

What exactly is the key message? It’s is the one thing you want to tell people about your startup. Think of it as a big, bold statement that grabs people’s attention and explains why they should care.

The key message is sometimes known as a positioning statement because it positions your startup against competitors. But I don’t like this terminology because it sounds too technical and doesn’t immediately convey its meaning. Classic positioning statements are also structured in a very dry format which doesn’t exactly inspire creativity (eg “For [audience], [company] is the [product/service] that [benefit] because it has [reason]”).

A key message sounds simple but it’s not, because it must meet two important criteria:

1. It needs to be independently compelling and believable. You, your company and your customers need to buy into it. No fluffy statements or BS.
2. It needs to be differentiated from competition. It doesn’t matter if your message is compelling if another company is already claiming it. It will fall on deaf ears or simply look disingenuous.

Note that the key message is not:

- A product description or functional spec. These only state what the product does, not the benefit it provides.
- A tagline, manifesto (sorry, Holstee) or ad campaign. These are creative interpretations of the key message.
- A mission or vision statement. These focus predominantly on the future, whereas a key message is grounded in the present.

Not surprisingly, a well-crafted key message takes time. Brand strategists at big advertising agencies spend weeks or months on this one statement, laying the foundation for creative folks who then find clever ways to express it. It simply doesn’t come out of thin air.

But why should startups care? I’ll put things into perspective:

- Most people will not have tried your app before you tell them about it, so your message will be a determining factor in changing their behavior.
- The novelty of the word “startup” is wearing thin as more and more people use the term, so just saying “hey, I’m cool” won’t be enough to grab people’s attention.
- A great message helps to differentiate roughly similar technologies, which is increasingly common in the startup world. Who remembers Gowalla or Jaiku?
- People are already exposed to 5,000+ marketing messages each day, so as different devices and platforms proliferate, their attention span will only get worse.

WHERE STARTUPS FAIL

The problem is that most startup founders approach the key message in the wrong way. Many write cheesy taglines that don’t do justice to their product. Others craft key messages that are over functional and uninspiring. Still others try to say too much and never figure out what aspect of their product really makes people tick. Their key message usually looks something like this:

1) App X is a private social network for category Y.
This message is too functional and boring. It doesn’t explain why people should care about the product, or why they should use it instead of an obvious alternative (eg Facebook). To avoid running into this trap, think about the reason behind what you built and articulate that better.

2) App X lets you easily share photos with friends.
This message is not the least bit differentiating, as there are dozens of other apps that do the same thing (eg Instagram). Referencing a small feature like photo filters will probably not help - a larger philosophy or process is necessary to stand out. If you still have a hard time articulating your point of difference, you may want to revisit your core product. Note: a category message like “simple photo sharing” only works if you’re a first mover.

3) App X allows you to access your social history.
This message is focused too narrowly on one specific product feature, which means it will become obsolete if the business grows and the app adds new functionality. It would be better to broaden the message to a larger benefit, such as the positive feelings people derive from memories. 

4) App X does A, B and C.
You can only say one thing before you start losing your audience’s attention. So either pick the most prominent statement of the three, or find a thematic link to join them. Note: if you have a two-sided market like Lore, Skillshare and Codecademy (students + teachers) there are clever ways to express both sides of the story in one statement. As this gets into messaging architecture, it will be the topic of another post.

COMPELLING KEY MESSAGES

So what does a compelling key message look like? To illustrate, I’ve compiled a few examples of top startups (and one VC) and explored several potential areas of focus for each. These statements are based on my assumptions of each business and what I think would grab the attention of their customers.

Duolingo
Duolingo makes language learning accessible to all. (focus: supporting a bigger cause)
Duolingo is a fun, social way to immerse yourself in a new culture. (focus: community)
Duolingo unlocks your potential as you master a new language. (focus: personal potential, game mechanics)

LaunchRock
LaunchRock guides startups through their earliest stages of growth. (focus: guidance, trusted partner)
LaunchRock supercharges the marketing efforts of startups. (focus: value add)
LaunchRock is an expert in launching and growing new companies. (focus: thought leadership)

Branch
Branch promotes high-quality dialogue on the web. (focus: dialogue)
Branch empowers people to engage in stimulating debate. (focus: empowerment)
Branch is your window into fascinating perspectives. (focus: different opinions)

Airbnb
Airbnb lets you live like the locals. (focus: the experience)
Airbnb opens the doors to homes around the world. (focus: access)
Airbnb inspires a richer travel experience. (focus: optimizing travel)

Bitly
Bitly makes web links more powerful and dynamic. (focus: web links) 
Bitly lets you organize and share interesting web content. (focus: organizing information) 
Bitly is the best way to experience stuff you care about online. (focus: experience)

Brewster
Brewster makes you a better friend. (focus: personal betterment)
Brewster creates more meaningful relationships. (focus: better relationships)
Brewster spurs you to take action on your address book. (focus: GSD)

Wanderfly
Wanderfly inspires excitement and anticipation for your journey. (actual key message)

Huntsy
Huntsy helps you realize your professional potential. (actual key message)

foursquare
4sq turns your life into a game. (focus: fun, gamification)
4sq helps you discover new places. (focus: location discovery)
4sq lets you make the most of where you are. (focus: optimizing life)

These key messages reflect foursquare’s evolution from a simple mobile game to a tool that lets you optimize your life better through its understanding of your location. 

Union Square Ventures
USV is the champion of networks that create, empower and transform. (focus: power of networks)
USV promotes an interconnected and open web. (focus: connectedness)
USV fuels the exchange of ideas in a connected world. (focus: idea exchange)

This example is taken from my USV design brief post. In one of my comments, I suggest to Fred Wilson that he should first articulate USV’s key message before doing the logo redesign.

WRITING GUIDELINES

Now that you have a better feeling on a what a compelling key message looks like, here are a few guidelines for crafting your own:

- Keep it short and snappy. Convey one thing in ten words or less.
- Focus on the benefit. Remember, people don’t care about your product’s functionality, but the benefit it brings them. Get as emotional as possible.
- Use action words. Get your audience jazzed up with words like “empower,” “promote” and “supercharge,” and when possible, avoid passive words like “help,” “let” and “enable.”
- Allow room for future growth. Don’t be so specific that your message limits future communications, especially as you build out your feature set and functionality.
- Use positive statements. Say what you do, rather than what you don’t do. Also, avoid language that articulates your value relative to competition.

In terms of the process, I find that it helps to write out all of your startup’s potential key messages in a Google Doc so you can explore various facets of your product. As you elaborate on each specific message, evaluate its pros and cons to determine what specifically you like about it and what you don’t, as this will help you refine the language. You should then compare the key message against your competition to ensure that it holds up in the market. Once you have a few options, gather feedback from your co-founders and outside parties to help pick the winner.

I can’t stress enough the importance of crafting a compelling key message. It’s the foundation of everything you say about your company. As such, it should be one of the top priorities at your startups, an absolute necessity for getting it off the ground. Just because most startups have crappy messaging doesn’t mean yours should, too.

So take the time to understand the value you’re providing your customers that others don’t. Then craft a killer message that inspires action, sets you apart from competitors and makes it easy to communicate your product to the world.

A few days ago, Albert Wenger announced that Union Square Ventures is launching a talent audition for designers to help the company update its visual identity. The competition, which is hosted on USV portfolio company Behance, runs until October 31 and allows designers to submit their best pieces of work for consideration by the partners. The top 5 projects will be selected as semifinalists and paid $1,500 each for responding to the brief, while the winner collects $12,500.

The contest has already generated a lot of debate on the post’s comment thread, mostly around the process itself. Some folks have argued that selecting five designers doesn’t foster the right relationship, others complain that great design work doesn’t come from multiple submissions, while others disagree about the money awarded at different stages of the proposal. Most of these points are valid and something for USV to keep in mind. 

But what interests me most is the design brief itself. In its current form, the design brief reads a little more like an instruction manual than a creative document, and it’s missing some key information. Perhaps the partners are waiting to share additional information at a later point, or maybe they’ve never engaged in a formal design process. Whatever the case, their point is not coming across in a compelling way. Having worked with designers in the past, I know that they would want to hear more inspiring language about what USV believes, where it’s going and what it wants its design identity to communicate. They would also appreciate more specific information about the project to steer their thought process in the right direction and submit portfolio pieces that best align with USV’s goals.

So I’m taking the liberty of writing the design brief in the way that I believe articulates the idea more effectively.

In USV’s case, the design brief refers largely to a logo brief. While the logo does not constitute the entire look and feel of a brand, it is the most important part as it sets the tone for the color palette, style, iconography, etc. Once the logo has been finalized, the rest of the pieces will flow from it.

Before we get started, I’d like to share a few top-level guidelines for making a great logo:

It should to be memorable. This is easier to preach than to practice, but the idea is to make something that stands out and doesn’t look like everything else around it. If all VCs are doing the same thing (dark colors, stern typography), why not stand out and do something different? Just think about how an apple became a symbol of a high-tech company.

It should have an ownable mark. A mark can be an icon or symbol, but it could also be a style (font, color, pattern) or even a character (Abe from Timehop) that is unique to your company. A good mark is something that cannot be copied easily, so if you’re relying on a free font (e.g. Lobster), that’s probably not a good idea.

It should be infused with meaning. Most logos and visual styles look pretty for the sake of looking pretty. The good ones, however, are infused with meaning. Meaning can be straightforward and immediately understood (network = nodes), or preferably more abstract (network = series of circles joined together), allowing the brain to make an implicit connection before the concept is fully processed.

With this in mind, here’s the design brief on a fairly standard template. You’ll notice that I use language that is simple and straightforward, and speaks to the emotional elements that will inspire designers. I’m also making certain assumptions about USV’s business that may not necessarily be true, but the content, structure and presentation of the brief will not change.

UNION SQUARE VENTURES DESIGN BRIEF

1. BACKGROUND
Union Square Ventures (USV) is looking to re-imagine its visual identity. Since its last design iteration in 2005, the company’s beliefs and the Internet in general have evolved significantly, creating a disconnect with its current visual identity and spurring the need for a fresh look and feel.

2. PRODUCT/SERVICE
USV is a New York-based venture capital firm that invests in technology startups. The firm develops relationships with entrepreneurs typically in the very early stages of a business when it demonstrates a lot of potential, and offers them both financial ($250K+) and advisory support. Its 9-person team manages over $450M in assets and has invested in top startups like foursquare, Twitter, Etsy, Skillshare, Kickstarter and SoundCloud. USV’s philosophy is to invest in companies that build large networks of engaged users to replace traditional hierarchical structures. Union Square has a website/blog at www.usv.com and tweets at @usv.

3. COMPETITION
USV competes with other technology-focused venture capital (VC) firms in New York, Silicon Valley and other major startup hubs. Some top VCs include Andreessen Horowitz, Accel, First Round, Sequoia, Benchmark, General Catalyst and Spark. The firm also faces increased competition from individual angel investors, many of whom can be found on AngelList, as well as alternative investment platforms such as Kickstarter (which is incidentally a USV portfolio company).

4. DIFFERENTIATION
USV is know for its investment leadership. It is considered the top VC firm in New York and one best in the world primarily because it invests in extremely successful startups. The company also differentiates itself through its openness and transparency. In 2005, Union Square Ventures made a bold move by transforming its website into a blog, and today, its not uncommon for its posts to receive 100+ comments and spawn separate discussions. Many of the firm’s initiatives are completely transparent, from hiring analysts to discussing the future of a particular industry to conducting a talent audition for this very brief. The company has also recently solidified its investment thesis around the ability of networks to empower individuals, transform the status quo and create new value.

5. AUDIENCE
USV’s primary audience is entrepreneurs who are looking to grow their business. These individuals, typically recent college grads in their 20s, are looking for not only financial capital (money), but also advice, support, a strong network and other intangible benefits. As the market for new tech ideas becomes more competitive, they are placing an increasing emphasis on these value-adds and being more selective about VCs who share a common vision and beliefs. They want their VCs to be forward-thinking, cutting-edge and even carry a little hype, because these attributes reflect back on their companies.

USV’s secondary audience is limited partners (LPs), extremely affluent and typically older individuals (ages 40+) who provide the firm with money to invest in startups. These LPs may not necessarily understand the inner workings of the Internet, but are attracted to a VC’s reputation, vision and past returns. 

6. KEY MESSAGE
This section is the hardest to define without consulting USV’s partners (and may require an exploration of its own), so I’m providing several different options:

a) USV is the champion of networks that create, empower and transform.
b) USV promotes an interconnected and open web.
c) USV fuels the exchange of ideas in a connected world.  

7. ATTRIBUTES
Connected. USV is a network of companies, ideas and relationships.
Open. USV is open and transparent in its thoughts and processes.
Innovative. USV exemplifies the excitement and energy of web, helping to shape it through investment in great ideas.
Resolute. USV is a company of action which does what it believes in with conviction.
Generous. USV promotes a better web through its thought leadership and community involvement.

8. PERCEPTIONS
We want people to think that USV is:

Unrivaled. No one can match the firm’s investment prowess.
Forward-thinking. USV is always at the forefront of the web.
Inclusive. USV brings people together to exchange ideas.

9. PREFERENCES
- Fonts X, Y and Z.
- Colors X, Y and Z.
- Logos X, Y and Z. 

10. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
- Avoid category conventions (dark, serious, boring, corporate).
- Stay away from Web 2.0 design (bubbly, cartoony, childish).
- Design the color palette to work well with both the logo and website.
- Take risks! We prefer original ideas over the tried and true. 

11. REQUIREMENTS
- Logo to use primarily in digital media (web, mobile, etc) that scales nicely when small and preferably has a horizontal lockup.
- Style guide that explains all fonts, styles and assets and how to use them on the web.

So that’s it, a design brief that articulates USV’s promise and direction in creative terms. My hope is that this will help the company develop an inspiring visual identity that truly lives up to its potential (and in the process, put an end to questions like these).

In the same way that USV promotes an open dialogue for all of its blog posts, I’d love to hear your thoughts and comments on this exercise. I’m particularly interested in the opinions of designers who are submitting their work for consideration on Behance.

I’m excited to say that Wanderfly has been acquired by TripAdvisor!

Wanderfly was my first true foray into the startup world, and it’s been quite a ride building the company over the past 3+ years. Like other tech businesses, Wanderfly started as nothing more than an idea, but now it’s one the most beautiful and social ways to discover travel on the web. Throughout the process, I’ve learned everything from fundraising and writing legal docs to hiring talent and running finance and operations. I even had a chance to do my real job - business development and marketing.

One of the most important things I learned at Wanderfly is the value of laying a strong foundation. By that I mean establishing the right culture and processes to help build a sustainable business. It often means investing time in things that don’t necessarily have a payoff today (even when there’s the temptation to cut corners), and overcoming chaos and uncertainty with a clear - yet nimble - plan of action. I’ll be exploring this theme a lot on this blog to help answer a very common marketing question: given a wide range of things that we could do, which ones should we focus on and how?

I’m excited about the Wanderfly’s future and wish my co-founders all the best as they take the company to a bigger and brighter future. I’m equally excited to share the knowledge I’ve gained building the business to help inspire current and future entrepreneurs. There is much to discuss and analyze, and this is only the very beginning.