Three Reasons Why Your Tech Startup Will Fail

A tech startup is an excellent way to change the landscape of a particular industry or truly make a name for yourself in the digital sphere. There's never been more resources at our disposal nor people ready to adopt new digital products. However, this is not to say the market for startups is an easy sell. Here are three crucial elements, that if not taken into consideration, can cause any tech startup to fail.

1. It isn't cool.
From the user experience to the market materials, in the competitive world that comprises startup culture your business needs to be cutting edge (not a remake of Pinterest). The idea must connect with a simple need that an audience you can reach will quickly understand. The question of, Why? Should be answered within five seconds.

The branding should be as intuitive as the user experience. It should syndicate seamlessly with other platforms (sign-ins through primary social networks speed up the process of getting started and enable easier cross-network promotion). Special attention to mobile is a must. Responsive website design for both tablet and mobile is a must. Geotargeting should be strongly considered, but may not be applicable for all. You are selling to the top digital decision makers -- people that know what their time and information is worth. They also know what developments exist and every step you miss is another ping of doubt as to whether investing their time in your app will be a complete waste.

Is it worth their time? Is it worth their friends' time?

2. Your profit margins are too far out, and you're not prepared for them.
As any business goes, your startup is only as valuable as the people you have using it. It doesn't matter if you angel investor dropped five million into your project -- if no one uses it, no one gets paid.

With that in mind, who you hire needs to be aware it could be months before they get paid. This doesn't mean you can't recruit top talent, but it does mean you are going to need to pander a bit to land and keep them.

Your leadership must be a top notch relationship builder. They must identify which top talent has potential as brand evangelists. Once talent is hired on, that leadership must come through on every promise made. Running a quality company on a shoestring budget is not cheap, it is paid for by the blood and sweat of leadership meeting the expectations of their employees. These employees are not working for your company because it is a job, it is because they are passionate about what they do and who they work for.

And yes, a few interns aren't a bad idea either. Just please be sure to reimburse them better than the man delivering your company sandwiches.

3. It doesn't make enough money.
We've all seen "The Social Network" and listened to Justin Timberlake, as Sean Parker, spout to Jesse Eisenberg, as Mark Zuckerberg, that trying to make money off the early Facebook was a big mistake. That no one knew what it was yet, and to (I'm paraphrasing here) let it gestate to maturity.

Yes, this is great advice, but on the other side of the coin eventually your investors will come knocking, your staff will want to be fed, and all those promises you made will need to be delivered. Facebook was revolutionary, but we don't need to reinvent the wheel. Tech business models have been developed with real business marketing dollars that users are growing increasingly familiar with. Adopting, or at least considering, a few of these strategies is a great step toward giving your employees and investors a plan.

A plan gives order to chaos and even if it isn't how it probably will work out, it gives people a sense of control so they can get on with their best work and the idea that you all believe in can truly flourish.

Had any experience with a failed or successful startup? Would love to hear about your experience.

Foursquare to Release New iOS

It’s no secret that Foursquare’s success story has grown stagnant; and without action soon, the company could join its buried startup brothers and sisters or be forced to sell its wealth of data to a network a bit more comfortable with action.

But Foursquare hasn’t thrown in the towel. According to TechCrunch, Foursquare’s new iOS release will be a game changer.

Instead of simply recording user data of places visited and giving incentives to be mayor or make a visit (a business partnership it’s hard to say they’ve capitalized on to its full potential), Foursquare will now make recommendations before you even make a decision or know what your next destination is.

Not sure exactly how this would look, but I would imagine it to recommend restaurants around your common meal times and current proximity, bars depending on where friends are currently partying or movies pending recent releases and past habits.

It's a brilliant move for Foursquare; a rising concept in marketing that has been pushed since the late nineties with the tech revolution and the influence of social networks--people are making decisions earlier than ever before and with more influence from peers, meaning to be relevant marketers must get inside these communities and appeal to customers before they even know what they need.

We know Foursquare is a data gold mine, but that isn't enough to beat out competitors. Foursquare needs to take action. We just hope they shape and present it to the user in a way that is intuitive and doesn’t freak them out.

Geo-Targeting, It's More than Foursquare

Geo-targeting isn't just about Foursquare. It isn't just about kitschy bargains, loyalty rewards or even becoming mayor of your local coffee shop. The big picture lies within tailoring marketing strategies on a national and international scale.

Just by knowing where someone lives, marketers can predict weather, culture, holidays, nationality, and ultimately, behavior effecting those consumers. Imagine going to Macy's website and before you can even shop, a pop-up says "It's supposed to snow tomorrow. Our store location three blocks from you has these three coats for sale." Or imagine you're a retailer located in different states and have different prices for each state. Now, those prices can change depending on the IP location. Seems simple right? Not exactly.

While it may be easy to obtain IP addresses and develop needs for this asset, to actually make it feasible is another matter. Right now, geo-targeting only identifies a site visitor's true location no more than 85% of the time (according to Geoffrey Hueter, chief technology officer at Certona Corp.). Also, geo-targeting is not the answer to everything. It should still be combined with other information companies have on their consumers to produce the most tailored results.

All-in-all, while geo-marketing isn't perfected, it is undeniably a tool for the future and retailers and marketers alike would be wise to watch its development.