EP054: John Mullins & The Customer-Funded Business

In The Customer-Funded Business, best-selling author John Mullins uncovers five novel approaches that scrappy and innovative 21st century entrepreneurs working in companies large and small have ingeniously adapted from their predecessors like Dell, Gates, and the Zieglers. In a world where three out of four venture-backed startups fail, customer-funded businesses offer a sure-footed path to starting, financing, or growing your venture.

John Mullins is an Associate Professor of Management Practice at the London Business School and a worldwide speaker and educator. He is a regularly published author at Harvard Business Review and MIT Sloan Management Review.

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Key Takeaways:

[1:05] The big idea behind The Customer-Funded Business book.

[3:30] Raising capital is a huge distraction. There is a better way.

[6:57] Does Venture Capital funding ever make sense?

[9:55] Three out of four VC-funded companies fail to return the capital that goes into them.

[12:26] The pay-in-advance and subscription models allow entrepreneurs to collect a customer’s money before delivering the product.

[16:54] The scarcity-based model uses a limited time offer to lure an immediate purchase.

[23:49] The key to a successful service-to-product model is segregating the two offerings.

[30:40] Airbnb is a good example of the Matchmaker model.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Customer-Funded Business: Start, Finance, or Grow Your Business with Your Customers’ Cash, by John Mullins, Ph.D.
• How to Finance and Grow Your Startup Without VC
• Built to Sell
• Praxent
• @PraxentSoftware on Twitter