Glossary

angel investors. Angels are “accredited” investors (who meet certain SEC criteria for net worth and income.  Angels usually have little personal relationship with the founders. Usually they are investing in startups as part of their overall investment portfolio.

audience. The audience are the people who see your work. The audience is generally larger than your customer base and may include some of your customers.

business owner vs. entrepreneur. The key difference between an entrepreneur (of any type) and a small business owner (which are often confused) is one is searching to find a business model that works (entrepreneur) while the other is managing a business on a proven model (small business owner).

content business.  A business whose core product is content, such as is the case in newspapers, television stations, films, video games, apps, or media companies.

crowdfunding. A method of funding innovative product ideas that are too early for investors. In this method, innovators reach out to like-minded supporters, early adopters and fans, who are enthusiastic about backing early stage ideas. The crowd not only contributes money to develop the product but offers something just as valuable: early market validation for the product, and a chance for the entrepreneur to build reputation and credibility.

desirability-feasibility-viability. The most valuable design sits at the intersection of three questions: can we do this; should we do this; do they want this?

elevator pitch. An elevator pitch is a business pitch or sales pitch told as a brief synopsis for the purpose of gaining the listener’s interest in the hopes they will request more information or request to see the complete pitch.

engagement. 1. Any physical action that can be taken with digital content; e.g. a video view; a click or scroll; a like, share or retweet; reading a web page. 2. The practice of identifying, listening to, interacting with and activating digital audiences.

engagement manager. A person who manages connections to and conversations with audiences. Sometimes called a “community manager” or “social media manager.”

engagement rate. The total number of engagements for a piece of digital content divided by the total number of the content’s impressions. A measure of how “engaging” the content is.

entrepreneur. An entrepreneur is someone with a market-driven pursuit of a conceptual idea, who seeks a viable business model that succeeds in a target market.

freelance consultant. Someone who works independently to provide a service to a client. Typically consultants have control over how, when and where they perform the work. They are not considered employees. They are also subject to additional taxes that an employer normally pays.

freemium. A scenario in which people can use parts of a product for free, but must pay for upgraded functionality or features.

goal. A company’s overall high-level business goals.

sensor journalism. A type of journalism in which sensor technology is used to collect data and journalists analyze and report on that data.

impressions. The number of times a digital platform served a piece of content to its users.

initial public offerings. When a company (and investors) first sell shares to the public (e.g. the stock market), the company can raise significant amounts of money to fund operations, growth, or new products. This also offers the investors (and founders) a chance to sell some of their stock for (sometimes significant) cash.

intrapreneur. An employee who innovates and thinks entrepreneurially to develop new lines of business, programs, or products within an existing organization or corporation.

market risk. The risk that a new product will not be needed enough that consumers will pay for it.

measurable objective. The specific, measurable metrics you will track to know if you have successfully executed your strategy. (You could say, our objective is to attain X percent user growth in a certain time period, for instance.)

membership. A subscription model under which the content can either be free or paid, but users who purchase a membership receive perks and bonus materials, exclusive access to supplemental materials and so forth.

paywall. A mechanism by which readers or viewers must pay in order to access content, such as on a news site.

people risk. The risk the founders or team members of a venture won’t be successful managing the product or the business.

private placement memorandum. A private placement memorandum, or PPM, is also known as an offering document and includes disclosures for investors.

product risk. The unknowns surrounding whether a proposed product can be created or built at all.

prospectus. A prospectus is a detailed summary of a business plan put in writing. If a company wishes to sell public stock or to offer other financial instruments for sale, a complete prospectus includes many financial disclosures and the price of shares and number of shares to be offered.

reach. The number of accounts or users a brand or an individual piece of content was shown or served to.

small business owner. Someone who owns a for-profit, U.S. company that is independent and not dominant in its industry, according to government NAICS codes. “Small business” is a specific classification of business that may be eligible for some government contracts. Whether a business qualifies is based on “size standards,”^[1] which take into account profits, number of employees and other factors.

strategies. The how of how a company plans to achieve its business goals–its approach.       

tactic.  The actions a company takes to meet its agreed-upon objectives.  

tweet. A posting made on the social network Twitter.

technology startup. A scalable company providing a technology product, platform, or service.

user personas. A tool that entrepreneurs can use to drill down into the the ideal audience member and adds psychographic information such as behaviors and lifestyle information.

venture capitalists. A VC is a professional fund manager. They aggregate investment funding from large institutions then make investments in high-growth companies for potential high returns. VCs need their funds to make an extraordinary return on investment.