12+1 tips to get the most out of Startupxplore as a startup

Are you the time-crunched CEO of a startup that’s on Startupxplore…

…and you want to make the most out of your time on our growing community?

Long question, huh? Well, how else could we prove that we do know you’re busy and at the same time hungry?

To help figure out what startups and their team members should be doing on our community to maximize their visibility and time, we are sharing here some best practices and tips.

The technicalities

1. Exist. Edit your profile.
In Startupxplore, all users have their own profiles as ‘people’ (1). As users you can add organizations, for example, startups (2).

Think of facebook profiles and facebook fanpages. Or Linkedin profiles and Linkedin company pages. And so on. For instance, my profile is: https://startupxplore.com/en/person/elena-benito and the startup page I am a member of is: https://startupxplore.com/en/startups/startupxplore.

To edit your profile is pretty simple. There’s a big orange button ‘Edit profile’ you can’t miss! Once you’re editing you’ll see a pencil icon that lets you edit each field. Pretty intuitive.

What type of information should you share in your bio? Well, we recommend you being yourself. But if it fits your style try spicing it up with something that catches attention. Imagine an investor on startupxplore who has spotted your startup and wants to see who’s behind. And your profile is empty or half-empty or the bio is just one of too many…

2. Relate. Add your startup.
Relate your profile with a startup. Do you have to be the CEO of a startup to add it? Nope. Any team member can add a startup. Just remember not to mess it up: people are just people and organizations are organizations!

3. Stand out. Make your page sexy.
The same way we said above. Include pictures of your products, services, app. Who cares if they’re mockups? Show something to the world. You can also include videos (thinking of a pitch?), and pictures of your team (time to show you’re human maybe?)…Grab the best of your videos from youtube or vimeo, or the best pictures from your cellphone, facebook, flickr. You can also add infographies as images.

Well, imagination is the limit. This is your showcase.

Not that what I want to frighten you but what are you going to do when someone searches your startup name on Google and your startupxplore profile ranks the highest and your page is well…blank or abandoned?The monster closet

4. Be active. Publish updates to be seen!
In your startup profile, there’s a section to add updates. Yes, we are working to get this integrated with social media channels but in the meantime, you can share your progress here.

Now, what kind of messages? Well, leave the ‘time for beers’ sort of updates for facebook or twitter. Here we recommend you to share as much as possible about your progress. Think of press coverage, roadmap features progress (is there something on the way that’s cool and you want to use as bait?), team members welcoming messages, new partnerings or any sort of announcements. And probably the most useful: just publish you are seeking funding, and the requisites. We’d recommend you to publish at least twice a week!

I went for a random search and picked Chicisimo (not because our CEO Javier Megías is one of their investors…). They did great by sharing this news: new apps coming. But they included this in the bio section not at the updates’ section, where it should go.

Why?

Because the updates are shown in the markets’ radars. When you browse a given tag (location, industry), you see a list of things ‘happening’, and the updates are one of the types of ‘things happening’. So, if you put your progress on the bio and not as updates, you’ll be missing quite a few chances. Investors who are monitoring interests, say your industry and your location, won’t get to know what your startup is up to.

5. Position yourself. Target and get targeted on our radars.
You can define your interests as a professional and/or CEO at your profile page and also set the interests of your startup at the organization page.

For instance. My interests at my own profile:

And the interests of the startup I am a member of:

Why are these interests so important? Well, these are basically ‘tags’. And our livefeed is a radar that searches activity on any tag.

6. Share. Grab your profile and take it elsewhere.
We are working on a widget that you can take to your own websites. Meanwhile remember to add your startup profile to all your channels and corporate materials. You can use our shortened link: sxplr.com/your-startup.

The Holy Grails (yes, there’s more than one…)

7. How do I explore markets?
Easy. Click on any tag (=interest). We are working to integrate this with curated digests served chill at your inbox, at your convenience. Meanwhile, pay us a visit. Just set a routine (see below).

8. How can we get top featured at homepage?
We feature top startups, investors and VCs and accelerators. On our homepage, soon on our digest and also on a forthcoming section at our social channels. On what grounds? Our staff decides upon a several list of requisites: completeness of profile, recent activity, returning frequency. Just be here and be proudly active and we’ll love in return. And viceversa.

9. How do I find an investor who fits my project?
First, set interests: markets by industry and location. If you’ve been reading till here you know what I’m talking about. Second, browse and monitor the updates, and monitor whether there are investors or not (investors have a green tag assigned to their names). We’ll be releasing in a near future better filtering and searching options to easily match industries and locations with investors.

When you’re at an investor profile, see what their investment criteria is. This is the Holy Grail for startups. No more wasted time on searching the right investor.

Let’s take François Derbaix investor’s profile. He’s included his investment criteria, so if they fit yours…can you hear bells ringing?

10. How can I connect with an investor?
Easy, don’t go that fast, cowboy. We are deploying lean. In less than 4 months we’ve launched this rocket. Just give us some days to land on the moon. Of course, you’ll be able to contact an investor, if you are an active startup on Startupxplore. If you love us, we’ll love in return, remember? We want both investors and startups have meaningful connections and save time. We’ll notify the most active startups when this option is ready. So create a compelling presence on Startupxplore and you’ll be rewarded.

11. How can I get funded?
There’s a coming soon post by Javier Megías about the way you can get funded via Startupxplore. Basically it’s all about syndicate funding. The winning option for both startups and investors that’s revolutionizing the startup world. We are currently launching some private syndicates with a selected group of interested investors. Email us if you want to know more.

The extra tips: how often in Startupxplore?

As long and as much you want.

12. Add SXPLR as a routine to your business and communication tactics. We’ll soon share here with you how real startups are using SXPLR. Time-crunched startups like yours.

12+1. This routine can be daily or weekly or at the given time range you set. For instance, depending on how many news you have to share, you can share updates daily or weekly. And you can allocate time to monitor markets and people once a week, instead.

We are building a knowledge base and a FAQ at the same time we are developing new features. We’ll keep you, dear startupxplorers, informed. Meanwhile, do please ask us on our social media home, we are happy to help:

• Twitter: http://twitter.com/startupxplore.
• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/startupxplore.
• Google+: https://plus.google.com/+Startupxplore-community.
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/startupxplore.
• I’m the lonely type: ok, send us an email here.

And if you’re on Startupxplore, you can ask us directly by clicking on the chat window.

Are you an investor on Startupxplore? Stay tuned, next week, it’ll be your turn.

And if you’re not on our community yet, where have you been all these days? Welcome onboard.

Get found. Get funded.

Join Us

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Featured photo by Wiertz Sebastien.