Hey friends 👋
Saturday night at 9pm. While the rest of the world was doing… literally anything else, Cameron and I went live from the Startup Challenge to talk business models.
Specifically: how most founders get lost in what we jokingly called the Bermuda Triangle of Business Models — where you think you’re making progress but you’re actually going in circles.
So in this lighthearted (and hopefully insightful) live session, we walked through:
Why your business model is not your revenue model
How to think about the four core components: Who, What, How, and Why
What happens when you get one of those wrong (spoiler: the whole model shifts)
The real reason “cheaper and faster” isn’t a value proposition
Why your business model is your product (rather than your solution) — especially if you’re fundraising
How to use business model patterns to explore alternative models you might not have considered
We also drew (badly and in real-time) the magic triangle, brought up the importance of decision-making evidence, answered live questions from founders in the room, and briefly lost the lights in Cameron’s office thanks to a ill-tempered motion sensor.
If you’ve ever slapped a business model slide into a deck without validating it — this one’s for you.
—jdm
PS: I’m live every Friday at noon PST right here on Substack. Join me in the app:
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