Start Telling People: The Guide to Marketing Strategy and Brand Building for Future-Defining Startups

At last, a book focused on revealing the marketing strategies, tactics, and opportunities unique to early-stage startups as they emerge, grow, and change the world!

Written by Chris Matthews, Silicon Valley-based marketing & brand consultant.

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“If you’re a hardware founder, ‘Start Telling People’ will stop you from screwing up your biggest opportunities to shine.”

Andra Keay
Managing Director of Silicon Valley Robotics,
IEEE Entrepreneurship Vice Chair, 2023
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At some point, every early-stage startup needs to stop being a secret and start telling people. As your company begins to take shape, building fast attention and strong demand become essential - and just buying ads won't be enough.

Matthews provides frameworks, examples, and interviews that reinforce the book’s central thesis: marketing is a discipline, not just an activity. The book offers practical, jargon-free ideas that seamlessly blend marketing fundamentals with the functional realities of fast-paced, growth-focused startups.

Key topics: how to design & build your first marketing team, mastering product demos, building customer-centric go-to-market models, and team dynamics. Plus, how it all links together to build the foundations for a cohesive brand.

Why You Need to Read "Start Telling People":

• Startup Marketing 101: To treat marketing as a discipline from the beginning is a startup superpower, unavailable to legacy brands. Learn how the growth journey can be faster, smoother, and more profitable.
• Master Product Demos: Delivering a compelling display of what your product can do for the consumer is core to the growth and survival of your startup. Follow the disciplined guidelines for demo protocols to craft compelling stories and ensure flawless execution.
• Balancing Creativity and Data: Learn to harmonize the art of creative marketing with data-driven precision to increase confidence in decisions and leapfrog competition.
• Craft Exceptional Customer Experiences: Discover how adopting a customer-centric framework for your go-to-market strategy can foster fruitful, long-term customer relationships, advocacy, and flywheel growth..
• Power of Alliances: Uncover the pivotal role that partnerships between internal teams play in developing marketing as a discipline within your startup.
• Innovative Positioning: Gain groundbreaking insights into how your startup can claim your niche, define categories, and distinguish itself within your competitive landscape - even (or especially) when the landscape is entirely new.
• Future-Proofing Your Startup: Build a long-term marketing vision that meets the current needs of your startup while understanding that change inevitably comes with growth.

Matthews' clear, engaging narrative, combined with actionable advice, transforms this book into a unique and relevant resource for early-stage startup founders, investors, and marketers. Order now, and Start Telling people!