Spring 2020 Curriculum

Students will all do intros and learn how to write a short intro statement. Directors will give an overview of Venture School, history, student introductions & ideas, curriculum, milestones, and expectations. We will cover mental health and misconceptions about entrepreneurship. Key terms, the St. Louis startup ecosystem, and tools needed for the program.

Students will all pitch their idea for 2 mins and receive feedback. Director will teach naming, domains, one-page websites, and how to write a survey. Mentor will be chosen to talk about naming and how to develop early-stage messaging.

Students will each explain their idea with their website on-screen. Director will cover the philosophy of customer development, expectations, branding/logos. Mentors will be chosen who have developed an idea or company through customer development, and what they would have done differently in the past.

Students will share first customer surveys and feedback. Director will cover basic product design, scoping, and basic database design. Mentor will be chosen to talk about steps to design a beta product, writing a scope, and developing a beta product.

Students will share their initial high-level scope. Director will cover software templates, outsourcing, and finding a developer overseas. Mentors will cover their MVP, first scopes, and what they learned along the way.

Students will share their product templates and how they want to design their products. Director will cover competitor research & business model concepts: freemium, tiered pricing, annual vs monthly. Mentors will cover pricing, competitive research, and testing pricing, models.

Students will share a competitive research and pricing strategies. Director will cover key metrics of SAAS, KPIs, landing pages, how to launch paid Facebook ads for testing. Mentors will cover online marketing for launch and grow a marketing plan.

Students will share success from test ads. Director will talk about selling, sales pitches, and when to hire a sales rep. Mentors will cover how to sell to target customers including SMBS and enterprise.

Students will give their verbal sales pitch. Director will talk about operational/accounting tools. Mentor will talk about lawyers, IP, Trademarks vs Patents, and what to pay for vs do yourself.

Students will give their verbal sales pitch. Director will teach fundraising presentation outlines and keys to fundraising presentations vs pitch contests. Mentors will share their pitch decks and keys to fundraising.

Students will do their first pitch. Director will talk about investor communication, update outline, and email tools. Mentor will talk about types of investors, angels/VC/PE, how they raised money, finding your first investors, and how to work with investors afterward: updates, board meetings, etc.

All students give a 5-7 minute pitch for feedback. Directors, students, and mentors who can attend will give feedback for revisions.

Students will get 7 min pitch and comments from investor/mentor pannel. Startups will have a table set up for the rest of Venture Cafe to demo and pitch if product ready.