ReadWriteStart

Entrepreneurs demonstrating their latest ideas at the EMO Spring 2012 conference showed that inspiration travels in many directions. The young companies that took the stage Wednesday to kick off the three-day startup fest in Santa Clara, California, demonstrated a surprisingly wide variety of software and Web services.

Unfortunately, one thing most of the new companies share is the lack of a clear plan for building a profitable business. Typical for today's startups - particularly in the mobile and cloud markets, but even in e-commerce - the strategy of choice seems to be building as large of a user base as possible, then trying to figure out how to make money later.

In the Internet startup space, some companies choose to develop enterprise solutions they hope will attract large corporate contracts. While some entrepreneurs have experience giving investors their 30 second pitch, corporate CIOs are a bit of a different beast when it comes to selling a product. During the first day of product pitches and launches at DEMO this week, a panel moderated by Computerworld's executive editor Julia King focused on this very issue. Here are some tips for enterprise startups looking to snag those big enterprise contracts.

The two largest startup ecosystems within the United States are arguably Silicon Valley and New York City, but there's a whole lot of land between the east and west coast. Smack dab in the middle of the country is Chicago, and not long ago we told you about a demo contest hosted by venture consulting firm midVentures that brought a bit of TechCrunch50 flair to the Windy City. This September, the firm is hosting another event in Chicago that looks to be the largest startup conference in the Midwest.

Since we published our Never Mind the Valley article on the growing startup scene in Chicago, I have received several emails about various events and startups that call the city home. The technology culture in Chicago is quickly expanding, just as it is in most major metropolitan areas, because startups as a culture are breaking further and further into the mainstream. As we've shown with our series of profiles, no longer is Silicon Valley the one true home to startups; Boulder, Austin, New York, Portland and many others have stepped up as worthy contenders for national (and international) startup attention.

With DEMOfall 09 now behind us, pitch season has given us a lot of "Wow": solid businesses with promising applications. The majority of new ventures we're seeing today are variations on familiar themes, new combinations of old technology, and niche plays. Not all of them have convincing business models, but the bigger challenge seems to be acquiring a customer base at all.

At the earlier TechCrunch 50, Paul Graham of Y-Combinator asked a number of the startups that presented, "Who do you think your best target is?" Acquiring and retaining a large enough customer base to make a venture worthwhile has always been a challenge for young companies, but it seems particularly an issue these days. Here are a few reasons why.

I joked that one of the best reasons to go to events such as TechCrunch50, which starts today, and DEMO, which runs September 21st to 23rd, is to get good user names for all of the new services. The startups launch right in front of you, and if the wi-fi holds, then my chance of getting "mick" goes way up. Okay, there are better reasons to attend, for both spectators and new businesses. We'll talk about those reasons in this post.