Battery Ventures Debuts Powered, Its Content Hub For Entrepreneurs

Content is the new black for VCs, with First Round Capital, Sequoia, and even Andreessen Horowitz ramping up original content for founders. Today, Battery Ventures is debuting its content hub, called Powered by Battery.

There are some similarities to First Round’s Harvard Business Review-style, and the content on the site is definitely more how-to, marketing copy than hard-hitting journalism. But as former WSJ reporter and communication partner at Battery, Becky Buckman explains, there are a few differences from what other VCs are doing in this area. First, Battery wants to source content from all of its partners around the world, including Israel and Boston.

The content itself has a singular focus, which is to help entrepreneurs manage, create and foster growth. Content will vary on the author–some pieces will be authored by Battery’s EIRs, Partners, and associates, and other content will be authored by executives in the Battery portfolio.

For instance, the site will be running a piece from a HotelTonight co-founder about the importance of employee performance reviews, as well as a “Battery Book Review” by Wayfair CEO, Niraj Shah, outlining his main takeaways from Brad Stone’s recent book about Amazon, “The Everything Store.” And Buckman herself will be writing bylined pieces around PR, content and marketing. As she explains, Battery wanted everyone to be writing under their own bylines.

The site will also be experimenting with video content as well. The site will be debuting video interviews from Craig Weissman, the former Salesforce.com CTO who more recently co-founded SaaS company Duetto (embedded below); HotelTonight CEO Sam Shank, and Sprig CEO Gagan Biyani.

It’s still unclear yet how marketing content is actually helping VCs, or making a difference in things for founders or firm deal flow. But some of the content coming from VC firms has been compelling. First Round Review for example, has been putting together some interesting content around the how-to areas.

But some of the best content creators when it comes to VCs, such as Fred Wilson, Ben Horowitz, and Mark Suster, have been doing it for years before it even came in vogue. The beauty of the writing produced by VCs like Wilson is that it isn’t just catered towards founders, his analysis on investing, management and other areas are useful to anyone in the industry, and even beyond the tech world. It should be interesting to see if a VC firm can recreate this.