May I apply the term "lean" if I adapt lean startup concepts & apply them outside entrepreneurship w/o infringing on any legal protections of "lean"?

As your targets are SME companies with 3 or more developers you can use LinkedIn premium search for finding the list of top executives of the companies and send them in-mails for partnership! Another great source for you could be outsourcing websites where US development companies are represented and do testing for their clients periodically for various projects! Please call for more detailed information of the best B2B sources for you! I have got also some availability to the actual lead generation job for you with a reasonable hourly rate. I have been working as a sales manager in this industry for over 4 years and have got large databases of B2B clients that you will be interested in!

Wow, lots of questions here. Let me try to hit them in order: "Should I get a job or find investors?" IF you have access to enough investor capital (not debt and not your savings) and you can get to MVP and still maintain ownership of a sizable majority of the business then do it. IF that means debt financing then only use the debt lines the cost of which can be carried by returns generated by the use of funds. I would prefer to offer a convertible note to prospective investors that can be easily extended throughout both friends and family and seed rounds (up to $2M to $3M) to get to proof in the market. If you can get to revenue and earnings fast enough then you can avoid equity dilution all together. IF you cannot secure that find of funding AND you cannot produce enough revenue from your business to deliver sufficient earnings for you to live on, then by all means, you should find a way to make the money you need and not burn all your savings or mortgage your home If that means short term contract work that's great. Particularly if you can find log term work that is relevant to the business you're building. If that means taking a job then do that. IF you do that, then yes, be transparent with your employer and let them know you're working on your own business also. Hope this helps....

(I'm a small biz attorney who helps people with copyright, trademark, and other IP law, and I'm answering per U.S. law.) As soon as you take your idea and put it into a tangible format (write it down, create an infographic, record a video), then that writing/infographic/video is automatically protected by copyright law. You can record the copyright on it too, which makes it easier to protect and get damages from other people taking it. But the formula itself would be probably protected under trade secret law or patent law. Patent law obviously takes a bit more effort, because you have to apply for the patent and get your application examined by the USPTO, which takes years and $$$. Keeping it protected under trade secret law means you have to make an effort to keep it secret (which may not work if you are disclosing it as part of your marketing efforts), such as keeping it confidential and requiring NDAs. As someone else said, the other terms you use might be protected under trademark law. If a member of the public would use those terms to link your products/services with the source of the product/service (aka, your company), then they could be trademark-able. There are some state law protections for trademarks, and you can also file to register the trademark with the USPTO and get more protection. Hope that gets your started!

Mobile app that has launched: You need ALL of the following: 1) Trending towards or at 100000 installs within first 90 days of launch; 2) Day 30 retention rate of at least 20% 3) Core "MTM" (metric that matters) healthy (dependent on business model, usage model etc) 4) Evidence that growth is just "getting started" with plenty of upside left. Happy to talk more in a call.

Khuram's reference to what I call the "gap technique" is spot on. Few people will rate something 10/10 or A+. This gives you the opportunity to ask them how to achieve that highest rating. Once you do that: "Shut up and listen!" :) -- One of the worst mistakes is to get a participant talking (and many people talk way too much) but then to cut them off even though they're giving you substantive information (obviously, if it's drivel, then you do want to move on). You also have to assess those you survey: some are founts of information and insight while others have nothing to say. All are not created equal, as it were. In all surveys, whether in person or on-line, I recommend open-ended (i.e., unprompted) questions (where possible) followed by close-ended (i.e., prompted answers) questions. In other words: What is your favorite brand of cookie (with no list specified)? Perhaps they say Oreos. Later on, after they've forgotten that, you have a list: Which is your favorite cookie brand: a) Little Debbie; b) Mrs. Fields; c) Oreo; d) Duncan Hines? Now if those two don't match up, how valuable are these answers? So that gives you the ability to test for validity. Once you present the prompted answers, you've poisoned the well, which is why they have to come later. Hope this helps and should you have any questions, I would welcome the opportunity to discuss with you. Best, Steve