Startups Wednesday Social Club - Share What Events You Are Attending This Coming Week |
- Wednesday Social Club - Share What Events You Are Attending This Coming Week
- Growing faster than expected. Nobody seems to be doing what I’m doing. Am I a small business or a startup?
- The good, the bad, and an ask.
- I’m new to this, where do I start?
- What to do with a co-founder who is absolutely incapable of doing any short-period planning (hours to a week)?
- Chief of Staff as a transition gig into business?
- I haven't started because I'm afraid...
- Looking for a business partner with sales experience - I am a producer (jewelry/coffee)
- Continually spread the product, further than "handshakes" can reach
- Advice on ideal contract to ask for as first salesman at Saas Startup?
- How to find a customer
- Setting Up A UK Company To Use For Crowdfunding
- Trying to figure out TAM
- How/what to price when starting out?!
- Level of transparency when engaging with I.T contractors?
- Can someone explain startup stages/phases to me?
- Procurement will use testimonial as leverage for discount?
- Do I need a business partner?
- Not sure if this is allowed so remove is so but thought I’d ask in here too.
- How many renters are there in each country?
- End of startup #1? Not sure where to go from here
| Wednesday Social Club - Share What Events You Are Attending This Coming Week Posted: 26 Feb 2020 05:06 AM PST Welcome to this week's Social Club thread.Share what events and meetups you are going to so we can discover new ways to be social together offline and help grow your local community. Focus on sharing events that are happening within the next 7 days of this date of this submission. Anything that falls outside of 10 days will be removed, no exceptions. No duplicate posts. If you happen to be attending an event that is already posted, leave a comment to inform the community that you will also be there. If you are hoping to organize something on your own, outside of an existing event, feel free to use this thread to rally some people together to meet up. Please use the following format to share an event: Event Name and URL: Location: Event Date: Event Time: Event Description: Event Cost: Discount Code: [if applicable] Please use the following format to organize people to meet up together: Location: Purpose of getting together: Suggested Places to meet up: You can also find more support using instant chat on the /r/startups discord. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 26 Feb 2020 12:20 PM PST I'm a freelancer in the advertising industry in the US. I jumped into this less than two months ago, and I've already had to turn away A LOT, an unbelievable amount, of revenue because I'm overbooked. I'm very excited but completely shocked. I never considered seeking funding because this business requires very little money to get started. I paid for everything out of my own pocket. The plan was to simply build a stable freelance career, but I'm realizing I have an opportunity to keep growing very quickly. I don't want to burn myself out or lose momentum. If I could devote some time and money to finding a cofounder, hiring and training a small team, and advertising to a bigger audience (I haven't spent a dime on advertising yet), I could turn this into something much larger. So I guess I have a few questions:
If anyone has any feedback or perhaps book recommendations it would be much appreciated. I did not think I'd find myself here, but here I am and I need help lol EDIT: WOW thank you everyone for the thorough and super helpful feedback!!! i will try to reply in a few... thanks so much [link] [comments]  |
| The good, the bad, and an ask. Posted: 26 Feb 2020 08:16 PM PST Hey reddit, fair warning- this post touches on a particularly unpleasant part of the startup world. The good: About six months ago I was asked to join a startup by a friend of a friend; I didn't know him too well but I knew he is extremely smart and had been looking for a co-founder for the agritech company he was in the very early stages of growing. I had just left another company myself and was looking for opportunitiies so when he offered me the position of operations director, I did some due diligence, familiarised myself with the industry, spoke to some people about the product and the market and accepted. It has been awesome- we recruited a CTO, have been shortlisted for a national prize in innovation, have started some serious conversations with investors, nearly have a prototype complete, have been given several government grants to develop our technology, and have made a series of smart pivots that have led us to an excellent business model which I've been really excited about. The bad: All sunshine and roses, right? Until this last week, it mostly was. On Friday an intern who we have been employing for the last two months came to me asking about the $5.5k she is owed. Money I had put into the business account of my cofounder's previous company (she's being paid using a government grant which is paid after the internship finishes, and we hadn't yet set up the bank account for the new business so we used his account out of simplicity). Having been under the assumption that she was being paid fortnightly this took me aback, so I went to speak to another company who he had been meant to pay for some design work they did for us- same deal, unpaid. Having thought further about the situation there have been some red flags that I shouldn't have ignored- lying to his wife, taking months to pay me back for a personal loan etc. The ask: I don't know what I want to do from here, but he owns 1/3 of the company and I never put a vesting agreement in place (please, I understand this was a mistake, I'd appreciate if we can accept this and move on, Reddit). There technically isn't any IP in place yet as we are a hardware company and we haven't developed much aside from some designs of what it might look like. Myself and the CTO (combined 66%) are interested in continuing the company, but my first priority is to recover the $9,000 I loaned to his other business to front for the intern. Reddit, what are my options here? [link] [comments]  |
| I’m new to this, where do I start? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 07:16 PM PST I'm new to this, where do I start? I'm looking to start a company that helps out people who just can't get a break in life. I have always worked hard, and always fell short to someone who has a good smile. I came a very long was from living on the streets to where I am now. To this day I don't complain about why not me, rather I look for ways to overcome my trails. I would like to give this trait back to other I have everything plan out, but I can't get anyone attention on this. How do I promote this? How do I get the ball rolling? What's the first step? How did you get the ball role on your start? And no I don't not have any experience here but will in a year. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 26 Feb 2020 07:45 AM PST For the context, we're a one-year-old IT startup in a construction space, a team of three. I'm in charge of the company as I'm the CEO but we happen to be friends in civil so the boundaries and responsibilities have been somewhat vague. Last week we decided to focus our responsibilities and came up with a process on how to do short-period planning. We needed the process to avoid surprises my co-founder has managed to create in the past. Last week was the last straw since we lost some money and credibility due to his "talent". We planned the process in a good spirit. We made jokes about our mistakes. Everyone was happy and we're able to move on. Until four days later. My co-founder asks me to do something that was not according to our agreement. It was like we had never even discussed the issue. He knew I had some high-stressing meetings scheduled and prepared, but since he is incapable of doing any planning whatsoever, he could not understand why I was so upset. During our one-year business adventure, I've tried everything. When I first started to notice this behavior, I ignored it. But it made me angry, and since I didn't have tools to handle it, I shouted. I raged. I became mad everything he demonstrated his capability to fuck up my or someone else's schedule. I realised I need to do better. I read books. I talked with people. I browsed internet. I learned to negotiate, understand, be supportive, guide him. Nothing fucking worked. Last week when we planned the new process, I felt that we are finally behind this. But now I'm lost. I have tried absolutely everything. I need help. How should I deal with this issue? We are still bootstapping, piloting, and generating a lot of interest. The business idea is solid af, and the market is there, so stopping is not an option. [link] [comments]  |
| Chief of Staff as a transition gig into business? Posted: 27 Feb 2020 12:45 AM PST /Startup community— I am in a bit of a bind. I am trying to switch career paths but am starting to run out of financial runway. I was previously an executive at a unicorn startup that was acquired just before I joined. However, the more time I spent in the role I was brought on to do, the more I discovered I didn't enjoy the type of work I was doing. Moreover, when I looked around at my industry peers, I realized I didn't want my career to be like theirs. Ultimately, I came to the decision I needed out of the career path that I was on. After leaving my exec position, I took some time off and joined an early stage startup whose mission I believed in. However, the company's mission changed dramatically over the course of my tenure and I amicably parted ways with the team. In the wake of these two transition periods, I've been trying to plot my next move. I need to find a new job but don't want to do the type of work I was doing previously. There were certainly parts I enjoyed: hiring, building strategies, presenting internally and externally, and meeting with industry peers. I would love to be an executive again— just not in the type of role I previously held (it was in a marketing related field). Frustratingly, most everything I am hearing about is exactly what I have been trying to get away from: my previous role. For reference: my resume reads well (lots of name brand companies, and prestigious experiences, plus I have an MBA), I have 15+ years of experience, hustle, a pretty expansive network, and am hardworking. I ultimately want to switch into more of a business function and learn the business side from a seasoned pro (i.e. someone who has experience closing major revenue deals and developing complex go to market strategies). I have no issue cold calling, networking, blind emailing, or asking for intros. However, I do have an issue explaining what exactly I want to do. I'm thinking a Chief of Staff role may be a good next step— but I don't want to get pigeonholed in to being an assistant. It seems like Bizops is too data focused and Bizdev is purely sales. In the long run, I'd like to be a Chief Strategy Officer or something similar. Ideas? Thoughts? [link] [comments]  |
| I haven't started because I'm afraid... Posted: 27 Feb 2020 01:53 AM PST What do you tell yourself when you have doubts? When you feel like an imposter? When you feel like no one should be paying you to do this because there just HAVE to be better qualified people out there? I'm struggling to dedicate enough time to get my idea off the ground because I'm feeling so anxious and nervous about the potential implications. If I fail, will it be because I missed something important or because I didn't know what I was doing? If so, how can I possibly get the answers to questions that I don't even know to ask? Or if I succeed, it's even worse. Can I maintain stable MRR? What if an important customer is dissatisfied with my work, how can I pay the bills if my customers pull out? Most importantly, why would anyone want to hire me when they could just do the work themselves? I'm not offering innovation, I'm not doing anything differently from other successful people in my field because I'm modeling my business on their success. Does the lack of uniqueness detract from my value, or is uniqueness an extinct, mythological creature? [link] [comments]  |
| Looking for a business partner with sales experience - I am a producer (jewelry/coffee) Posted: 27 Feb 2020 01:33 AM PST Hi I am a young (22) business owner interested in partnering with someone with experience and contacts. I have experience running smalls businesses (1) jewelry/watches workshop and store in my country , (2) an audiovisual production company (I have worked with Porsche and few good brands in my country), (3) owner of 50% of a small company that produces coffee, coffee liquor and cocoa bars but I would like to make it grow more. I need a partner that is willing to invest in two of the companies or that can create a brand in exchange for a % of the sales.
These can be supported by my audiovisual production business (I have one graphic designer too). I am looking for someone who has capital, operations and legal experience in the US for a stake in the brand or someone with online sales experience for a percentage of the sales. I will be visiting the USA from February 13th to March 10th this year 2020 . I will be in the state of California (in La Verne and Upland). We can arrange a meeting so I can show a few samples of the products. I can also send videos of my audiovisual production company by whatsapp. Please message me here if you are interested. PS: I do not need someone who contributes just with money. I need someone who can work with me. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Continually spread the product, further than "handshakes" can reach Posted: 26 Feb 2020 06:39 PM PST Our company has developed an all-inclusive cybersecurity solution that covers the "A-Z" that a small business would need to keep them protected in today's day in age, at a price a small business can ACTUALLY afford. It covers everything from next-gen anti-virus on their workstation to backups to even phishing assessments to ensure that employees don't get "tricked" into falling for spam emails and phone calls. It covers everything in our opinion and the lead developer is one of the top cybersecurity advocates, holding onto his GSE certification. Equally, a LARGE benefit to this solution is that we actually partner with MSPs also that are already supporting small businesses and they will get a cut of the profits when they deploy the solution! Problem is, we feel we've pushed our marketing to our boundaries and we need more thoughts on where to go next. We want to get this product as big as we possibly can because we are going against the "big players" ie; Datto, Solarwinds, etc. with a product that does the same (if not more) for a much cheaper price. We've hit the marketing from many angles, social media, word of mouth, google ads, "cold emailing", reaching out to security instructors, etc. We just need some possible new avenues. As we've onboarded customers already and been through the beta testing phase, this is live now and needs customers. We're both very technical when it comes to the background of the software, but neither are well versed in "getting the product" out beyond people we can actually meet. It's a full cloud platform and very easily scaled to any size. Just hit a wall, need any new thoughts maybe this group can provide! [link] [comments]  |
| Advice on ideal contract to ask for as first salesman at Saas Startup? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 09:51 AM PST About a year ago three friends/ coworkers of mine with came to me with a program they had developed for a very specific market. I told them I would try selling it to some of the local businesses in the target industry in exchange for 15% commission on any revenue brought in during the first 4 years of any account I open. Cut to a year later, and the product has taken off like wildfire. Easiest sales of my life type of thing. We're in talks with big conglomerates about buying thousands of site licenses. VC's are trying to get a piece of the pie. It fills a huge need, and almost every business we have spoken to about it has asked that day how quickly we could get them up and running. My commission off of the ~100 hours I have actually spent on this is already triple my salary for my regular, good-paying, full-time Sales job. They now want me to come on full-time, and I am trying to figure out the best way to ask for them to structure my contract. They have never started a business before, but because they are already getting offers in the tens of millions for pieces of the company, they are very hesitant to offer any ownership in the company to me. Totally understandable. My thing is, if I am going to leave a stable, good paying job to jump on board a company that I could realistically see being sold for hundreds of millions within the next 2 years, I need some assurance of stability, or at least a payout in the case of a sale. They have spoken about potentially doing a stock options pool, but I don't even know how to ask for that to be structured. The salary they have discussed is great, and the commission on top will mean I am making more money than I have ever made by far, but to be honest I would give up a lot of that to get a shot at more ownership, if only to give me a parachute when they inevitably sell. Any advice would be appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 26 Feb 2020 10:47 AM PST Hi all! I am a technical founder of a start up company based in southern California. I, along with a few of my colleagues have, built out an enterprise software product centered around the concept of VDI (Virtual Desktop Interface). The platform is completely built out, tested and ready to ship. As you might have guessed we are having trouble finding customers. More specifically paying customers. We are currently bootstrapping this project. This paired with the fact that there is a fairly significant upfront cost associated with deploying an instance of our product (a technical hurdle that we cannot overcome... trust me we've tried) we must have an upfront investment from our customers. We actually can't even spin up a single demo without having some sort of upfront investment from our customers. We can find businesses who are willing to take on the product, but only if there is a free demo associated with the product. So we believe the value proposition is there (also it is not at all a controversial thought that VDI is beneficial for businesses) but a free trial is not something we can facilitate at all. And of course we have tried raising some capital but investors by and large are not interested in investing in a business without a proven sales model. We have also tried to negotiate with the existing businesses we have to have them put in some kind of upfront investment so that we can facilitate the free demo they are asking for but to be completely honest even getting a business to agree to swap out some of their core infrastructure to a no-name, no-reputation startup company for free is an incredibly difficult thing and is definitely impossible without a warm referral of some kind. So my question here is how can I find a business who is willing to write a check for my product without a free demo? [link] [comments]  |
| Setting Up A UK Company To Use For Crowdfunding Posted: 26 Feb 2020 07:31 AM PST Greetings, I'm a video game developer. I'd like to launch a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign for the game I'm currently developing, but I'm based in Greece, a country where Kickstarter is not available. I've searched around and found many creators in the same predicament, and many of them formed companies in eligible countries and launched their campaigns through them. Kickstarter requires the following in order to launch your campaign as a business entity:
It then requires you to complete a form for identity verification as a UK resident. You need a UK home address (Could I use the same address as the business Address?) Afterwards, the site asks for bank account details, and of course, the account must be UK-based. Lastly, it requires a UK Visa, Mastercard or American Express Debit card to use in case of chargebacks. The goal of the campaign would be to raise around 3844 ($5000) pounds. If the campaign succeeds, I would have to pay the taxes, transfer all the funds to a personal account and close the company. What would be the most cost effective way to handle this? Thank you for your time. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 26 Feb 2020 10:47 AM PST It's a bit of a tricky one. The overall industry is worth X, but our target audience within that industry is only small to medium businesses within particular industries (e.g. only B2C and there are some B2C it won't work well for). The target is potentially global. Do I literally need to go to each country and find out right there are X cafes, X hairdressers, X dog hotels, X restaurants etc etc and then add them all together?! Any better way to approach this?? [link] [comments]  |
| How/what to price when starting out?! Posted: 26 Feb 2020 02:22 PM PST Hey guys. So something I have been struggling with is pricing when just starting. If you have a online service that you're selling, some type of a SAAS. (For example) Not really focused on the product or service just straight up pricing. Would it be in your best interest to not charge early adopters to your service that way you can build some kind of traction? Or would it be better to charge right away that way you earn some income. Or some where in between? I've heard arguments for both sides and I'm curious to see what other people think or past experiences Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| Level of transparency when engaging with I.T contractors? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 02:03 PM PST So you have an idea that's going to require you to engage with app and marketing specialists. Do you give them full transparency at the risk of them sharing your idea to their friends or doing it themselves? Or do you bring it down to just the functions you need? They always ask what the business is. [link] [comments]  |
| Can someone explain startup stages/phases to me? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 10:41 AM PST Hello everyone. I run my own business, and I'm trying to better understand startups since this isn't a profile of a company I usually work with. I'm not in tune with all the buzzwords and jargon that's going on in the venture capital world, so I'm here to ask you people who are most likely experts in this. Can someone tell me what's the (un)official term when describing a startup in this hypothetical situation: An early stage startup that just recently created an innovative product/service offering, successfully got the market validation, and now they are ready to start selling their value.They are now slowly selling, hiring more people, investing in their branding and whatnot in order to "polish" the startup and prepare themselves to pitch the startup to some investors, in order to get the funding needed to take it to a higher level. What's this "preparation" level of a startup called? The "we just got the market validation and we can make our startup official" phase? Calling it an "early stage startup" seems like a blanket term, is there anything more specific? Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Procurement will use testimonial as leverage for discount? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 03:37 AM PST After many months of using my SaaS product, I asked one client of mine (enterprise) if they'd be willing to do a testimonial. Our relationship has been nothing but amazing so far. My contact at the company told me they wouldn't mind doing it, but that if the procurement team see this testimonial on my public-facing website, they're likely to use it to negotiate a discount in the future. Since it's the first time I'm asking for a large client's testimonial, I was wondering if anyone else has been in this situation and if this is a general practice amongst enterprise-level procurement teams... Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 26 Feb 2020 05:28 AM PST Hello. I have recently graduated high school and have been attending university majoring in computer science. I have this idea to create a game app that I think will be very successful in my country. In order to do this, I am learning android programming online. As I said, I am a university student and I have a lot of things to do but I have been investing time whenever I can to learn android programming. I started the project in August and now, I am about 20% of the way to learn android. I think that this pace is super slow and I need the app done by the end of March as that is the best time for the app to be introduced to the public. (As a side note: I believe that paid advertising or sponsorships will not be necessary as I rely on the word-of-mouth spreading of the app). Also, this is mainly a side project so I am not open to the idea of hiring someone to create the app. Therefore, how do you think I can get help from others in this project? If I find a business partner who can create the app, how much of the profits will be theirs? Is it a good idea to get freelance help from people on Reddit? PS: initially, I thought that even though it will take time, it would be better to just create the app myself, however, a rival of the type of app I am creating is using AI and other types of technology that will definitely need a professional to implement. Thank you for your time. [link] [comments]  |
| Not sure if this is allowed so remove is so but thought I’d ask in here too. Posted: 26 Feb 2020 08:03 AM PST |
| How many renters are there in each country? Posted: 26 Feb 2020 06:33 AM PST I've been searching across the board and find it a significant challenge to find how many renters there are in each country?. As a min requirement I'd like to know the rental market numbers in UK, EU, USA and Canada. The challenge is the definition differs for a 'renter' within credible level stats available. Eg USA has stats for unit stocks vs UK has renters (household). Comparing apples and pears so to speak, which throws out the statistical analysis. Any thoughts or experiences? [link] [comments]  |
| End of startup #1? Not sure where to go from here Posted: 26 Feb 2020 05:56 AM PST If you look back at my previous posts, I've been trying to continue my tech startup with very little money and using almost all of my credit limit on my cards. Software not functioning was the ultimate backfire. As much as i described the product in great detail, the 1st dev just couldn't get it together. After trying to hire a few devs, 2 didn't work out either, again wasted more $ Trying to get visits to the website for email sign ups, advertising on ig, everything was just a waste of money. This is my first go around as an entrepreneur. I am blessed to be a part of another startup though, i joined them to get insight on how to run a company and be a ceo. We're very successful so far But as for my own, it pains me to walk away from it for now. I was told to not touch it again until i have at least 24 months of capital at my disposal. I'm no where near that. I don't want to leave the website stagnant for 6+months. I feel that it would make it worse. I'm not sure where to press forward with my startup. Should i leave up the site and still collect emails, or just shut everything down from the company name down to the software and start fresh? I'm currently learning software myself in the meantime to try to build an mvp Thanks [link] [comments]  |
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