Thank you Thursday! - October 28, 2021 Entrepreneur |
- Thank you Thursday! - October 28, 2021
- What to do with $50,000? Tired of working for someone.
- I (32m)started my landscaping company halfway through the season with a scoop shovel, a garbage can, and a tarp.
- $100k MRR and $1m raised – here’s what I learnt building my startup
- Reaching out to partner with rival startup?
- Good Businesses to Start for 14-year-old
- Advanced Google search operators give productivity superpowers to any founders doing B2B sales online. Here are 4 simple tricks anyone can leverage.
- What is the declared value for customs if shipping unsold inventory to a distribution warehouse?
- How to become good at becoming aware of and identifying new big trends early on?
- Residential Cleaning - The first steps
- I’m trying to start my own post op care business
- Creative Accounting Taxes
- New here. Not sure how this works, but are there any ‘dating app’ entrepreneurs or any ‘app’ entrepreneurs? Looking for a side project to help me, and possibly partner with.
- Question about biz buy sell.
- [Question] Where do I find guides on how to write documentation of my app features for programmers?
- What type of business could I start with $200,000
- Any digital nomads here? I have a question about telemedicine.
- Is excepting large payment through Quickbooks Invoices Safe?
- The strategy that turned UNIQLO into a global empire
- Business or a house?
- Need advice from Uber/Lyft Drivers!
- Are you using AI to predict churn?
- I am creating API monetization SaaS - share your thoughts!
- Where to find a CTO, and do I need one?
- Before you write a line of code, you must go deep on the business reasoning behind that idea, keeping your users at the forefront of your mind.
| Thank you Thursday! - October 28, 2021 Posted: 28 Oct 2021 02:00 AM PDT Your opportunity to thank the /r/Entrepreneur community by offering free stuff, contests, discounts, electronic courses, ebooks and the best deals you know of. Please consolidate such offers here! Since this thread can fill up quickly, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts. [link] [comments]  |
| What to do with $50,000? Tired of working for someone. Posted: 28 Oct 2021 06:59 AM PDT Hi, I'm in my mid 20s working in finance, specifically in tech side. Although my salary is decent for my age, I know that I have the work ethic, determination and want to achieve for more. Instead of working for someone, I want to start my own business. Don't get me wrong, I am fine with working many hours, and I already work about 75 hrs a week. I just think if I put this amount of time and pressure (you know finance can be stressful) I can make more money working for something else? I don't have any debt or fixed assets like cars/houses but have $50,000 cash that I can start something with. What are your suggestions other than the classic "down-pay for a condo and airbnb it"? Cheers! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 27 Oct 2021 05:45 PM PDT So i was a chef at a decent restaurant. I made average pay for a line cook, had very little in savings, and i was completely burnt out. One day i went out to my van for a break, and i just drove off. I know tgis was a shit move. The restaurant wasnt a bad one, and my head chef was very fair and ran a clean restaurant. The problem was i couldnt bring myself to set foot in there again. I dint know how to explain it, but my body told me that i was done working in the food industry. I took a few days to figure out what i wanted to do. While doing that i gotnon youtube and started looking up different gustles and businesses people started with little to no money. Eventually i stumbled across landscaping videos, and something clicked. I used my last 3 weeks pay to buy a shovel, bucket, leaf blower and a few tarps (my dad gave me a push mower and a few hard rakes.) I also have a 2000 chevy astro van. I got my first job through my roomnate who cleans houses. It was a cleanuo of a yard that was full of trash, and weeds. I charged $200 and it took half the day to do. That $200 bought me a weed wacker plus the client wanted a flagstone patio built and weekly mowing. I had never built a patio before but thanks to extensive youtube and google research i got the jist of how to built a level foundation, and how to build a flagstone patio, i also learned roughly what to charge. I built a 465sq ft patio in 3 weeks and charged $7,200. Both the client and I were EXTREMELY happy when i finished the patio, and i walked away with a few grand in my pocket, and a new sense of confidence and pride in something in built. I used the profits from that job, and i bought a pressure washer and some power tools, and boom i now have a landscaping and a pressure washing business. I also went on Fiverr and had some dude make me some logos and business cards. All in all it cost me about $80 for the logos, business card designs and business cards. The reason i made two seperate businesses was because I figured i wouldnt be searching for a landscaper if they want a pressure washer. After i had the logosi made a yelp busiess page for both companies. I cant remember where i found out about yelp business, but its been great to me. I get requests fornjobs every day, and i only pay avout $5-$15 per lead. This isnt an ad or anything its just the platform i found first. Use what you want idc. Through those leads ive been able to sign up 13 clients for lawncare maintenance. Im averaging $50 per lawn per week, and i turn down work i generally dont want to do. The pressure washing jobs have been a little slow, but so far my $400 pressure washer has made me close to a $600 return on its purchase(all of this is pre tax, but i am paying my taxes). Am i rich? Not yet, but i quit my job mid july, started two businesses, built a catalog of tools that have all paid for themselves, and found a new respect for myself. I dont really have anyone that inwould tell all this to, but im super proud of nyself for starting this, and the progress i made so far. Next year my goal is to have 45 clients, a pickup truck/trailer, and 5k saved so i wont have to get a winter job. Idk i think im hoping to inspire people to just try. Fuck all the excuses, just put yourself out there and give it everything. Thanks for reading. This might be the longest thing ive ever written. Edit: link to that patio i built. I need to take more pictures. https://www.instagram.com/p/CUQo1HdFmkb/?utm_medium=share_sheet Edit 2: idk what i was expecting when i wrote this post, but the amount of positivity had been overwhelming. Thank you all. [link] [comments]  |
| $100k MRR and $1m raised – here’s what I learnt building my startup Posted: 28 Oct 2021 02:43 AM PDT Hello entrepreneurs, my name is Nik. I'm happy to post here again. I founded WeLoveNoCode, a platform that connects people with expert no-code developers to build their software and apps without a single line of code. All that is based on a monthly subscription. My startup just raised $1M in funding and we reached a monthly recurring revenue of $100k+ within less than a year. I have learnt a lot from other makers. So I decided to also share my experience about building a startup that is growing at rocket speed. I hope this helps other entrepreneurs (and if you are looking to join a fast-growth startup, I'm hiring). How did we achieve this kind of growth in a short time? Start with Satisfying your Customers: Sounds very basic, right? Because I had no cash to do any advertising, I let my work speak for me and I made first sales, controlled the quality of development, and asked for feedback later on. I tried to exceed expectations on all the work I did for clients. When you focus on delivering results that satisfy your customer, they will spread the word. Don't be shy to tell them to share about your business. Sometimes people need that extra nudge to refer you to someone. Don't forget to keep in touch with your customers. This part started becoming much harder when the team became bigger, so I had to be even more persistent with creating a culture of user empathy. What helped while growing: having weekly feedback from customers and keeping constant interaction based on that feedback. Educate the market I know that no code is the best option for fast testing of product ideas, releasing MVPs, getting user feedback, automating internal tasks, and shipping typical apps. All these can be done in days, not years, and in a very cost-effective way compared to doing it in code. Based on our experience, 95% of things that you can build with code you can also build with No Code, just much faster and cheaper. But NOT everyone on the market thinks this way! There are a lot of misconceptions regarding no code. So while building my startup I realised how important it is to teach the market and provide initial education before going into sales (this works for marketing as well!). An MVP tells you what your customer wants: I often see entrepreneurs try to build a flawless product before shipping. The problem with this strategy is that it's often complex for customers to use or sometimes doesn't even solve their problem. Unless your product is high-risk, creating an MVP helps you gather quick feedback from your customers so you can iterate better. It can also be a useful prototype for your potential investor. You can build an MVP with tools like Bubble, Webflow, or a mix of Zapier and Airtable. In our case, I built a landing page about no-code development and invited leads to book a call. This is how WeLoveNoCode started - a simple landing page built with Tilda. Even now our platform is MVP and I'm often feeling embarrassed about how "not perfect" it is. But, hey, it solved the customer pain and generated a constant revenue stream. Built MVP with users is always better than no perfect nothing. Find a model that works — think automation When we started, our model was to charge customers an hourly service fee. By the end of the first year, our monthly revenue grew to $20k. While it felt good, delegation and an hourly fee was no longer an efficient model. Automation was the answer. We decided to build a platform that matches developers with specific skills with projects that require that skillset. Today, we offer clients a low-cost no-code development subscription service. This allows you to start your project quickly, efficiently and affordably– a gap that exists in the market. Entrepreneurs get access to the best no-code developers who have been pre-vetted by us. Don't be afraid to allow your model to evolve as you get feedback from customers. However, continue to deliver satisfying services as you evolve. No startup got a business model right from the first try! Be very clear with your value prop For WeLoveNoCode the value is the speed of product delivery, cost efficiency, and quality. For $1999/month the client gets a brain of 3000+ Nocoders with a stack of 241 tools instead of a single no-code developer with experience of 1-2 tools. It took us time to define our value prop and we are still working on it for different users. Approach Marketing with a growth mindset: Growth starts with finding product-market-fit. If you meet users' needs with your solution, growth and marketing become easier. Our marketing is a mix of product-led growth, paid channels and outbound sales. Until recently we didn't have a marketing team, so all the growth happened thanks to the product, which meets user needs. Now, we are much more focused on having a marketing strategy, marketing OKRs and even Head of Marketing! I do hope someone finds this write-up useful. I'm open to answering any questions regarding our journey so far. Would you like me to share an article about how we raised funds? Please let me know. Thoughts on fundraising Fundraising is hard. I learned so much while closing a $1M seed fund. You should see things from an investor's perspective. As an entrepreneur, you're completely absorbed in your startup. You've spent years building this business, you think about it 24 hours a day and you spend most of your time actively working on it. However, for the investor, what matters the most is the long-term viability of the business and returns on investment. Seeing things from this perspective will completely change how you approached raising capital and lead you to revisit how you pitch for investment. You must realise that to your investor, your start is not a product or a technology. You must position your startup as an investment. Ask yourself, what's the underlying value of my startup, who is investing and how will investment grow over time. For us, we are in an industry currently valued at $17b and is projected to grow to $125b in 2027. We already have a platform with over 3K pre-vetted no-code developers and $100k in MRR to prove its viability. This is what we sold to our investors. Put these numbers upfront when you're pitching to investors. Raising investment is not about asking for money. What you are doing is selling the value of your business to an investor, telling a story and creating Momentum. VC money is not the only way. You can consider crowdfunding, raising from Friends and family, Government grants, Angel investors or pure bootstrap. Whichever route you are taking (and you should consider more than one at a time) the key to success is talking to multiple people at once. This creates a buzz and a feeling that interest exists, pushing investors to act for fear of missing out. It works. This was just a small portion of my learnings and I will be happy to follow up in the comments! [link] [comments]  |
| Reaching out to partner with rival startup? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 12:47 PM PDT I've been testing a startup idea over the past 3 years, iterating and learning to code so I can build/manage a team around it. I've recently come across another early company (landing page/email collection stage) doing the same thing at a very basic level. I've had difficulty finding a passionate/capable team to join me and I'd love to partner with these guys due to similar vision. However, having 3 years of time to conceptualize and gaining market feedback my MVP/scale/execution strategy is likely much more polished than theirs. If I reach out to them what is the best way to protect my IP before we decide to work together or not? Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Good Businesses to Start for 14-year-old Posted: 28 Oct 2021 09:58 AM PDT I'm 14, and I like money. Every day after school I'm watching Dave Ramsey, and It's not as if I am not trying. I already have an umpiring gig, but that's seasonal, and usually can only clear +-500 every year. I also started kind of a business about a year ago, which cleans grills, I made a nice chunk of cash, but business has slowed to a crawl, and I haven't got a job since late August. I have $2000 in savings and would be willing to sacrifice $1000 to the business. Some businesses I cannot start: Drug Dealing, Dropshipping, Selling food at school. Everything else is fair game. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 06:18 AM PDT I've seen multiple people sharing a few examples of advanced google searches that entrepreneurs can leverage (Example here). After seeing an overwhelming number of people providing positive feedback and sharing how these google searches made their life so much easier, I decided to launch Part #2 - with even more examples. This post gives you tips for sales-related use cases so you can efficiently:
You want to know the best part? It's incredibly easy. An example to get data about a prospect when you need it fastYou joined a sales call and suddenly need to browse information about the prospect or the company? Google advanced operators are here to help you. Here's an example: 1. related:domain.com This operator lets you find websites that are similar to the one you're searching for. Let's say you have a really good customer that is benefiting a lot from your product and you want to find similar companies, use related:domain.com. Additionally, if you're in a sales call and are not sure about the market where your prospect competes, use this operator to have an idea of similar companies that you are familiar with. Example: related:google.com delivers results such as yahoo.com, bing.com, duckduckgo.com, etc. Never imagined there could be so many alternatives to Google. An example to do meaningful research about an industry, account, or prospectAlthough this section might overlap with the previous one in a few ways, this example is meant to help you do deeper research about a prospect or account whereas the previous one focused on quick specific information. So, here you go: 2. site:domain.com filetype:pdf There are a few websites that share industry knowledge extensively, Harvard Business Review or Mckinsey Co. are two good examples of it. If you're doing research about an industry, try to search for pdfs within these domains about the topic you are researching. Example: site:mckinsey.com filetype:pdf saas sales An example to excel at list buildingBuilding lists of priority accounts isn't just a strategic assignment, it can be boring and time-consuming too. When you're building out your lists and collecting data from multiple sources, it's important to be as efficient as possible. This example helps you with that: 3. site:docs.google.com/spreadsheets "keyword" Use site:docs.google.com/spreadsheets to find open spreadsheets with anything you want. Example: site:docs.google.com/spreadsheets companies hiring remotely With one click, you immediately find multiple spreadsheets with hundreds of companies hiring remotely. This makes it extremely easy to copy and add those companies to whatever list you're building. An example to find a specific resource or material4. Append filetype:pdf to anything you're searching for This search will get you results in the file format you're looking for. Besides "pdf", there are plenty of file types you can search for on Google. These will help you better target the type of content you want to find. For example, you can always filter results based on file types such as:
---------------- Want more examples of useful searches that entrepreneurs can use to make their everyday life easier? Check the complete guide here with more than 10 examples. ---------------- Have any questions? Happy to help! [link] [comments]  |
| What is the declared value for customs if shipping unsold inventory to a distribution warehouse? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 01:16 PM PDT So if I ship goods from the USA to Canada or the UK and they ask what the value of the goods are for the customs papers, what should I put in there? Since the goods are not sold, can the value be $0? What is the lowest value I can put on here considering the goods are not sold and there's no guarantee as to how much they will sell for? [link] [comments]  |
| How to become good at becoming aware of and identifying new big trends early on? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 12:22 PM PDT I have had a weakness basically all my life of being late to learn about a new big trend. I want to get better at this and capitalize on new emerging trends to start businesses taking advantage of it. Paul Graham refers to it as "living in the future" and says one gets there when they become an expert in there. However I think I'm good in my field but still don't really "live in the future." I understand there is probably no magic trick for it but I'm looking for habitual and lifestyle changes that would make me the kind of person who tends to be early to know about an emerging trend and its likely scale in the coming future, and can jump on the bandwagon reasonably early to build something valuable in that domain which can ride the wave as the trend takes off. I'm looking for the broader and more theoretical analysis behind it really, or something that can be generalized, rather than any specific hacks. I would love to hear any advice. [link] [comments]  |
| Residential Cleaning - The first steps Posted: 28 Oct 2021 11:17 AM PDT I'm still early into the process of bringing my company to life. I picked up a PT job to fund all of my startup equipment (vacuum, broom, chemicals, etc), early advertising, logo, business cards etc as with my normal 9-6, I'm pretty strapped. There's a few things I'm confused and concerned about when trying to make this leap.
That's all of the questions I have at the moment but if anyone would like to add additional "must know" knowledge, tips or tricks, please do. [link] [comments]  |
| I’m trying to start my own post op care business Posted: 28 Oct 2021 10:16 AM PDT Hey everyone, I'm 31 and my sisters and I are all in the medical field. RT, RN, and PA. We live in a state where plastic surgery is very popular and we wondered if we could possibly open up a place for these patients to get post-op care. We have no business experience and we are the only ones in our family that make money. Could someone help me with finding information on where to begin? Where I could go to network? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 01:10 PM PDT Please correct me if I am wrong. So my business is an LLC where I am the only employee. If I understand correctly i as the employee only pay income tax, not the LLC or however much it has in it's bank account. How can I go about paying the least amount of taxes possible? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 12:39 PM PDT I'm trying to create an app, with a friend. But I'm sort of stuck as to what to do next. I have the idea, and would like help creating more ideas for it. I'm looking into the business side, and also eventually will need fellow entrepreneur partners, or a team. If anyone is in LA or California it would be nice to meet up and talk about the app, to see if it's something you'd like to be a part of. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 12:39 PM PDT Does anyone in here have experience with them? I found an investment opportunity on their website and want to know other peoples experience with the site. I'm not sure if there is scammers on the site or not but I am really curious as the investment fits my price at 20k. Also should I call the number they list on the contact form? [link] [comments]  |
| [Question] Where do I find guides on how to write documentation of my app features for programmers? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 05:44 AM PDT Where can I find examples of professional technical documentation of software mechanics. We are a small startup and want to start documenting features we implement in our app, so if any new programmer comes along they can immediately understand how the software operates. We are planning on expanding and hiring more programmers, so we need documentation for the software so programmers can start working as soon as possible. We also need standards for social network activity (what accounts, where, what kind of content should be posted, in what formats). Question is: where can I find examples of such documentation for programming, marketing and other features? [link] [comments]  |
| What type of business could I start with $200,000 Posted: 28 Oct 2021 10:42 AM PDT I'm coming into a settlement soon and I'll have about $200,000. I'm wondering what's a good easy starter business that I could have that generates revenue and that's not super hard to run. I've worked in luxury retail as a store manager for the past 7 plus years so I have an idea of how to run a business but not necessarily start my own. All suggestions are welcome! [link] [comments]  |
| Any digital nomads here? I have a question about telemedicine. Posted: 28 Oct 2021 10:10 AM PDT I have a question for digital nomads from the U.S. I'm curious if you use or have ever used or considered using telemedicine services for general health advice or for preventive health? Thanks [link] [comments]  |
| Is excepting large payment through Quickbooks Invoices Safe? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 10:05 AM PDT So I'm dealing with a new customer that I've never done business with before and I want to make sure I do this as safely as possible. Basically, I'm looking for the best way to conduct a transaction to make sure I get paid for the goods before I send them off to the distributor. Quickbooks offers invoicing, where I can send an invoice to a customer and have them pay (either through credit card or bank transfer). For a bank transfer it can take 5-7 days for the payment to clear to my bank account. Is this a safe option? Is doing the bank transfer the safer way? If I do it this way, do I need to wait the 5-7 days for the money to clear to my bank account or should I truck that Quickbooks says it's paid and send the goods immediately? If this is not a safe way to do this, what is the better option? I'm thinking maybe just invoice them and have them pay via ACH or wire transfer and wait for the money to clear. Are ACH transfers as safe as wire transfers if I wait for the money to clear to my account? [link] [comments]  |
| The strategy that turned UNIQLO into a global empire Posted: 28 Oct 2021 01:56 AM PDT This is how Uniqlo became a $19 billion/year global success story. 1/ Humble Japanese originsUniqlo's founder (Tadashi Yanai) was born in the clothing business. In 1972, he inherits his father's men's tailoring business but decides to move into casual wear. His inspiration: Gap, Benetton...; which he discovered traveling the US. Uniqlo was born. 2/ Bad perceptionUniqlo's concept works, with over 300 stores opening in Japan in the 90s. The only problem: the brand is perceived as cheap & low-quality; so they try a new strategy that would soon turn Uniqlo into a global empire: Provide luxury fabrics at a low price. 3/ The cashmere campaignCashmere was the perfect starting point for this new strategy. By sourcing the cashmere themselves, they managed to launch the most affordable cashmere product line on the market in 2003. It was an immediate hit. They'll do the same with wool, silk, technical fabrics... 4/ Low product countFocusing on luxury fabrics has a downside though. Uniqlo cannot offer too many collections. Their average product count is 3 times lower than competitors. 5/ Affordable luxuryIn 2004, they also decided to use megastores for their international expansion. Thousands of square meters are strategically placed near designer and luxury stores, raising the brand image and attracting big spenders who'll buy their basics at Uniqlo. Thanks for reading! B. PS: If you enjoyed this piece you should join my newsletter for a marketing case study like this 2x a month in your inbox. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 05:08 AM PDT Hi group, Long story short....I just sold my house in Quebec. I was planning on buying another however a great business opportunity fell into my lap. The business sale price is for $800K. The business Nets $250K a year before salaries but it is a one man show. I have spoken to BDC and Desjardins bank and they both work similar. Roughly 25% down payment and 7-9% interest for the balance. If I choose to go that route all the funds for my house goes into the business preventing me from buying another house, which scares me because real estate prices are increasing so fast. I did a cash flow projection and it would take me 18-24 months to get back my $200K. After loan repayment, I can pull out $100-125K a year and do not need this money to live on since I do have another revenue already. My other option is a private loan. I have someone willing to loan me the full $800K at a 7% yearly interest but also wants 15% of yearly profit until the loan is paid. Doing this allows me to keep my down payment and buying both the house and the new business. But...that extra 15% profit sharing will end up costing an additional $375K. Interest alone will be $304K. Thoughts? [link] [comments]  |
| Need advice from Uber/Lyft Drivers! Posted: 28 Oct 2021 08:39 AM PDT Hey folks! I have a side hustle/business idea that would be putting extra money into Uber/Lyft drivers pockets with out having to do any extra work. I'd love to speak with any of you folks who have expertise/experience in driving for these kinds of companies! [link] [comments]  |
| Are you using AI to predict churn? Posted: 28 Oct 2021 07:39 AM PDT A recent McKinsey report estimated that reducing customer churn could increase earnings for a company by as much as 9.9 percent. So my question is what are you doing to reduce churn? Most companies are identifying at risk customers by looking for red flags (like survey); monitoring community forums and third-party review sites; and through continuous communication with customer success teams. Once the companies have identified at-risk people, then they may offer incentives or give those customers more attention. But you see, this is not enough, as every customer is so different and most customers don't show any red flags before churning and once churned, it is very hard to bring them back. So what is the ideal solution? How does it help? Survival Analysis gives us the expected remaining lifetime of customers until they churn. Because remember 2 people have same probability of churn, but one maybe churning in next 6 months and another in next 18 months. CLV and CFV calculations can tell us out of 1000s of churners which ones to focus on. The customers with high future worth need more immediate attention then lets say with low future profitability. Combining these 3 techniques can ultimately give you an action plan to reduce churn down to every customer. Interested to know more? Let me know, and I will share the white paper. How is your company dealing with churn? [link] [comments]  |
| I am creating API monetization SaaS - share your thoughts! Posted: 28 Oct 2021 07:35 AM PDT I am builing Monetizam - it handles authorization, payments and user management for APIs. You share link to your API page, user registers there and buys subscription to your API. All the management happens on Monetizam. All you have to do is verify if provided API Key is valid - through Monetizam. In future I am planning to add client_id, client_secret to allow generating access_token - this way your API won't need to ask Monetizam so often if the API Key is still valid. You would verify it with public key. What are your thoughts on such SaaS? I am currently building it, and not much left to launch the product. [link] [comments]  |
| Where to find a CTO, and do I need one? Posted: 27 Oct 2021 05:10 PM PDT Here's the story, I have dumped close to 150K into a reputable app developer to help me make my app (it's been close to 1.5 years in development). There's one or two major things left (I have to convert a Shopify store to use the tokens earned in my app-essentially a dropship gift shop), and some basic video chat features (it's partly a social app). The major issues I'm having is that I personally believe I'm being price gouged by the design team at this point. Very basic things (and granted I am not a programmer), are requiring 20-40 hours of work at a time, when the initial quote would have similar items for 3-5 hours. The other issue I'm having, is that the design teams attention to detail is HORRIFIC. The basic layout and functionality is there, but every time a new update comes out, it's like nobody ever tested it. Things I notice within 5 minutes of using the app (for example the use of military time, or basic common sense errors), are not picked up on. For 1.5 years I feel as I've just been a thorn in their side. I have spent essentially all my spare cash building this app, so I was wondering if you guys had any experience with being at this point in development. Is it best to bring on someone who codes who is as passionate as I am? The other tricky part, is I pretty much have no money to pay either, so where do you find people who would work for equity? Someone suggested just accelerators and incubators and maybe that's the best option. But I would love to just have someone else on the team ! Sorry if this just sounds like venting. Just so frustrating to basically put everything you have into something, and not have the developers recognize basic flaws. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2021 07:28 AM PDT It's common for entrepreneurs to approach developers as soon as they've had an idea for a startup. And while I can understand the temptation, with time to market being a critical factor in a startups success, it's a trap that you should avoid. Before even thinking about development, you should be focused on turning your idea into a structured product vision. It's the best way to ensure that users see value in what you're about to bring to the market. That's how great products are shaped. It's vital you know the problem you're trying to solve, who you're solving it for and the solution they currently use to solve that problem. You must always keep your target users at the forefront of your mind. If you don't, you risk building a product they don't want or need. Which is exactly what happened with the first version of Instagram. Initially called Burbn, the app was targeted at whisky enthusiasts and allowed them to check-in, share their experiences and add photos. But things went sideways rather quickly. Adoption was poor, and users found the app confusing. Even founder Kevin Systrom stated at the time that the app "felt cluttered and overrun with features". There was one feature, however, that users loved. Easy photo-sharing. So Systrom cut everything from the app except for its photo, comment, and like capabilities. What remained was Instagram, which today has around 500 million active daily users. This is just one example of why startups should be putting more importance on the product as they build an MVP. You need to organise your ideas in order to come up with an action plan to move forward effectively and efficiently. Depending on the stage your business is at, you should divide the process into a series of sessions:
Session 1 is the critical first step in transforming your idea into a structured business vision. Start by replying to the following questions:
Once you've answered these questions, the next step is to sum everything up in an elevator pitch. Your elevator pitch has to be simple and crystal clear, so your users can easily see the value behind your MVP. It should look something like this:
Once you have this, you'll have completed the session and it will be time to move onto the next step – defining the assumptions to validate. Session 2: "Assumptions" are those user actions that are key for your business, but at this stage, you don't know for sure that they will take those actions. For example, Airbnb assumed a number of user actions before building their initial product – for example:
You should list all the assumptions surrounding your product – as I did with the example above. Once you have that list, you should select all of the assumptions that can easily be validated with research. Take for example validating that hotels are expensive can easily be done with a bit of research. Then, you should be left with a set of assumptions that can only be validated with a working app. For those, you need to move on to the final session – playing the mirror game. Session 3: This session starts by listing all the features you want your product to have. From the fanciest, sexy features to the most basic and mundane ones. Now put this list next to the list of assumptions you made in the previous step. For every feature, ask yourself: "Is this feature absolutely necessary to prove one of the assumptions on the list?"
To take it a step further, here's an example using Airbnb – starting with the feature, followed by the consideration behind it:
Once you've compared all of the features you want with the assumptions you need to prove you'll have taken into account all the product considerations you need to build a truly lean MVP. You´ll also need to compile all of the documents you need to bring to a software developer, or agency – including but not limited to:
Once you have this documentation in place, you're finally ready to move forward to the development stage with a structured business vision. The next step, after you've structured your business vision, is to approach a technical partner that will actually develop your product. Good luck! [link] [comments]  |
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