Idea Unicorns

30x500 / Bootstrapping / Idea Unicorns — 5 Comments
17
Sep 12

Why Bootstrapping Is Better than an Accelerator Program

NOTE FROM YOUR EDITOR: Sometimes you get an email that’s so right, that so captures what you’ve been trying to create for years that you just can’t help but dance and squeal with glee. That’s how I felt when I saw this very powerful story on the 30×500 mailing list. I feel honored to help James learn to bootstrap.

Guest Post james jeffers

THIS POST BY: 30×500 alum JAMES JEFFERS

It is almost 2 years to the day that I was accepted, along with a partner, into a technology accelerator program. I’ll make a long story very short — we burned through $20,000 and had nothing to show for it.

I spent a long time beating myself up over the experience. My wife, who was initially leery of my participation since our family would forgo 6 months of income while I worked in the program, kept telling me “Well, at least you learned something.”

Yes, I did learn how NOT to succeed with someone else’s money. But only very recently did I discover I learned something even better. I learned that creating a viable business is not just finding really talented people and adding money. From what I’ve seen, it seems like every venture capitalist believes that that is in fact the magic formula.

I’m sure that approach (great people + money) can produce results. But it’s not a recipe that always works. More often than not, you get what we got — nothing.

Now, of course, I am paying someone else to learn how to create repeatable, learnable methods for creating real, viable businesses. And I mean a business in the most real sense: creating something of value, and trading that value for value. That means, of course, charging money for eliminating pain or helping people with their business.

This approach NEVER occurs to the funded team. They are looking to solve a huge problem by randomly choosing solutions, and then trying like mad to find problems. Which problems are picked are almost always chosen by HiPPO (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion) or cult of personality. Then, of course, there are the slides (or the “deck”) from which you must pitch, pitch, pitch, always hunting for the next round of money to keep going. Working on solving a real problem for real business people? Forget it, you better practice your pitch!

The accelerator doesn’t look for audiences — to them, the whole world is the audience. Gestalt is the community communication. It’s shocking to look back and realize my intuition was true – no one knew what the hell they were doing. Success was as much luck – hitting just the right combination of magical idea and current trend. Showing viable, money making results was not considered important – showing “traction” was.

Did you gain 12000 more users this month? FANTASTIC! Did those users make you any money? “Well, no.” Oh, did they cost you a ton of money? “Well, yes… but look at our traction!” What utter rot!

Don’t ever feel that you are missing something by not being 22, up to your eyeballs in the latest technologies, working 20 hours a day at some hot little startup, mentored by former one-hit-wonder CEOs or slickster VC types.

You know what you should feel like you are missing? Total control over your life, including how and what you work on.

Don’t be in the race to grow big and fast, so you can become like the next human dumping ground. The world doesn’t need another tragedy built on HR orgs and technological fiefdoms. It needs a million more real businesses, creating joy and making money.

“We were taught nothing about how to build a real business.”

AMY: Wow. What was the backstory to this email? What triggered it?

JAMES: Backstory? Not much to say other than my wife was in Slovakia and I was alone late at night, contemplating the fate of the free world. I suppose I was also thinking about my history, where I had been, where I wanted to go. I might have also nipped some brandy.

It just struck me that as wanna-be-entrepreneurs , we put of a lot of time trying to get into that accelerator. And when we were accepted our focus switched from customer discovery to an elaborate game of “find the investor.”

In the meantime, we were taught nothing about how to build a real business [in the accelerator]. The default assumption was that you would just figure it out. No one had a clear method. Every mentor who had done it before had no system for showing how to do it. The people who ran the program (and I remain friends with the director) also had no agenda for showing us how do it.

So, for my purposes, 30×500 was the first place I’d found where not only mindset but specific tactics were taught. And each step was broken down, too.

Should you attend 30×500 this winter?

AMY: If you could give 1 sentence of advice to somebody on the fence about taking 30×500, what would it be?

JAMES: If you want to learn how to create products and sell them, then 30×500 is an excellent place to start. Also, if you are good at bullshitting yourself, 30×500 is a great place to unlearn it.

30×500 reopens this Friday.

This story by James was beautifully timed, but I didn’t ask him to write it; I wasn’t even sniffing around the alumni list trying to get some launch content. Nope. This email, like so many others, was totally unsolicited. To my mind, that makes it even better. There was no external incentive for James to write it. I didn’t promise special favors or even that I’d be grateful.

He wrote it because he felt it.

That’s why I love my job.

A while ago, 30×500 alumni Brennan said that I was the midwife to his business. I helped bring it into the world.

That’s a slightly awkward, messy thing to say. It’s raw. I like it, because you know what else is slightly awkward, messy, and raw? Creating a real business with real income.

And if you’re ready for that — for the slightly awkward, messy, raw reality of stacking the bricks and building your own financial independence from the sweat & blood upwards — and you’re a designer or developer with the skills to create, then you should seriously consider taking 30×500.

If you’re serious about making it happen, I’m serious about helping you.

The only way to enroll in 30×500 this winter is by entering your name & email address right here:

The Details:

Class starts in early November. Admission is $2,450 if you apply early and pay when you’re accepted. Nauseating amounts of detail here.

Doors open this Friday, the 21st. Well, I say “doors open” but I mean “the doors to the application process open.” You have to apply (so I can help you decide if it’s right for you.)

The application process is first-come, first-serve — last time, most of the seats were taken by folks who applied in the first two hours.

So get on the list. I’ll see you in class!

Bootstrapping / Idea Unicorns / Slaying Unicorns — 91 Comments
29
Nov 11

Fuck Glory – Startups are One Long Con

I’m in my early 20s. Startups seem to be the only way out of 40 years of mediocrity in TPS-land for me, so I don’t really think I have much of a choice. It’s startups or nothing for me.

Or maybe I am being myopic? Are there more options to be had in life than mediocrity/wageslavery vs glory/startups?

— Random HNer

Startups are glorious! So raw, so close to the bone, so mettle-testing: 100-hour work weeks, sleeping under your desk, ramen, putting it all on the line, changing the world.

You know what else is glorious?

Glory.

“Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” is one of the most famous lines from Horace. You’ve probably heard it. It means “It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s fatherland.”

Here’s another one — drawn from Plutarch, allegedly said by Spartan women to their sons, as they gave the boys their shields before battle:

“Come home with your shield or on it.”

Come home with your shield — honorable, glorious — or die, for you will be without honor, and without glory.

Ancient times were all about glory. Glory’s not so big any more, but it used to be huge.

Glory was a way for fat old statesmen and generals, who never saw battle, to tempt young men to die by proxy for politics and petty schemes.

When glory failed to tempt, it was used to taunt, disdain, and guilt.

Or, as jwz puts it, “trying to make the point that the only path to success in the software industry is to work insane hours, sleep under your desk, and give up your one and only youth, and if you don’t do that, you’re a pussy.”

It’s about fucking time we talked about the fact that the worship of glorious death, and the startup mythos, are the same damn thing.

Every fucking time you see somebody using glory to hagiographize young men & women who are doing something clearly stupid, you must ask:

What is this raft of shit, and why are they trying to get me to paddle it?

And make no mistake, bartering away your “one and only youth” (jwz again) working 100-hour weeks on a web site for the promise of a big fat carrot on the end of a stick 80 million lines long, dangled by a fat statesm–venture capitalist, who will make 3x or 10x or 100x more than you, in the vanishingly unlikely scenario that you “succeed”… is clearly stupid.

So what are the motivations of the people pushing glory — pardon me, startups?

Money. Follow the money. They want a piece of you. Investors have to have projects to invest in.

The more kids who buy into the crazy dream, the more racehorses the venture capitalists can bet on, the more little soldiers the VCs can set on the board. The harder those kids work, the more theoretical chances the VC has that of one of his many investments making it big.

The harder those kids work, the less they question.

Post-hoc justification kicks in the more pain you inflict on yourself — because obviously, if you’re so terrible to the person closest to you, you’ve got a good reason, right?

It must be worth it, right?

I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.

— General William Tecumseh Sherman

Remember, if you question it, you’re a pussy. Startups are hard. So work more, cry less, and quit all the whining.

You’ve got no fucking shield so you might as well lay down and die.

Who are these crazy fuckers who say these things? What the hell do they get out of it?

But wait! Questioning a speaker’s motivations is an Ad Hominem Fallacy! Paul Graham says so in How to Disagree.

Oh, he did, did he? I’m not one for conspiracy theories, but isn’t that nice and pat?

As someone who has certainly studied rhetoric more than Paul Graham the Instant Expert, let me assure you:

Questioning a speaker’s motives is not only not a fallacy, it is a sign of healthy debate.

Otherwise you’re a wide-eyed sucker just waiting to be taken.

It’s especially critical to question the motives of the speaker whenever he urges you to glory, by tempting or guilting — and whenever he tries to sell you his religion.

You must be sharp, questioning, alert. You must be on your guard.

Inevitably — without fail! — those who sell glory, who sell religion, who sell noble wars, will not be in the trenches with you.

And that, my friend, that is all you really need to know.

There is no Mojito Island. There is no pot of gold at the end of this evil rainbow of suffering. There is no Asgard. There are no 70 virgins.

When you die, however sweet and fitting, you are dead. As the Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martial wrote, “Glory paid to our ashes comes too late.” Glory paid to the ashes of your days, burnt and gone, comes too late.

Fuck glory.

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori:
mors et fugacem persequitur virum
nec parcit inbellis iuventae
poplitibus timidove tergo.

How sweet and fitting it is to die for one’s country:
Death pursues the man who flees,
spares not the hamstrings or cowardly backs
Of battle-shy youths.

Hi, I’m Amy. Like this? You’ll like the rest of what I’ve got to offer: philosophy, tough talk AND practical information on what to do about it. Follow me on Twitter or Subscribe so you don’t miss anything important.

Hard Work / Idea Unicorns — 8 Comments
13
Jul 11

7 Hardass Rules for Business and Life

Lemme run a scenario by you, and you tell me how it feels.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one

You…

  • Fantasize about not working any more, or semi-retiring to some improbably perfect scenario (the perfect Little Café, Mojito Island)
  • Envy people you know who seem to have time to do everything they want
  • Find yourself uttering the phrase “… I can’t, because…” and madlibbing in either time or money, depending on the situation
  • Have a certain dollar amount in mind that, if you had it, would give you the freedom you want
  • Dream of how wonderfully marvelous your magazine-feature life will be, once you get your business going… sometime in the next 10 years

Well, my friend, pull up a chair cuz I’m here to drop some knowledge on ya.

It’s within your reach

Yep, it’s within your reach.

You can have that amount of money. You can create the time to do what you want. You can say “yes” to things you’d love to do.

You can throw away your pair of ratty crutches Time and Money and stop hobbling one-legged through life.

To have it, though, you’ll have to get off your butt, stop daydreaming, stop fantasizing, stop making excuses, stop pulling random big numbers out of your waxy ear and pretending that they’re truth.

You’ve gotta let go of the escapist fantasies — they’re unicorns, m’dear — and you gotta let go of the if-I-only-had-$x-dollars fantasy, too. You gotta let go of the daydream that there’s some magical line you’ll cross, some tipping point, where you’ll feel free, successful, and rich. Because there isn’t.

Freedom, success, and richness are gradients you achieve day by day or not at all.

Success is like aging, that way: when you wake up on your birthday, you don’t feel older. There will never be a day where you wake up and suddenly feel successful.

If you’re ready to achieve real freedom, success, and riches — even though you will never suddenly feel free, successful, or rich — then there’s a template you can follow.

Ready to start kicking your own ass? Here’s a recipe

You’ll have to fill in the blanks yourself, and keep at it and adjust it for your purposes, but there’s a core pattern to the lives of most successful people. And it’s more than just “hard work” or “persistence” or “irrational optimism,” although those things play a part.

Here’s the recipe I’ve compiled from years of research and my own personal experience:

1. Get real about what you really need to do the things you’re putting off

You don’t need $50k in the bank. You don’t need a year or even half a year off. You may need to quit your job, if your employment agreements stipulates that they own everything you do outside work.

You may need one extra day a week to work on your thing. You may need to fire unprofitable clients, and charge the rest more, and work fewer hours for them.

But do you need an idyllic situation? No. Do you need funding? No. Do you need a sabbatical? No. Do you need everything to be just so, in its right place, all i’s dotted and t’s crossed? Absolutely not.

What do you REALLY need? A little extra time, a little extra money, and the willingness to keep going.

2. Figure out how you can get it

By hook or by crook, dude.

Take a long, hard look at all the unspoken, unwritten assumptions that govern your business/professional life, cuz obviously they are not getting you where you want to go. Unspoken assumptions such as: If I try to negotiate, I will be fired. I can’t possibly fire clients, I need the money. My butt needs to be in this seat for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week.

Let’s take that last one as an example. Thought experiment time: Imagine what you could actually achieve with one extra day a week. Got a job? Do they need you? You could negotiate a 4-day work week — I did it, and at least one person I’ve advised did it, too. (And no, I wasn’t “famous” at the time — and neither was he.)

Here’s how I did it: I went along for a whole series of interviews, including a flight to another city, to get a job offer I had no intention of taking. Then I presented the offer to my existing bosses (it was a 20% raise) and negotiated to stay, instead. Was it easy? No. But did I end up with a 4-day work week, of with regular hours, and the same salary as before? Yes indeed.

Freelancer or consultant? Your business is sloppy, I can tell from here. You have unprofitable, energy-sucking clients you can fire. You have bad estimates for how long projects take. You have an hourly rate that is too low. Shore it all up: fire clients, charge more, set yourself up to earn more in less time, stop wasting time, eliminate repetitive crap, stop sitting in front of your computer dawdling when you’re not working. Freckle will help you with all of the above, because it was designed with exactly this purpose in mind.

And there’s no room in this equation for self-pity or other self-denigration such as, “Oh I’m not important enough,” or “I’m not skilled enough,” or “Nobody would pay me to teach them anything.” Everybody who’s ever sold anything has felt this way, sometimes or all of the time.

We all love to have a little pity party now and again, but it sure as hell doesn’t take you anywhere. So give it up like the self-indulgence it is, and get crackin’.

These techniques will help you free up time and money… what little extra you actually need to get started. One day a week will do it. Yes, really. Lots of people have built empires on less.

3. Let go of your dreams. Yes, really.

Should you follow your dreams? Sure. But you have to acknowledge what you can and can’t achieve at once.

Dream your big dreams, but recognize that you’re unlikely to reach them for years and set them aside so they don’t distract you from the reality of today.

Once you eliminate luck and perfect storms, major successes are all snowballs: they start as many small successes (and small failures). You have to aim for a small success.

You are building a cathedral. You can’t start with the spires: first you have to dig a hole for the foundation.

Digging holes is unsexy as hell, but there’s no fucking way around it.

4. Get over Soulmate Syndrome

You wouldn’t expect to find one single person who’d fulfill all your needs for people in your life, would you? Of course not. So don’t fall prey to the myth that one “job” (business) can fulfill you in every way.

Is charitable work one of your personal values? That’s wonderful, but it’s not a business.

Take care of your financial needs first, and then you’ll be able to volunteer or donate (or engage in your hobbies) without stress. Don’t try to turn non-business pursuits into a business — you’ll shortchange everybody, including yourself.

This is the same principle as “secure your oxygen mask before aiding others.” If you pass out and die, the little stubby-armed people next to you are going to die too. That is the opposite of charity.

5. Recognize your strengths and limits. Beg, borrow, steal any advantage you can.

There are no medals for heroism in business. So stop trying to be a hero. Find the easiest possible route to success… and take it.

Don’t fight an uphill battle. Work with what you’ve got. You can shore up your weak areas — or hire help for them — once you’ve achieved a solid income.

6. Embrace boredom

Here’s a fact most people won’t acknowledge:

Most success is boring.

Success is, by definition, figuring out what works and doing it over and over again: Writing email newsletters. Sending out discount codes. Tweaking your copy. Doing the same type of product again and again for different audiences. Taking what you’ve already made, and repurposing it for a different price point and different audience.

Keep doing it until it stops working. Which, by the way, it almost never will.

Don’t let yourself be seduced by novelty. Don’t let yourself be overcome by the self-indulgent anxiety of “Well I already posted on this topic last week,” or “I already ran this blog post a year ago.” Nobody cares but you.

Look at bestselling books and movies for inspiration: they’re pretty much the same thing, over and over. There are only so many human stories; as the saying goes, there is nothing new under the sun. And yet people keep buying and nobody complains. Why? Because we like it. Because it works. Because it doesn’t matter.

7. Investigate the true nature of business

Is it unethical to sell something you think is obvious? (No, of course not. Who died and made you the ideal customer?)

Why do people buy, anyway? (Things that kill a pain or create a profit. And only people who seek out & willingly buy new things will buy it.)

What’s a good price? (The absolute maximum you can charge without cutting into your profits.)

What about the people who tell you you charge too much, or your product’s no good? (Fuck ‘em. People who bitch instead of buying aren’t customers, by definition.)

These are the questions you will face. The answers are not what you think. You can’t just take mine at face value, you’ve gotta do your own investigation — but be prepared to start from zero, as if you knew nothing, because your half-voiced assumptions and beliefs aren’t helping you.

Bonus Rule: 8. Claim your baggage

Fact: Business is hard.

Or is it?

Life is hard. Relationships are hard. Being a good person in the world is hard. Business is a subset of all of those things, and in some ways a magnifier. But the hard of business is no different than the hard of life.

But nobody suggests you avoid life because it’s hard. Nobody says, “Oh, life is too risky. Better to die early and save yourself the trouble.” Nobody says, “Oh, are you sure you want life? My sister’s best friend’s cousin’s husband’s brother had a real problem with his.”

Tell people that running a business is hard and you should keep your day job, and they’ll nod sagely, as if you imparted something wise. Tell people that life is hard and you should keep your coffin handy, and they’ll back away slowly and stop inviting you over for tea.

And yet — business and life are the same damn thing.

Most of the problems you’ll have in your business will mirror the problems you have in your life. Are you a self-indulgent worrier? You’ll worry self-indulgently about your business. Do you have a problem telling your friends and family “No”? You’re going to have a hard time telling your customers “No.” Do you fail to finish any of your projects around the home? You’re going to have a hard time finishing anything for your business.

They’re the same damn problems.

The corollary, of course, is that a great business with lots of money won’t solve your personal problems.

But business, like life, is very worth pursuing.

Done lazily or lackadaisically, it’ll be just as messy and screwed up as everything else.

Done right, it’s an endeavor that will help you grow as a human being… show you new depths to yourself and others; teach you persistence and perseverance; make you feel competent, useful, and adult; give you resources to help other people and to leave a positive, lasting legacy on the world.

Believe me: that’s worth it.