
Loic Le Meur's Ten Rules For Startup Success - nickb
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/12/05/loic-le-meurs-ten-rules-for-startup-success/
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pg
He got 8 out of 10 right. 2 is wrong. You shouldn't be overly secretive, but
it would be a mistake to go so far as talking with competitors; if you're
smart, your competitors will benefit more from meeting you than vice versa. 10
is also mostly wrong, though the median startup might do better if they
believed it.

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marcus
Don't agree with you about #2, if you really are intelligent, control the
conversation and information flow. You should be able to gather more
information about the business from your competitors than vice versa.

Especially when you are still in pre-launch mode and they don't know who you
are. Talk to them as a customer/supplier/affiliate, it might be a bit
underhanded but Sun-Tzu would approve, you'll be amazed at how much
information you can get.

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pg
It might be ok (strategically, if not ethically) to pump competitors for info
by pretending not to be one, but that's not what he meant.

Though indeed I'm not sure it would even be good strategically to do that sort
of thing.

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marcus
One of the main difficulties in building a successful startup is intimately
understanding the needs of your clients, suppliers etc.

Once you have clients of your own you obviously should interact with them
continuously to get the data, but even the first iteration can be made much
better & faster, by simply interacting with your competitors in various roles,
and putting yourself in the shoes of your clients & suppliers.

