
How can I tell if I am failing at my entrepreneurial venture or start-up? - revorad
http://www.cenedella.com/job-search/how-can-i-tell-if-i-am-failing-at-my-entrepreneurial-venture-or-start-up/
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phugoid
That seemed awefully smug and discouraging to me. I've been studying up on
other people's successes and failures, and it seems there's no simple pattern
that fits all.

"You are asserting that, despite the presence of 7 billion other people on the
planet, ... you have come up with an idea, a business, a company that none of
those other wonderful human beings have thought to invent yet."

Tell that to the Chinese immigrants running the convenience store around the
corner. Their unoriginal idea is putting the kids through college.

~~~
cenedella
Hi Phu -- the topic is addressed to internet entrepreneurs, not hard-working
small business people. I agree with you.

M

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Maro
Marc, he law of the land here on Hacker News is not to sign your messages.
Cheers!

~~~
cenedella
Got it!

x

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brm
You're failing from the moment you start. Your whole mission is to get to a
point where you're not failing anymore.

If each day you're making progress towards the things that will make you're
specific venture sustainable then you're on the right track. otherwise its
time to adjust.

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code_duck
"You are asserting that, despite the presence of 7 billion other people on the
planet, and a US economy that produces $14 trillion in goods and services each
year, and over 100 mm white collar workers in our country, that you, little
old you, have come up with an idea, a business, a company that none of those
other wonderful human beings have thought to invent yet."

Not really. Most entrepreneurial ventures are not based around ideas that
nobody else has done yet. They usually involve a known business model or idea
done better, in a different place, or at a more opportune time.

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bryanh
I think that in the beginning you really have to redefine success as: "Am I
Making Progress?"

After lots and lots of progress and zero results, then you are probably on the
verge of failure.

~~~
bigsassy
No, no, a hundred times no. "Am I Making Progress?" is the worst question you
can ask yourself. It results in answers like:

"I've decided on which web framework to use, so yes."

"My tests now have 100% code coverage, so yes."

"I added a new feature that I think may or may not help 1% of my hypothetical
customer base, so yes."

As someone who hasn't launched yet, it's easy to wrap yourself in the security
blanket of "progress". But progress that doesn't involve customers paying you
more money than yesterday is bullshit.

/me leaves to lock himself in his office until he launches.

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rokhayakebe
I think progress means : How many users, pageviews, leads (or whatever other
metrics matters to your bottom line) you are adding daily/weekly/monthly.

~~~
keerthi
and $$$$....

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kj12345
So products which take a long time to initially build and release simply can't
be successful? That just seems like an extreme and limiting economic theory to
me, and one which requires a lot more data and lot less rhetoric than the
current hype about launching quickly is producing.

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Maro
The underlying principle is that you have to understand and control the
factors affecting your startup's success. If you're not doing so in a
meaningful way, you're exposing yourself to large / unknown risk factors,
where "large" means "very likely to lead to your failure".

Not having launched the product (esp. in the consumer market) as early as
possible is definitely one such factor.

~~~
kj12345
I agree with what you're saying, but I think the original post went much
further. Even with respect to what you're saying I think the paradox is that
if you discover that people don't like the product you rushed out the door, it
might be because you rushed it out the door. And the lessons you learn from
customers saying "it doesn't look that valuable" may or may not outweigh the
effort it took to launch quickly. Sort of like the way A/B testing can help
you make small corrections but probably won't actually create value where
there is little to begin with.

~~~
dasil003
The original post went much further because that's the message the first-time
internet entrepreneurs need. There's a tendency among experienced
businesspeople doing their first startup to look to their experience in
successful companies and try to analyze that success and bring some of those
things to the new company.

The problem is that successful companies have layers upon layers of processes
and refinements, all of which (in a healthy company) play some role in their
ongoing success. But the marginal benefit of 99.99% of these things is
irrelevant to a startup, and the assets that an (internet) startup has to
protect are nil at the beginning.

This is one of the reasons very young people are often successful despite
inexperience; they can focus on building a compelling product—something
they've known very intimately for their whole lives growing up with the
internet and mobile phones—rather than the trappings of "business".

To get back to your point:

> _if you discover that people don't like the product you rushed out the door,
> it might be because you rushed it out the door._

If you built the wrong product up front, then it's better to learn that by
getting real feedback, rather than laboring on a false premise in secret. I
think stealth mode has pretty much been debunked by now. The bottom line is
that you can launch a shitty product, and it doesn't matter because know one
fucking cares. You may have all these grandiose dreams, but getting attention
and traction is a huge ongoing uphill muddy slog. If you have a seed of a good
idea, but it's very poorly implemented, at least you will pick up a few very
early adopters, and they will be the ones providing the most valuable feedback
to make the next refinement and layer on the next batch of slightly-less-early
adopters.

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jkresner
From two of my own baby ventures. Defining success is only a tool to keep you
temporarily focused because the more you grow the bigger your idea of success
becomes and evolves. As Entrepreneurs we are driven people who always strive
to get bigger and better as we improve.

It is those people that only see 12 months or 2 years through an idea that
often fail. The realization that comes with experience is that if you want
anything to be HUGE is takes more than 2 years. I'm really only coming to
grips with that after 5-6 years on naively planning and following dreams.

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yannickmahe
I started reading the article, but midway through I got to working on my
startup site.

~~~
cenedella
Awesome! You are learning the lessons well... ;)

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chopsueyar
How did you get the illustration of yourself (on the right side of your blog)?

~~~
cenedella
It is a Photoshop effect. Fortunately, if you focus on getting real paying
customers, you can eventually afford people who are better and smarter than
you and know how to create cool effects!

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pxlpshr
Once a year it often feels like your business is about to fail until it truly
reaches the point of a sustainable business.

I think what separates real entrepreneurs from wantrepreneurs is how they
handle the barriers and low periods that are natural with any startup.

~~~
cenedella
only once a year pxl? that's better than i did! :)

marc

~~~
rokhayakebe
I agree. I think it is more like 99 times/day. Luckily the one time you feel
like you are going to make it, it's give you enough high to not worry about
the other 99.

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icey
If you want to know if you're succeeding or failing, you should know what the
metrics of success look like for your product. Is it number of users? Amount
of revenue? Revenue per user?

How do you measure against those goals?

If you know what success is supposed to look like for you, then it should be
easy to tell if you're failing or succeeding.

"Released a product" isn't a metric for success. If you haven't released you
can't start measuring.

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blastek
The worst part about telling someone your new idea is "It's been done
already". Anytime someone says that you know to just stop talking to them and
walk away. Burger place? It's been done already! Tech blog? Been done already!
I have seen more startups using existing ideas become successful than original
ideas.

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dsl
Find the meaningful stats in your company (customer churn rate, monthly
revenue, etc) and show them to your investors.

If you are doing a bad job, they will scream bloody murder. If not, they don't
care, and you are doomed anyway.

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macournoyer
"free customers"? Leads or prospects perhaps.

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harscoat
"RT @pkedrosky: Polite, patient, purposeful founders fail.
<http://bit.ly/gXA282> /via @cenedella"
<http://twitter.com/pkedrosky/statuses/48017595332440064>

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skmurphy
It's a great sound bite that I think is completely wrong.

It's been my experience that purposeful founders do not fail. Patience is
always reqired for success and politeness costs you nothing. If a founding
team has a sense of purpose, a realistic idea of the amount of work it takes
to succeed (patient), and is able to encourage others to assist them (polite)
I normally see these as markers for success.

I think the behaviors he is actually highlighting are perfectionism (not
patience), an unwillingess to test your vision by getting out of the BatCave
and talking to prospects, and being afraid to take prudent risks.

~~~
harscoat
While I agree with you mostly What I saw in this quote is "don't be shy, go
for it even if you are a bit rough on the edge" #hustle - Cheers

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jckay
"Gut level craving" - that is what hit home for me. Enjoyed this. thanks.

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noverloop
you're failing until other people suddenly start to refer to you as successful

