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What are the most common mistakes first-time entrepreneurs make?
by
SumanJung
What are the most common mistakes first-time entrepreneurs make?
#ask-ih
Building before validating.
I've built countless projects, that ended up having no user, because I built for the sake of building without making sure it would interest enough people to makes sense.
Amazing advice! In fact, I've also made a couple of projects without validating and which failed for sure. How do you validate projects? Did you find any super effective methods?
Unfortunately not (yet?)!
I'm still experimenting, and just finished a Landing Page Generator with the intent to build quickly analytics packed Product websites to start somewhere. More about it here: https://www.indiehackers.com/jeanphilippe/post/802e323546)
Not shipping and not charging are the two more common ones I see. Get it out, and have a plan to start charging. Income doesn't happen without those two things in place.
I think this is very important because demand is a function of ability to pay, and WILLINGNESS to do so. Everyone can afford $20/month but you want to find out asap if they are not willing to do so for the value the product provides. In very few cases, the actual amount matters, its more binary - will pay or not at such early stage.
Spending time on things that do not matter like A/B test and other analytic tools, logos, etc.
@scottwater What do you think entrepreneurs should spend their time on which really matters?
@sumanjung talking to (potential) customers and building the core product/service.
Perfect! that's what i suggest too.
Not playing to their strengths.
It's very easy to try to do everything and then not doing anything well. The solution is to bring people together to help you make your weaknesses stronger.
Some of the so-called 'Entrepreneur Gurus' out there tell others to focus on multiple things to generate multiple incomes. What do you say about that? I've also met with a few people who are doing their jobs, running side businesses and still doing good.
I fully support building multiple incomes, which I do, and is necessary most times to achieve financial freedom (my goal).
My point is that you will most often times have more success with each of those incomes when you stop trying to build all of them all yourself, and instead focus on building out the infrastructure (people) for each of those to continue to flourish. Otherwise you will spend all of your time switching between random problems for each business. And eventually they will start crumbling down around you because you can't do it all.
Until I made this mind switch this was happening to me between my 3 businesses and I was super stressed out constantly trying to switch between each thing.
And to take this idea one step deeper... If you take a look at all of the most "successful" entrepreneurs in the space you're focused on; they 1) started by building a good product themselves, 2) made money from it and proved out the idea, and 3) got really good at building out teams of people to enable the business to scale and go far beyond where they could have taken it themselves. The key thing here is that they are really good at making many different moving parts all come together and work efficiently.
It's very true. I too was super stressed managing 3/4 businesses at the same time but none worked well. And I decided that I'll focus on one business, make money from it and start other businesses only after putting the first business on autopilot.
On a side note, I checked out your product which is literally for small businesses. Can we connect and explore the opportunity of B2B partnership as we share a similar customer base? We provide web experts (graphic designers, digital marketers & web developers/maintainer) on rent for a monthly flat fee. www.designpac.net
Indeed, very good advice.
Recently just read "essentialism" book AND currently reading "the 80/20 principle", both books advocate and suggest that in order to have the biggest impact, you should focus on a little set of things that are the most relevant for your purpose, and eliminate/deficate less efort at the others.
Yep, the ability to orchestrate people and infrastructure to work together towards a common goal is the one thing that I've seen that the most successful entrepreneurs all have in common.
And the first step of that is understanding that you aren't good at everything and you can't do it all.
if it's B2B make sure you create a demand for the project before you launch publicly. If you have a B2C play, I would make sure you have enough capital runway and support to enter a Geo / Market that will allow you to scale after you find product market fit. It's pointless to launch or test in a market that doesn't allow week over week growth.
Hey @LynchC Good advice. How do we create a demand before launch of B2B?
before you build you should be interviewing possible clients and based on their feedback design and build something that fits their need. As you find out what they are looking for you should be able to create a sense of urgency and need for your product... so when it is ready to be let loose into the wild, you will have people excited to use it.
Some entrepreneurs highlighting their product/business too early on social media or with friends. Of course, highlighting product is a marketing strategy but do it on the right time.
I disagree.
It is never too early to share your product, even if it is incomplete or embarassing.
Early feedback and validation is priceless.
I agree early feedback and validation is priceless, but I do think it's generally a good idea to wait before sending it out to your friends, family, and greater network. Feedback from friends and family should be treated differently than feedback from people who don't know you. Additionally, why not validate the concept with people you don't know first, so that when you activate your network you're sharing something that you already know is valuable and has legs?
Why not validate with both outsiders and friend and family? Why wait to use a network you already have?
How to figure out that right time?
The right time is when the product is ready then do everything regarding marketing/highlighting. This might be not suitable for any giant firm but for small entrepreneur, there are lots of obstacle until complete their idea into a real business.
Nota saying that either Is wrong, but I have seen a lot of people preaching for the opposite, that you should market first and then build. I believe that there's a thin line about this, and I have the nerves to say that in some cases both statements are true, and that either one might apply better for an specific given Situation.
IMHO, you should market after you have at least an MVP built to validate your business hypothesis. Lets remember that an MVP can be anything, it doesn't have to be a working product (i.e. DropBox MVP was a video explaining how the software would work, using the currently folder explorer).
Apreciated. Thanks!
This comment was deleted 7 years ago
This comment was deleted 7 years ago