Help! I have a YC Interview for W2020
I got the word this week that I have a YC interview. I pitched SugarKubes but given how crappy the traction is with it and how difficult it's been acquiring users I'm not sure what I should focus on between now and early December when the interview is. I could tell a story deciding to transition from SugarKubes to NoCo, or I could go all-in with SugarKubes, though I have done that with less than stellar results.
If you or someone you know have gone through YC and would be open to a quick call I'd really appreciate it!
#ask-ih
A few miscellaneous thoughts from a YC alum (s07):
Congrats!
You're the 19 MVP dude I believe. Given that, it's possible you haven't actually put enough effort behind sugarkubes to figure out whether it has potential or not. But it also may not.
YC tends to see value in services for other developers/startups since their alumni community can act as an initial customer base for these types of products. It's possible they see an "internal" use of sugarkubes between/within their portfolio companies to get the initial traction and then expand from there.
Asking as neutrally as is possible (since I know nothing about you and haven't looked into your work at all): is it possible that you have a major shortcoming as a founder (e.g. some of mine were screwing up my pitches and writing shitty copy) which is undermining the growth of something which is otherwise promising? This is one case where finding your own defects is actually great news, since plugging them (via either self-improvement, drugs, or additional team members) can move the needle.
I disagree with some of the "wait and see" approaches in other comments. They may see the potential, but they also need to see that you see the potential. You need to be able to see and tell the best story of your own future. Otherwise they'll decide that although the idea has potential, you don't, and they'll pass.
Times have changed since I went through YC and the standards are a lot higher now, but we totally reinvented our idea during the interview itself, and ended up getting funded for something different than we initially submitted (and which we had spent the first 3 minutes of the interview talking about before realizing it was doomed). They funded us because they thought we were a sharp team who could make well-designed products, and they figured they could nudge a bit of business sense into us. So it may also be possible to go in with two sharp stories prepared and sort of ask them what they think. This would rely on a certain ability to control the flow of the conversation, but it's not impossible.
Anyway, g'luck. My email is around if I can be useful for anything.
Thanks @robfitz. I am unfortunately the 19 MVPs dude haha.
I applied with a friend of mine, we're both CTOs of venture-backed computer vision startups in LA. I think both of our shortcomings as founders are around sales/marketing since we haven't really done that before, but we have a demonstrated ability to build engineering teams and complex enterprise products.
I was transparent in our application that our traction is garbage. I am hoping what happened to you will happen to us as well. I'll reach out via email. Specifically, I'd love your advice on what to do between now and then to set ourselves up to have that kind of conversation.
I'd like to offer some help/advice with your issues with sugarkubes, if you're interested.
I think the idea is strong/has a lot of potential, and I think one issue might be that your current site is lacking in features to convert users.
What is your user acquisition strategy?
Do you have marketing landing pages or are you just sending people to the homepage?
Yeah, I'm interested! I will shamelessly take good ideas from anywhere and everywhere :)
So far I've gathered 15,000 emails of developers who have contributed to open source and have been cold emailing them for months. The open rate is around 50% but the response rate is terrible, and resulting signups are small as well. I've begun putting more developer segments together as there's somewhat of a conflict between open source developers and SugarKubes as a concept.
I had a fancy landing page and it wasn't converting very well so I got rid of it. I'm open to putting it back up if you think that's what is missing. Buying code is a weird concept, I think that it's likely it would be helpful to have a landing page that explains more about it.
Honesty. YC knows about those issues, or will know latest in your interview. Maybe they see the potential in a future use case you hadn't considered yet?
They will ask you about what they want to hear. It's probably NOT your next thing. There's a reason they thought your application was interesting. Maybe it was you, maybe a potential future acquirer, maybe your traction isn't as bad compared to competitors who applied. Any way, they will ask.
I was super transparent in our application that our traction sucks so if they read it, then they know.
Truthfully, I think we're the black sheep option. SugarKubes is very counterintuitive and counter to a lot of trends right now (open source being the elephant in the room).
I think you'll get a lot of perspective from this meeting. Don't sweat it! There's a reason you got invited.
From my view: OSS is not always sustainable. WordPress Plugins are likely a 100+ million dollar market. Now apply this to all of the web, then all of software. This has potential!
Also: YC has worked with companies at the idea stage before. As someone who has a market on the product and revenue (even if it is 2-digit), you're along further than many of them!
Thanks man, appreciate the advice!
Congrats Andrew!
Look you got to follow your heart. This could be the thing you're working on for the next x years. Why get the funding anyway if you know deep down it's not going to work? Obviously only you know the answer to the question of whether your hearts still in it
People respect honesty. Bullshitting will just waste a couple of months of your life. But nothings easy.
Maybe @sabba from Veed can offer some help. He's wrote a good blog post about getting rejected from YC actually.
Thanks Harry, I read the Veed article. I'm going to give up on my channel strategy and change to a new one, but not yet give up on the idea.
I think the next few months will be best spent finding new channels
Hey @wrannaman
I would stick to whatever has gotten you this far. Sounds like you need to give SugarKubes enough time to explore different funnel strategies. Don't panic pivot.
This is excellent advice. As my 19 MVPs show, I have a bad habit of panic pivoting.
I agree, I have to give up on the channel I was targeting, that's not working, but not the idea itself.