Tag: tips
Conserve The Possibility To Try Again
John Osher: 17 Mistakes Start-ups Make
John Osher is a “serial entrepreneur” who has developed literally hundreds of consumer products, from energy saving devices to baby products, toys and candy, and household appliances. He has built and sold several successful businesses to major companies and is most popularly known as the guy who brought the “five dollar electric toothbrush” to the world. Launched as the SpinBrush, in only fifteen months, it became the top selling toothbrush in the U.S. He started Dr John’s toothbrush company in 1999 and sold the venture to Procter and Gamble only two years later for $475 million.
Here are the “17 mistakes start-ups make” according to him:
- Failing to spend enough time researching the business idea to see if it’s viable.
- Miscalculating market size. Entrepreneurs say, ‘The market size is 50 million people. If I only sell to 2 percent, I’d be selling a million.’ But most products sell less than 1 percent.
- Making a commitment on sales projections that were wrong. Created costs that require those projections to be met. Run out of money.
- Overprojecting sales prospects.
- Making cost projections that are too low.
- Hiring too many people and spending too much.
- Lacking a contingency plans.
- Bringing in unnecessary partners.
- Hiring for convenience rather than skill requirements.
- Spending half their time doing something that represents 5 percent of their business.
- Accepting that it’s “not possible” too easily.
- Focusing too much on volume and company size rather than profit.
- Looking for somebody to tell you you’re right.
- Lacking simplicity.
- Lacking clarity of your long-term aim and business purpose.
- Going after too many targets at once.
- Lacking an exit strategy.
# Source: 17 Mistakes Start-ups Make
# Via: ValleyWag
Seven Golden Rules For Startups & Entrepreneurs
I thought I’d try a fun little experiment and throw out the following question on Twitter:
“If you were to choose one golden rule for startups and entrepreneurs, what would it be?”
and then see what everyone’s feedback would be and share it over here with you all.
Here are the first seven replies I got:
- Always have fun #
- Read Guy Kawasaki’s the Art of the Start, and his upcoming book Reality Check #
- A startup’s job isn’t to save money, it’s to invest as much in the business intelligently as you can so that the gamble will pay off #
- Creating customer personas to narrow down your target market which would also help your business plan #
- Be different #
- Business is not about ideas, it’s about initiatives #
- Do not reinvent the wheel #
Thanks to everyone who replied, sending in their golden rules, and helping create this post.
Please do add to the list and enrich it by sharing your golden rules in the comments section.
On Going The Extra Mile
Study And Listen To Reactions To Your Product
Simplicity, Value And Quality
Why Startups Fail
David Feinleib from venture capital firm Mohr Davidow Ventures recently published a great post about why some startups fail. He answers that they fail because they run out of money.
But then he develops it a bit further, listing a number of points that get them there. In this post, I’ll be quickly listing them here with my thoughts on each one, and then let you read the details over on his blog.
The main reasons he mentions are the following:
- They spend too much on sales and marketing before they’re ready: I couldn’t agree more with this point, many people launch with a half-baked product, mainly in an attempt to be the first-to-market with the idea, and they start promoting the product heavily and sending out people to sell, when the product wasn’t ready enough to be sold.
- The startup doesn’t move fast enough and is outpaced by the market: This is very true too, it’s somehow the opposite of the first point, where the startup takes too long to launch their product, or they fail to keep up with the market developments; it’s a very thin line and big balancing act.
- The entrepreneur behind is unable to take the idea and transform it into a well defined product: Whether we like it or not, not everyone who launches a startup is an entrepeneur and has the necessary energy and commitment to make it work.
- The market takes too long to develop: This is a risk every entrepreneur who launches a new idea faces; the idea might be perfectly awesome, but still it might take just a bit more to develop than the startup is able to hold on; leaving the big win for someone else who launches later on or for someone who can manage to hold on that bit longer.
- Risky Business: Well every business has a percentage of risk built in to it, some more than others, and depending on how much research and planning went into it; In the end it’s really up to the investor to decide how much risk he is willing to take.
Read the full post here: Why Startups Fail