#StartupStruggles: Is Starting Out the Hardest?
🚀 Are you feeling overwhelmed at the beginning of your startup journey? You’re not alone! Building a founding team, raising funding, and validating with customers can feel like breaking down walls every step of the way. But fear not, here are some actionable steps and insights to help you navigate through the challenging early stages:
## It all starts with a strong foundation
💡 Before diving into the deep end of startup life, make sure you have a solid business plan in place. Conduct market research to understand your target audience, competition, and potential opportunities. This will help you lay the groundwork for a successful venture.
## Building the right team
👥 Surround yourself with a diverse and talented team that complements your skills and brings different perspectives to the table. Collaborating with like-minded individuals can help you tackle challenges more effectively and fuel innovation.
## Raising initial rounds of funding
💸 Securing funding is a crucial part of the startup journey. Whether you opt for bootstrapping, angel investors, or venture capital, it’s essential to have a clear understanding of your financial needs and be prepared to pitch your idea to potential investors.
## Validating with customers
🤝 Customer feedback is invaluable when it comes to refining your product or service. Engage with your target audience early on, gather their input, and iterate based on their preferences. This iterative process will help you develop a product that truly resonates with customers.
## Does it get easier over time?
📊 According to research conducted by CB Insights, around 29% of startups fail due to running out of cash. However, those that survive the initial stages often find their footing and experience growth over time. As you learn from past mistakes, pivot your strategies, and adapt to market trends, you’ll likely find that the challenges become more manageable.
In conclusion, while starting out may be the hardest part of the startup journey, it’s crucial to stay resilient, open to learning, and agile in your approach. Keep pushing forward, seeking mentorship, and leveraging the resources available to you. Remember, every successful entrepreneur started from scratch – you’ve got this! 🌟 #StartupSuccess #Entrepreneurship #BusinessGrowth
I’ve never been successful with my ventures, but if I had to guess, it probably gets harder as time goes on.
We now have a steady revenue stream, lots of internal policies, and audits completed. I’d say it got easier and harder at the same time. But we learned and are learning to tackle bigger issues as time goes by. If I started this business again it would be far easier the second time around due to the lessons we’ve learned.
Personally I think you’re at the easiest part of the journey.
Ha! Dude, starting out is the **EASIEST** part. And if you’re bitching about things now I’d question if this is right for you
Starting is the fun part. You are excited. You think your concept is amazing. You talk to people and they tell you that you are on to something. You are picking names and logos and getting domain names and building websites. The MVP is all new and exciting and you feel accomplished.
And then… all those people to loved the concept didn’t mean they wanted to PAY for it! You get thrown into jobs you absolutely hate because, well they gotta get done! You start slogging to try to raise funds and figuring out how to avoid the dreaded “end of runway”. Your wife/girlfriend starts asking when you are going to get a “real” job. Every customer you get is hand to hand combat and then those bastards actually want support! So now you are doing tech support and trying to fix the problems with the product instead of making new stuff. You are working six days a week often until time to go to bed. And again your wife/girlfriend asks when this is going to end because it’s making you miserable. The darkest parts of your brain start asking if you are a failure and it gets real hard to come up with a convincing answer for yourself. You start wallowing in the pit of despair trying to do enough work to keep things afloat and not get shit on by your cofounders but your brain is just so tired of doing this crap. You seriously start questioning if you were ever any good at anything and head toward depression. Your family is kind, but they can’t understand you working so hard for seemingly nothing, so they are just faking it and it’s obvious. Your brother-in-law who was part of your friends and family round starts making comments at family dinners about what’s happening with his money, he doesn’t mean anything but your mental failure mode definitely takes it as an insult. You start losing/gaining weight and feel like shit because sitting in front of a computer 12 hours a day, six days a week is hella unhealthy.
Anyway… so yeah, no starting out is not the hardest part. Not even close. There is a reason that not everyone does this. Hang in there!
Getting that first comer is the hardest
I think it might be one of the hardest parts! If you get the PMF right you’re in the top 20% of startups (out of 2-4% that raise). The hardest aspect is not the product, is the market. If you have real customers (not family and friends) paying you real $, you should be very proud of yourself! In case you don’t have a product and have 1000 names on your waitlist and people are dragging you into the market, you should also be proud as you stepped on the PMF landmine!
P.S.: I started my company recently too and all I’m doing is talking to people on LinkedIn and in person in the city where I live. Best of luck to you and your team.
It gets easier as if your team helps you as well, make sure you’re not doing all the ideas on your own plan with your team.
Every part of this journey is hard. I founded and sold two companies to Fortune 100s and even the selling part was painful. Letting go and moving on from those sales eventually. There are great moments where you feel you are on top of the world feeling like everyone loves you and moments where you are ridden with anxiety, questioning yourself and everything and everyone around you. Hang on for the rollercoaster. Take a deep breath and remember it only fails when you give up.
10 years in, it just keeps getting harder TBH. I’d say its 1-2 orders of a magnitude harder than when I first started.
If you built everything from scratch, yes? But for me the hardest part is staying on the market. You always need to continue to adapt once you get out there.
No, it’s harder when you’re bigger and you just slowly learn why big companies do all the stuff you used to hate as you also have to do it.
Starting out is the easiest part. The hardest part is if you have some initial success so you raise seed money, hire some people then miss some milestones and can’t raise another round but make just enough money to scrape by if you harass everyone you know for money, meanwhile you have to fire people that we’re excited to join your journey and were super dedicated because you can’t afford to pay them. All the stress and effort to deal with the finances means that you start to do a bad job of delivering for your existing clients, all of which creates more work and headaches as they start busting your balls. You pour everything of yourself in but it’s just incredibly overwhelming and it feels like pushing against an immovable object.
Also as the workload increases and milestones get missed, the buzz in the office changes because you’re not on track to be the next unicorn. Suddenly key people start quitting. This puts even more work on yiur shoulders and now you have to hire as well, which is even more work.
All the while each month you’re scrambling to make salary payments, you’re getting angry letters from suppliers demanding to be paid as you push off anything that can possibly be delayed.
In our case this situation dragged on for about 3 years. It was hell.
We managed to get the other side to an extent (it’s still tough, just not thst tough) and are now a profitable 7 figure revenue business but no definitely not, starting out is the easy part.