startup mistakes: great post

[akula]

David Beisel makes a great point:

In the many startups that I’ve worked in/with or got to know in my experiences, there is one thing that almost always rings true: the initial idea and incarnation of the company isn’t the one that results in the end. In other words, whatever the early notion of the business, it just doesn’t work as planned

http://www.genuinevc.com/archives/20...ually_does.htm

In my experience this has proven to be true. For example, we had a blogging application startup that's transforming into a blog network play

But the real danger is this: If your original idea is a loser, and you don't quickly transform into a winner, the "let's just wait a bit more and it'll be o'right" line is gonna wear thin on people who you depend on.

Quick show of hands - who's gone through this "we started with A, but ended up with B" transformation?

[MsNadi]

:::waving arm wildly:::

And it was actual one of those where I was sold and my partner one day was like "this isn't going to work" and didn't want to move forward.

And it pissed me off. I mean, I was irritated. And for 5 minutes I was like "fine, I'm going to go it alone".

And then started doing some research and realized she was right. That idea was bullsh*t. Oversaturated market. Too expensive to implement. No need for it in the marketplace.

What we did do was take one tiny aspect of it and create a business around THAT - totally different market. Not nearly as expensive to implement. Fewer competitors (2-3 that we know of, that don't directly compete). And the responses we get from our circle of advisors "quit analyzing and go do. bring to market".

Does that guarantee success? Hell no.

Listen to thy partner. If not, thou art a fool.

[akula]

Listen to thy partner. If not, thou art a fool.

that's a really good 1

nadi, you'd love shinto buddhism and the whole destruction of ego thing

if only more ppl told me i was an idiot, i wouldn't be so stupid...[hopeless sighhhh]

[MsNadi]

HAHAHA...

You should've seen me when she finally told me "I don't think this is goign to work and I think its a waste of money and time".

I was PISSED HAHAHA.

But she was right. Completely. Now we laugh about it. (And we're about to post it as an idea our own blog - ideas for sale).

And it led us to take what we liked from that and make it into something that we could both love.

The tell-tale sign for me: would YOU use your business?
Its that simple. Would you use it? If not, why do you expect other people to? Why are you solving problems that you don't have or providing solutions that you would use?

And what made me come around: that idea that we had poured so much into - i MIGHT have used it - mostly because it was mine HAHA.

And thats never good cause to go into business.

[cokeclassact]

well i suppose the software around my concept came together fairly quickly over the course of a few days...although what i started with at the beginning of the week wasnt what i had at the end. but when i actually sat down and wrote the business plan the marketing and just the "feel" of the concept changed quite a bit.

[NeeJam]

It is a great post you're right!

I think alot of people have gone through from A to B in here and i think they always will(no offence intended). This is becuase, of the development of the internet and trends etc becuase, if you don't plan your business for tomorrow you'll have no customers and no customers = no money = no profits!