He’s not the only one who thinks so. Mentors, VCs and serial entrepreneurs all say they routinely see new business owners fall prey to a common set of mistakes. So what are they? You should know.
No one would show up to run the Boston Marathon without training first. The same should be true of startups. You need to warm up with some prelaunch training, from getting proper rest and nutrition to shoring up relationships. “You have to be rigorous about making sure you’re ready and that every area of your life is in check,” Kamil says. A startup will take a toll on your life, guaranteed.
If friends and family don’t understand what’s about to happen and aren’t supportive of your vision, they’ll cause personal misery, not to mention a major distraction from the business. Have a candid conversation to manage expectations. “Tell them, ‘I’m going to give this my attention, and while it doesn’t mean you’re not important to me, it may feel that way,’” Kamil says. “You need to be sure these areas are buckled up, because entrepreneurship will shine a light on whatever parts of your personal life are weak.”
In this age of apps, Atlanta-based serial entrepreneur and company strategist Eric Holtzclaw says wannabe ’treps don’t always know how to build upon their success. “A product solves a single need,” he says, “but a real business has something customers will come back for again and again.”
Here’s how to make the distinction: Do you have potential revenue streams beyond the customer’s initial purchase of a product? That’s a key factor for prospective investors, who “want to see what the next thing is and want to make sure there’s some longevity beyond what you’re offering today,” Holtzclaw says. “Are you going to license the technology to someone else? What does the business look like in three or five years? That’s a big concern from an investor perspective, and that will help you determine whether you even have a business at all.”
]]>Jon King: For the holidays one year, Jim and I wanted to make homemade jam and sauces. I was working part-time at a greenhouse and brought our leftovers in. A woman suggested that I sell it at the local farmers’ market. I had huge student debt, so a few extra hundred dollars on a Saturday? Totally game.
We never had a product line — we just made what we wanted! If we were making strawberry jam and it didn’t set, we’d call it strawberry syrup.
That’s similar to how you created one of your most popular products, Roasted Garlic Onion Jam, right?
We were making garlic relish for hot dogs and burgers, and it called for a certain amount of sugar, to sweeten it a bit. I added the sugar, but Jim didn’t know, so he added the sugar, too. The batch just set — it was completely solid. But I was like, “We are not throwing this out; we made 120 jars!” So I called it jam and told everyone it was for bagels and cream cheese. And people loved it! So we just kept telling them it was a brand-new product for crackers and cheese.
This woman came up to us — she later became our mentor — and asked if we were selling wholesale. And I said, “I don’t even know what that means!” She bought everything in our van that day and sold it at this old family farm in New Hampshire. I drove over to see the display she had made, and she had doubled the price of everything. And I just thought, Aha! This is the difference between retail and wholesale! So the next week at the market, we upped our prices from $3 to $6. Our customers screamed at us, but they kept buying.
]]>“Working in Silicon Valley, I haven’t had a desk with a phone on it since 2010.”
You don’t say?
“I can imagine a scenario where getting someone on the phone would be the quickest way to resolve a complex issue. But even with that, we have video chat and group video chat in HipChat. The only reason to ever bring up my phone is if wi-fi is spotty. I think most young people probably associate telephone communications at work with interviews or more high-pressure situations. In Silicon Valley, we all work at computers, right? And most of our jobs are based around using the internet in some way. To use a phone takes me physically out of my workflow. Just the manual process of dialing with my fingers, looking up a number…”
Excellent. I’d like to spend the rest of this column unpacking pretty much everything she just said. Thanks, Elena. Elena?
(I think she hung up.)
Elena Gorman has hit on the ironic value of telephonic communication. It is fear-inducing (especially to a generation of texters) because it involves stakes. Getting on the phone with someone means a decision needs to be made. You don’t go to all the trouble to press seven to 10 buttons, then listen to two or three buzzes, then (possibly) speak to someone you can’t see and not be here to get something done.
But this is why it works. This is why it matters. This is why I’m here to endorse the telephone as the most valuable form of communication in business.
First, it’s important to acknowledge the various ways in which the phone is god-awful. To begin with, it’s not a sure thing. (Will the other person even pick up?) It can be really inefficient. (Phone tag.) It’s strangely anxiety-producing. (Ring. [pulse rate creeps up] Ring. [pulse rate creeps up]) There’s the annoyance of cellphone lag. (There’s the annoyance of…Oh, sorry, you go ahead.) And there’s the thing where the other person is eating what has to be a salad with lots of blue cheese dressing and it just sounds gross.
“My students under no circumstances want to make a phone call to set an appointment,” says Keri K. Stephens, associate professor of communication at the University of Texas, who is writing a book on communication in business. “I have an assignment in a class where they have to do that, and they will make up every excuse in the book — ‘Oh, I sent them an email! Oh, I sent them a text!’ I tell them, ‘No, you have to talk in real time to another human being.’ And they don’t want to do it.”
But why? Stephens blames the fear of rejection: “Some people really don’t want to bother other people. But part of the reason is they don’t want to be told ‘No.’”
And yet this is why the telephone is the best. It’s better than texting. It’s better than email. It’s better than videoconferencing (which, OK, is like the phone, except with the added unnecessary worry about what you look like). It’s the best form of communication in business precisely because it kind of blows. The telephone perfectly illustrates a key truth: If you go to a lot of trouble to get yourself in a situation that feels a little uncomfortable and half-baked and no one likes all that much, then you have no choice but to get yourself out of that situation. You’re invested. You’ve made an effort. You’ve prepared. You’ve steeled yourself for the problems that come with talking on the phone. You’re ready to deal with an awkward silence. You’re ready to be on.
The telephone builds grit. And when the going gets tough, grit comes in handy.
The next time you’re about to email or text someone, ask yourself this: Am I avoiding the phone because I don’t want to be told “No”? Am I avoiding the phone because I don’t want to feel rejection? Is this about trepidation?
And while we’re at it, here are some more questions to consider: Am I avoiding the phone because I don’t want to make the other person uncomfortable? Am I unsure of my own level of commitment to what I want to propose to the other party? Is it advantageous to have no written record of what we’re about to discuss? Am I in my 20s and unclear about the nature of this strange piece of equipment on my desk that has numbers and lights on it and what looks to be a “cord” of some sort?
If you answered yes to any of those questions, then call. The telephone allows you to efficiently converse, unlike email or text. It allows you to roll your eyes, unlike videoconferencing.
Most important, it forces you to be slightly more committed to your cause. To be slightly more hopeful. Go ahead; pick up the phone. Say, “Hi there! I’m invested in this!”
Right?
Hello?
I think you have the wrong number.
Ugh.
]]>Since the app store’s inception, I’ve been working with mobile apps and advising others as they develop their own apps. In that time, I’ve learned what makes an app wildly successful and seen surefire recipes for painful flops. If you’re looking to launch your first title, don’t buy into these three myths.
The startup world seems to put a lot of emphasis on making products and apps that aren’t like anything else on the market. While it’s both noble and inspirational to innovate against the grain, you have to ask yourself, “What’s my ‘why?’ ” If your goal is to build a profitable company, it can be quite a risk to do something unlike the public’s ever seen before.
While it’s possible you could build the next Uber, you should know there are thousands upon thousands of failures for every billion-dollar app unicorn. Instead of making something entirely new, you can spin existing tactics, psychology and proven app concepts into something unique enough to gain attention and attract downloads.
Within the gaming industry, developers take a systematic approach to app monetization. After a relatively low — or free — initial price, users make in-app purchases to get character upgrades, unlock levels or lead to other gamification elements.
Sure, you could invent a new way of making money with your app. But you’d better bring some serious cash, time and dedication. If you choose unproven, untested methods, you also must make certain your employees, business partners and investors are comfortable with the risk.
Many indie app developers are self-funded or bootstrapped their companies and now are making millions in revenue. If you raise money from others on the front end, you’ll have to split up the profit pie, too. Sometimes, accepting investors also entails giving up a degree of creative control.
The million-dollar myth is just that. You don’t need piles of cash to get ahead in the app world. In fact, strings attached to that funding might not be worth it, even if you were guaranteed success.
Done right, an app can fund itself entirely. Once you’re making a certain amount of revenue per user, you can redirect a portion of that money to new-user acquisition. As long as you can keep your cost per user lower than revenue generated from ongoing customers, you might have a scalable-to-infinity hit.
App marketing is grossly misunderstood. Ironically, the incredible initial success of apps like Candy Crush are the main reason behind such thinking. These apps dominated every possible online platform and needed to go to great lengths to attract new users.
You’ve also probably seen apps with their own Super Bowl commercials or large-scale billboards in major metro areas. Maybe you’ve heard celebrities endorse specific products. Generally speaking, only a select few app companies successfully carry off these marketing techniques. Everyone else is simply wasting their money.
Getting a big-name star to endorse your app works only if you have all your ducks in a row. You need to leverage a huge base of existing users, high revenue per user, strategic use of psychology, robust gamification elements and other factors.
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