From Little Things has been up-and-running for three months now, and we’ve noticed a trend — there’s something that makes successful startup founders different from the rest.
Successful startup founders aren’t afraid to talk about their business. Yes, it sounds strange to say, but we’re finding a handful of startup founders are reluctant to share even the most mundane details about their business. In the past few weeks, FLT has interviewed a bunch of founders who agree to chat with us, but then during our interview are reluctant to say anything more than a few hackneyed startup phrases:
- “We’re really doing something groundbreaking here which no-one else has done”
- “Things are going really well and we’re excited about the future”
Good founders realise that by sharing information — with investors, other founders, the media — they may actually benefit. Who knows who might be able to help you. But you need to be open about where you’re at, and what you need. Last week, FLT caught up with Melanie Kansil from the Heads over Heels network for female founders.
The network is one of the most effective in Australia, because founders can get up at the quarterly events, explain how their business works, and ask for what they need. It means the networking event now has a clear outcome. Founders might ask for customers, for introductions or for advice. It works because people in the network understand the power of relationships. As Kansil explains: “Members get the opportunity to provide help. It’s a very effective way to bring groups together.
FLT has seen first-hand how hesitant startups have become about speaking to the media. And yes, journalists occasionally get things wrong, misquote what you say, or simply don’t get how startups work. We’re not saying we’re perfect, but we do have a good understanding of startups. And, if we make a mistake, we’ll own up and correct it.
Speaking at an end-of-year event recently, Pollenizer co-founder Phil Morle said the ecosystem is the most important thing for a startup. We agree. What makes a good startup is other good startups. Silicon Valley consistently pumps out game-changing companies — why? Silicon Valley could be anywhere, but where it is, there are an unmatched depth of previous success stories to follow, mentors to learn from, experienced specialists to hire, investors to invest. That’s how an ecosystem forms.
As Startmate co-founder Niki Scevak explained to FLT for our recent report on the Silicon Beach startup ecosystem, an Australian startup hub will take time to build: “We’ve had a wave of companies succeed. We’ve seen an Angel stage forming, although it’s still not great. We’re at the very beginning. It takes years to build an ecosystem. You need to take a 20–30 year view.”
Pollenizer co-founder Phil Morle says the ecosystem is the most important thing for a startup (Image: courtesy of toastytreat)
We understand why the fear of bad journalism can make some founders go mute, but what we’re finding is that there is another, more ulterior reason for founders being coy — the fear of someone stealing their idea.
People like Paul Graham, Tim Ferris and Brad Feld have all written about this, and explained why ideas are almost worthless (here’s a good summary of their views). The last thing you, as a founder, need to be worried about is someone stealing your idea. Your time is better spent building and selling your product, learning what doesn’t work, and iterating fast.
Most investors or advisors will now grimace at you if you ask them to sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement). Many will flatly reject any potential relationship — it’s fast become the sign of the gringo founder. Unless you’ve spent 10 years researching a cure for cancer, it’s really not worth it — it’s unlikely you have IP worth protecting.
As the Startup Genome project found in 2011 after observing 650 startup companies, those which have the greatest success are willing to change their idea. Startups that pivot once or twice raise 2.5 times more money, and have 3.6 times better growth than those which don’t.
Here at FLT we understand that — we’re a startup ourselves. Our co-founders run startups, invest in startups and mentor startups. What will make your startup successful is tenacity, drive, vision, and hustle (and a really strong technical team). But lots of hustle; you’ll succeed by selling your product.
FLT is passionate about sharing stories that will help other startup founders. We want to improve the Silicon Beach startup ecosystem. It’s why we’ve invested in detailed research on the Australian startup scene. It’s why we’ve launched this blog to share Australian startup stores. And it’s why we’ll be launching a compelling startup events series in 2013, to help set the agenda for the years ahead.
But, in order to grow, Silicon Beach needs to be more comfortable about sharing its lessons. More discussion and debate is a healthy thing if we want to become a stronger startup community. We need to be more comfortable telling others what strategies have worked for us and what hasn’t. We need to be more comfortable taking advice from people who’ve been there, done that. To do so, we need to be more open.
FLT is not here to catch you out, or embarrass you, and we’ll work really hard to get our facts straight and report them accurately, but we do need your trust. We can’t write the content you want to read, without your help. So have a look through our stories so far, and judge FLT for yourself.
Help us by sharing yours.
I agree with this, but I understand both sides of the coin. By sharing our experiences and knowledge, we all grow stronger and most importantly you get feedback on what you share. But on the flipside, I also sometimes have hesitation in sharing numbers, customers, progress to date, roadmap, etc… However, I’ve taken the view that we (Native Tongue) had nothing to lose by sharing it.
I was at the recent Dave McClure talk, and when it came to the Q&A, a lot of people were hesitant to share or ask really hard questions of McClure, including myself. I can’t speak for everyone, but personally I wasn’t that comfortable asking a really specific question and sharing in front of 150 people all my details, especially in an impromptu situation even though we’ve pitched at a few events. Another attendee remarked that it was “A sign of an immature ecosystem. Founders have to also realise that no one will steal your idea”.
Almost nobody has original, unknown ideas to lose. At most founders risk inspiring their competitors to try harder to try and match your success. I think everybody knows about different marketing channels, different ways to get stuff built and different ways to fund growth, but what really helps other founders is to know what your metrics are and how your metrics have changed.
That’s what really defines whether what you’re doing is succeeding or failing. How much do you pay for content marketing? How does that translate into visitors, trials and LTV? When you changed your pricing table, what happened? When you decided to no longer offer a free version, what happened?
Start-up founder: “We’re going really well. We’re enjoying fantastic growth”
Me: “How much are you turning over?”
Start-up founder: “Oh, we’d prefer not to discuss revenue. Do you want to know how many Facebook likes we have?”
Welcome to my life Zach 🙂
Haha I hear you. We still have to do that coffee btw!
One of the other things I have noticed with this type of thing at shoestring is that the articles where people have shared this type of information are actually shared more, engaged with more and gain the startup more exposure. There is nothing worse than publishing a bland ‘filler’ article something which I have been guilty of this year. In 2013 I have introduced a no pussy footing policy for interviews and contributor articles, we’ll see how it goes… great piece Zach!
Thanks Mat 🙂 Let me know how the new policy goes…
I agree with @twitter-249639024:disqus that the articles that are shared the most are the ones that contain more revealing information of a start-up. Fellow entrepreneurs snack on info that provide them guidance, lessons to learn from, tips to improve and insights to navigate their start up. Sarah Lacy from PandoDaily touched on this topic in a recent video that the articles that surprised her for being shared the most are the ones where start ups disclose more information about their strategies, problems they face etc. She assumed articles about Facebook, Twitter, Apple would gain more traction. But it seems the young entrepreneur sharing consuming and sharing articles finds value in reading on start ups that are just slightly ahead of them.
Plus big shout out to Shoestring and FLT for aiming to be more known as an influencer on Aussie start up communities rather than just a publisher.
This is a great piece and has inspired me to share more of my stories on the different ventures I am part of; however being a technical founder, I find it harder to have this “extroverted” part of myself be natural 🙂 (I know that many technical founders are not cursed by the “shyness bug”).
It is also interesting to see how many start-ups and entrepreneurs do not get the attention, or the PR, that would mean the difference between stagnation and growth. I am not an expert in customer development, as I said I am a technical founder, unlike many of my fellow developers we tend to focus on the product, on the infrastructure, on the technical aspects of our business at the expense of all the exposure, the networking and generally the messaging about why what we are creating is interesting, can change the world or at least make it a better place.
I think with the vibrant ecosystem that we now have in Australia, there will be plenty more opportunities to share the stories, maybe even on this great publication 🙂
I couldn’t agree with these thoughts more. The most successful people I have ever met are the ones who take the risk to share. By sharing your idea/problems, you are essentially trading the small risk that someone will steal from you for the opportunity to learn from, and collaborate with, people who can help you get to where you want to be.