[cheez]

How to become an entrepreneur (from someone who has actually done it):

  - Get income from other people via job
  - Learn
  - Come up with idea
  - Test market in 2 weeks for < $100
  - Rinse and repeat until market test gives positive results you can't ignore
  - Quit job
  - Release version 1 in 2 weeks
  - Have income by 4 week mark
  - If no income by 4 week mark, u fucked up, get a job

[_nqj4]

How high should the income be though? A few existing clients of mine were willing and did change to my platform, but how do you know if the business is scalable/will be competitive against other large businesses?

[stingraycharles]

While helpful, I do believe these types of “rules” should not be followed as if they’re set in stone. Adapt them to your own situation.

In my case I had success with a fairly complex big data platform, there would be no way a version could be released in such short a time. This didn’t matter, as I followed a slightly different strategy.

A different way of looking at things is thinking about what can do wrong, and working back on trying to mitigate things. There’s a big, big difference in strategy you need to take if you need, say, a thousand paying clients in order to be “ramen profitable” vs one big client. I work in the latter space, and we managed to find a way for our first customer to partially fund the development of the platform, the money they would get back once the “monthly payments” would otherwise be arriving.

Totally different approach, but it’s one hell of a validation of an idea without taking on too much risk!

[cheez]

Well said. Yes of course those rules aren't set in stone but the idea is remove as much risk as possible, as cheaply as possible.

[cheez]

IMO, it should cover company and living expenses.

The rest can come later.

[anaxag0ras]

> Test market in 2 weeks for < $100

Could you elaborate on that one? Are you referring to landing page + ads?

[cheez]

Find customers willing to pay. Actively. Not passively.

[Drdrdrq]

Sorry, confused... What do you mean by actively / passively in this context? Actively "find" (work hard) or find customers that actively want to "pay" (who are really fans of your work)?

[cheez]

No one is a fan of your work, where do you hear this stuff..

Find people who will pay you to solve the problem you identified within two weeks.

[amitport]

while this works for some businesses, there are plenty of startups that could not have been formed this way

[cheez]

Find me a FAANG company that didn't start out simply.

The trick is to shoot a lot of shots and double down on the ones that hit.

[supercollision]

This question looked interesting, and it's a matter of opinion but IMO none of them started out nearly as simply as we're discussing in this thread. I think they all fail the 4-weeks-to-revenue test (Not seeking to argue, was just curious).

Facebook is probably the simplest: one month initial development time, launching after that month, adding three more colleges the month after. It looks like they had funding within about five months. Maybe worth noting they're the most software-only of the bunch, and that the v1 product was a CRUD app with great market fit (that's a good thing here for velocity, I'm not downplaying their success). And especially when they were founded, revenue wasn't really seen as necessary, so they probably get a pass on the "be profitable in 4 weeks" bit.

Amazon did start out sort of simply, as a bookstore, but it took a year from incorporation to launch and Bezos had a significant investment from parents. Remember luck and survivor bias, they caught the dotcom boom and bust, too.

Apple sort of fits simplicity - you had a couple people who worked together before identifying the potential of a product, founded a company, and get to prototypes and incorporation in a few months. On the other hand I think it's a tough case for simplicity since step 1 is "Invent the Apple I" -- and make sure it's during the beginning of a new tech revolution. Plus, in terms of success we are probably talking about the Apple II, released the year after the I.

Netflix started with funding from a previous successful venture and right out of the gate needed to fund N copies of nearly 1,000 DVDs. Wikipedia suggests they had "only" 30 employees at the beginning. One of the cofounders had prior mail-order experience--which is great, and counts! But the post here concludes with "I'll try a new career in marketing;" I hope it works out for him but notice there's a trend of prior experience or domain knowledge through several of these companies.

Google was the result of a multi-year PhD project and involved coming up with a new ranking approach (or, for the detractors, adjusting and applying an existing mathematical concept to directed graphs) and a somewhat fresh take on search UI. Then later they had to figure out ads to turn a profit.

Adding the M, Microsoft was founded after Gates and Allen had already created a tech company together prior, and they saw a market opportunity. I'm sort of sketchy on the history, but a quick search shows they developed Altair BASIC in around four months, reusing some of the work they'd one prior, had the advantage of using Harvard's infrastructure at least briefly, and IIRC sort of pretended they had a product when they didn't. Paul Allen is said to have written the bootloader they'd need while on the flight to their sales pitch. Probably no wi-fi or laptops on board that flight :)

You could say they all pivoted at some point or didn't hit on what would be their full potential from the outset, so it's important to get going on something. At the same time, it seems they found one solid product and took a risk on it, rather than taking a shotgun approach and seeing what stuck.

Overall I think there's much more planning and medium- or long-term slog involved in these companies to say they started simply. Though for most small businesses I do agree with the sibling posts to get going and test things out ASAP. I think being aggressive about culling ideas that aren't working is ok for SaaS or CRUD businesses, so you don't risk becoming a zombie company.

[cheez]

haha fair enough.