I spent two intensive years building products (with lots of buzz), while becoming a LeWeb finalist (London), participating in Startupbootcamp (Berlin) and having endless hours of mentorship. I learned the reality of bootstrapping and well-funded startups. Startups are really hard.

So what’s my honest advice to startup owners?

1. Fix your bucket first.
   Your client-base is like a bucket full of holes. You’re catching customers just to have them leave, probably. Adjust your product to meet customer needs. Fill in the holes in your retention bucket to keep your customers returning to you. Focus on retention over quantity. Better have 500 active users that return to you weekly than 10,000 dead signups. Focus on retention first and growth after.
2. Create a pain killer, not a vitamin.
   Solve a real problem. Don’t create a luxury product that is just a nice to have. Focus on providing a significantly better way to do something than what people have always been doing.
3. In the beginning, be VERY hands-on.
   You can’t expect to offer a product or service and magically watch your business take off. Nothing comes automatically. You have to push — much like a small local business — and mediate all of your business processes. Think of a car with a drained battery: you have to push the car manually first, only then start the engine and move forward.
4. At some point you’ll have to make a really harsh decision.
   If you really want something, you’ll have to give up on other very good things. You’ll have to jump between two cliffs at some point even if that makes you cry. Be ready or quit now.
5. This is an art, but there is more science involved than you may think.
   Percentages, conversions, funnels, numbers. You need to keep track of everything about your product and each step made by each user. Be maniac about metrics. The true art is to balance what the numbers say and doing non-standard things.
6. Customer feedback is key. Not your opinions.
   Validate your riskiest assumptions from the beginning. Find creative ways to test if people are willing to use a feature. Do this before the first line of code is written. Numbers will prove your opinions can be very misleading.
7. Define your brand framework.
   Clearly define what your business is and what your business is not. Why should people use your product instead of the ones they use now? Why should they put their hard-earned money towards your product? Position your business differently than the others on the market. Make yourself stand out. Believe me, storytelling alone can totally change how the public views the value of your product.
8. Keeping your team motivated is everything.
   Anyone will work for 8 hours when you pay them, but what you really should be paying for is excellent work. Add vision, meaning and fun to your workplace, and you’ll get your employee’s blood and sweat. You need to give your employees a reason to sacrifice their time and effort. Without sacrifice, there’s nothing.

Follow me at Twitter.