Being A Pioneer In A Startup: The STRUGGLE Is REAL
I’ve been working in a startup since last year and the struggle is real. Starting from small salary, delayed salary, to not getting paid at all. It was hard, with lots of sacrifices and learning. However, I’m grateful for the learning process and my growth as a person. My startup story started in November 2020. Right after my graduation, I got a job in a digital marketing agency in Yogyakarta. I was thrilled and excited as it was my first job. Everything was so new to me, I started to learn not only about the power of words but also about digital marketing, google ads, keyword tools, google trends, SEO, algorithm, design, funneling, vlogging, etc.
I did lots of things. That was fun and all until the real problem emerged. My salary was below average and it was delayed for two weeks in December. In January my company decided to start our businesses and stop working for others. In short, we stop getting paid and start to earn for ourselves. We were a team of young blood that was full of high hopes and dreams with a great leader that has a clear vision and mission, so why not? It may sound crazy for others, but for us, we have nothing to lose. In a blink of an eye, we decided to sign the contract. Yes, that’s right…We don’t get a monthly salary…However, the company pays for our living expenses. They get us a place to live, weekly money for food, and of course office to work. We were like one big family trying to build a family business with a very little budget that we can barely hold on to. Thus we need to use our own money.
Inconsistency Is A Consistence In Startup
Inconsistency is a common thing in startups. It’s related to new ideas and trends to stay up to date. However, as a pioneer, it’s like a hell cycle. We started by rearranging our company structure, the leader, the team, how we work, brainstorming for business opportunities, competitor/benchmark, evaluating our business canvas, etc. These are done many times like never-ending cycles. There will always be better ideas for tomorrow but not always with better results. The meeting and brainstorming part was extremely exhausting, why? Because we had two business consultants that were our main leader. They were the holding who had the idea to build this company. Therefore with these two different heads, we got lots of ideas. This morning, we might execute this plan and everything changes at 8 P.M. Oh yeah and we do everything with a smile on our face. The company culture says “ No complaining, be positive, look for a solution, work hard, be happy and smile”.
We kickstart with two businesses after long research and break down the business canvas. The first is website services and the second is skincare products. We were divided into two teams, and I was the leader of the website team. Everything seemed to go as planned, we got the landing page done, the ads, we got our first customer, we got problems, fixed it, and kept evaluating our work. However as we ran these two businesses, our consultant asked us to build other businesses. Without further ado, we created lots of other businesses from a digital marketing agency, social media agency, wedding photography, clothes and retails, newborn baby photography, to Aqiqah services. Yes, we go back to basics and work for others giving services. Yet, we still struggle with everyday life and money.
Sacrifice Yourself & Ready to Do It All
We were a team of 13 people, having our responsibilities. However, we need to be ready to help and support others anytime. Our businesses depend on digital marketing performances as we didn’t have any stores. Thus, we need to create content every day and it’s not as easy as it sounds. The key to digital marketing is originality and good content strategy. We need to squeeze our brains to create great content every day. Great content is original, taken professionally so it’s good to look at, and should follow the algorithm on whatever digital platform it is. Besides, we handle several platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Google Ads, and websites/blogs. How much workload we have based on how many businesses we handle, then multiplied by the digital platforms that we run. Yes, it’s a lot and with only 13 people whom not all people had the mentality of being ready to do it all. This made some of the team have a crazy amount of workloads while some others were just being there, sitting in the office, working on their responsibilities, and closed their eyes to what others do.
There were around six people who were always ready to do anything at any time. Sometimes we need to work until 11 PM for creating content, meeting, or dealing with clients. My main job was copy and content writing, that said I was the spearhead of content. I need to squeeze my brain to create and find the best things to write. However, the others still need to break down the ideas from my writing and create their content. Then we help one another in executing these ideas in the form of YouTube videos, TikTok, to handling customers and orders. The team was exhausted and fed up with all of the work with little results. Also, we started to feel in vain. We feel unappreciated as we didn’t get anything for what we do and the success that we dream of together was getting vague and farther away. Imagine you need to do this all every day, working hard like crazy, need to evaluate yourself and getting evaluated by others, you give it all, and you are still struggling with your basic needs.
The Break Down
We are just normal human beings with a family who have lots of expectations. We needed more money and we were running out of it. All of us started to talk badly and lost motivation, one person decided to quit and the others started to follow. I got out of my job in this digital marketing agency in April. At first, I said to my consultant that I need to work from home because of Ramadan and he said yes. However, the truth was, I didn’t get any job to be done. Then my friends called me, saying that the situation was getting worse and there was lots of drama going on. Our consultant had a trust issue and put some of my friends on hold. They were given a break with no clear intention. Then after Eid al-Fitr my friends who were put on hold and I got a message, saying that we are fired and he is sorry for being indecisive all along. The others also decided to quit. There are only two people left and they are great people who still survive until this day. We who quit, decide to move on and take these experiences as a great lesson. Business is business, family is family.
