The Startup Weekly: #31
The Startup Weekly is a journal for startups. We handpick some of the best articles that are out there, to help you learn and grow.
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Different Strokes
A list of some of the most innovative business models of the last 100 years. it’s a great primer — it talks about several trailblazing business models, like the Gillette razor, Google’s advertising-led search model, subscription, freemium, etc., and the key companies using them today.I also found it slightly reminiscent of my B-school lectures from many years ago — this nostalgia value was a plus!
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3 UX Laws to Retain Users
I love articles on design, and I especially love them if they make specific recommendations. This one talks about 3 ‘laws’, so it can’t get more specific than that! As we design our products, we often fall prey to the ‘curse of knowledge’. We forget that the user is not as conversant with our product and its features as we are. Result: We overload and tire the user, and she’ll probably stop using the app.This article presents 3 timeless axioms of design, and presents the science (and Wikipedia links) behind them.
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Don’t Listen to Your Users
We’ve always read and heard that you should listen to your users. And it makes intuitive sense — if your product roadmap includes features users say they want, then your product will gradually become more useful. Right? Not always.
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What Makes Founders Succeed
This was the introduction to a 2006 book, ‘Founders at Work’, written by Jessica Livingston, a Y Combinator partner. The most fascinating thing here was her read on what makes a startup founder successful. It’s not brilliance, it’s not foresight, and it’s not superlative deal-making skills. It’s bloody-minded determination. And being able to persevere in the face of ‘no’.
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Wasting Time With The Joneses
I run a mobile platform for consumer brands to engage with their users. Another player with a slightly similar model raised a ton of money a month ago. This made me envious and worried — how can I catch up with them?But as this article says, using funding as a yardstick for progress is erroneous — fund-raising is not a forum for competition. Capital is rarely the main constraint to growth. And you shouldn’t raise funding to close the gap vs. competitors, but to change the game.
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A Slide by Slide Guide to a Killer Investor Pitch
A quick reference for the next time you’re making a investor pitch deck.Elizabeth Kraus, who has compiled this, is the founder of an accelerator and has seen thousands of pitches. If that’s not a formidable resource to tap, she’s also consulted several angel investors in coming up with this format. You’d do well to copy this format. I’m re-outlining my pitch deck as we speak.
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The two goals of startup fundraising
As everyone and their neighbor is raising tens of millions, a timely reminder of why you raise funds. It’s not a competition to see who raises the most. You raise to put money in the bank, and to maintain optionality. The more you raise, the more you have to hit the next set of milestones. Funnily enough though, every extra dollar raised also reduces your optionality.
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