Is It Time to Give Up on Your Startup Dreams?
“I’m not sure what to do,” he said. A young founder was sitting across from me, tears welling in the corners of his eyes. He’d had some modest success. He’d raised $500k in seed funding. He had a handful of customers. He’d gotten some press coverage. But he was grappling with one of those moments of self-doubt every entrepreneur has dozens… hundreds… maybe thousands of times during their careers. “Things just keep getting harder. Sometimes I wonder if I’m even on the right track. How do I know when to quit?”
And there it was. The question about entrepreneurship I get asked more often than any other: “How do I know when to quit?”
For me, the answer was obvious: YES! His market was too small, his customer acquisition cost was too high, his runway was too short. In my mind, it was clear he’d spent too much time building a product and not enough time effectively addressing a compelling market opportunity. It’s one of the most common mistakes entrepreneurs make. But if I’d told him that, he wouldn’t have listened. Entrepreneurs never do. They’re too committed to their ideas.
Why do startups fail?
By some estimates, as many as 90% of all new businesses fail within the first five years of their existence. That’s not just Silicon-Valley-style tech companies. It also includes the local…
