4 ms·
Ask HN: How to survive emotional rollercoaster & running out of money?
Hi...first post here. I come here from time to time to read people's stories and listen to advice from the many helpful & knowledgable people around here. Figured it was time for me to reach out, so here we go.
I've been working on a startup for over 2 years and have been expending ALL my time, energy and money into it for the past year. It's been a great ride and lots of fun, but recently I feel like I'm running out of passion, desire, motivation, and most of all confidence. I have been full of all of that up until 4-5 months ago and now I'm wondering if I'm just wasting my time.
Brief history:
The product is an entertainment device with an accompanying website that will be leased to entertainment establishments. There's a physical gadget that had to be designed & built from the ground up. So it's not just a web project, there's lots of pieces to it.
When I tell people about it and especially when they use it, the response is always "this is one of the coolest things i've ever seen/heard of. you're going to be a millionaire." Sure, that's flattering and (used to be) validating...but they have no idea what they're talking about. You can't just snap your fingers and roll out a million units and expect people are going to sign contracts. In fact, I've been snapping my fingers, clapping my hands, running around, fine-tuning, re-thinking, testing, focus grouping, pitching, and alot more for 6 months. And guess what? I've only convinced 2 people to lease the thing... and at a price point so low that it will take me over a year to turn a profit.
This is why I'm losing my confidence and motivation. I spent so long on research & development and came up with a working prototype. Then I spent more time improving and making it legit along with filing a patent & trademark. Lots of time and money into this project... all out of my pocket and my personal life. I just sold my car and have enough money to cover about 2 more months of living. So now I can't spend any more money on my project.
There's glimmers of hope from time to time. I get calls from fairly high profile companies that are interested, but it's all been smoke for the most part. This is very frustrating, because the interest is there but these corporations are so bureaucratic and elusive. "Hey I saw your product and I really like it. I'm going to discuss it with the marketing team and get back to you." They never get back to me and never respond to phone calls or email. What gives? Thanks for the tease.
The bottom line is that no matter what product you have come up with, how cool anyone thinks it is, if a corporation doesn't know who you are, they don't care about you! They'll get back to you when they feel like it. And if you're trying to cold call them, forget about it.
So what's left for me is that there is some interest, but there's absolutely nothing I can do other than wait. And wait. And wait. And pursue another company to wait on. Or go door to door and get rejected because "it's really cool, but it's just not in the budget."
Then I fantasize "If a big order does come through, how the hell am I going to pay to get them manufactured? Who's going to handle support? Who's going to manage things? Oh crap, will the server be able to take the load? What if I get 100 of these out there and theres a bug or the website crashes? Is my revenue model completely wrong? Should I seek investors or partners? Who can figure out how to sell this thing? How am I going to come up with rent next month?"
Arrrrggghhhhh. Please help!
Thanks for listening!
jtesp
- dools 16y agoIf you already have a patent and it's "launched" and you're trying to sell it, why not tell us what it is so we can give you some qualified advice? Based on the information here you have a problem with: marketing/positioning and/or sales and/or product development. If you provide more specific details of the product, the market, your current business model, pricing and sales strategies then you might get some advice you can actually use rather than "hey man! don't give up!!1 you're a startup man! keep it up and stick with it!".
- jtesp 16y agoThanks, good point. Patent is pending so it's still a bit under wraps. I guess this is more of a question of biz dev & sales/marketing. How do you sell to large corporations such as Red Bull, MillerCoors, Wahoo's etc? It's just me, do I need someone with more experience in corp markets? How often do I persist without bugging? How do I approach corps and convince them to listen to me and see my product? Thanks
- dools 16y agoSell through ad agencies. They'll want a brutal cut of your profits, but if you're flagging maybe it's worth it. Ad agencies are already selling and have established relationships with those sorts of companies. Ad agencies quite often also have splits between "above the line" and "below the line" campaigns. Traditionally they call their "below the line" departments Agency Name DIGITAL (for some reason). Basically "below the line" refers to any campaign that isn't print, radio or television. Things like bluetooth proxy marketing, SMS, trade promotions and competitions, that kind of thing and the below the line guys are always on the lookout for hot new tech that they can flog into their client base. Bluetooth proxy marketing never took off because there were problems that were embedded in the market (most people have bluetooth off or hidden and then iphones came out without bluetooth and really screwed the pooch) but that didn't stop a hell of a lot of marketing agencies selling in bluetooth proxy campaigns to some pretty major brands. If your technology is actually good think how excited they'll be!
- 16y ago