2 ms·

What's the point of posting this ? Nothing insightful or useful for founders. "Work through your business model" as a growth strategy. Brilliant. Paid acquisi

What's the point of posting this ? Nothing insightful or useful for founders. "Work through your business model" as a growth strategy. Brilliant. Paid acquisition has gone through the roof as Facebook/Google are increasing monetisation. Content marketing has never been more difficult as more and more companies compete for the same keywords. More and more startups competing for the same customer. It's not like founders like me are looking to give equity to VCs. It's because it's getting more and more expensive to grow.

silexia 6y ago
Author here. My point is that founders should avoid VC's like the plague if they can. Founders think taking $1m in funding validates their concept, but only the market can validate your concept. Premature scale will feel good at first, then destroy the founder and the employees who joined. There are tons of methods to sell, and if FB and Google Ads (I am a Premiere partner of both) are your first avenue of selling, you will get destroyed. Try less expensive methods and only when you prove it elsewhere then try those very expensive areas.
- luc_ 6y ago
  I'd be interested to hear your proposed alternatives, then. Small business loans?
  - silexia 6y ago
    The best alternative to VC money is simply getting early customers to help fund you. Do services contracting for them and you will learn a ton about their needs and the problems your solution solves. You will iterate rapidly and bring your business to actually solve customer problems. Beyond customer funding, look at SBA loans. Or bank loans. Avoid credit cards if you don't pay them off monthly. Your business probably won't grow as fast as your debt will if you go this way. I personally used a combination of using my own savings (dipped into about $10k before my net worth started going up) in combination with customer funding.

silexia 6y ago

Author here. My point is that founders should avoid VC's like the plague if they can. Founders think taking $1m in funding validates their concept, but only the market can validate your concept. Premature scale will feel good at first, then destroy the founder and the employees who joined. There are tons of methods to sell, and if FB and Google Ads (I am a Premiere partner of both) are your first avenue of selling, you will get destroyed. Try less expensive methods and only when you prove it elsewhere then try those very expensive areas.

luc_ 6y ago
I'd be interested to hear your proposed alternatives, then. Small business loans?
- silexia 6y ago
  The best alternative to VC money is simply getting early customers to help fund you. Do services contracting for them and you will learn a ton about their needs and the problems your solution solves. You will iterate rapidly and bring your business to actually solve customer problems. Beyond customer funding, look at SBA loans. Or bank loans. Avoid credit cards if you don't pay them off monthly. Your business probably won't grow as fast as your debt will if you go this way. I personally used a combination of using my own savings (dipped into about $10k before my net worth started going up) in combination with customer funding.