Piggybacking on some earlier comments, the "sell ads to local businesses" model is a tough one to scale (using the common startup definition of scale to mean "g

Piggybacking on some earlier comments, the "sell ads to local businesses" model is a tough one to scale (using the common startup definition of scale to mean "grow exponentially"). However, that doesn't mean you can't grow your business into a nice little income source that, ideally, won't take much management (since your users are college students, people who move often, and a market that has a built in supply increase every year, if your service works for them, advertisers who see a benefit will likely continue to pay you once they are onboarded). You can probably get to this point (focus on the top 10, then 25, then 50, etc. colleges in terms of student population - I'd look at new student population, to be honest, as well as adjusting for % that live in non-university housing). From your comments, I don't think you should worry about trying to join an accelerator or get a largish amount of funding - that will just push you to make the Groupon mistake and spend too much money on local sales. My recommendation - see if you can raise money from friends, family, your university, or any local entrepreneurship groups (in Austin, for example, there are several organizations that exist nearly entirely to help students get through the part of founding a company you are in). From there, were I running the company, either you or your cofounder should shift entirely to onboarding schools (or hire someone to focus full time on this if you each are actually needed on other projects). Create a "college rep" program, and offer either a small stipend (college students will work for tiny amounts of money, especially if they can then put "worked at startup in school" on their resume) or in kind services from your advertisers (half off mattress, free move, whatever they'll offer to you). Build quickly from there, and keep promoting it. If you're business model is real, it will become apparent quickly, and you can think about raising real money then.