4 ms·
Ask HN: Startup related Mistakes you've done
Learning from mistakes is much more powerful than learning from reading or doing it perfectly
What are start-up mistakes you've done over the years. There are lot of blog posts and lists, I am just curious of individual/personal ones here.
Resources: http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html
- seven 17y agoIf we would learn from mistakes, we would be the brightest person (Charly Brown) Here a small fraction of my mistakes. And yes, I do sometimes repeat them. * Not outsourcing my tax stuff. * Distraction. :) * Being too proud to ask for help. * Slow in realizing that it is hard to sell inner value if the outer appearance sucks. * Being too afraid to be seen as stupid. * Listening to my tech-hacker peers when it comes to business. Or to care too much about their opinion. * Not learning from non-tech business people around me. * Not being interested in business but in technology. * Over engineering.
- petesalty 17y ago1. Trying to start solo 2. Not asking for help soon enough 3. Thinking that the market was broken but really just failing to understand the market 4. Never being "finished" enough to go live 5. Listening to experts 6. Completely and utterly underestimating how hard it would be to get customers.
- keeptrying 17y agoMe too. All of the above. Still doing 1. :)
- petesalty 17y agoIt was the biggest mistake I made. My usual tendency is to work alone but I learnt that only works for small projects. What I really need is someone to bounce ideas off, complement my skill set and occasionally fight with :) I'd never try and do anything substantial alone again. Actually I'm looking for a co-founder so if anyone knows someone who's also looking http://ineedacofounder.wordpress.com http://ineedacofounder.wordpress.com
- keeptrying 17y agoI understand the problem but I've been burnt one time before by a cofounder so I'm a little gun-shy there. I'm primarily interested in creating a company that relates to outdoor sports and the environment and travel. I also envision NOT sitting in front of a computer all the time and creating a company thats very Patagonia-like w.r.t employing people.
- Travis 17y ago#4 is most applicable to me. I'm always one bug fix away from releasing a new version, but don't manage to release often enough. IMVU runs a great blog (startup lessons learned) that you should read regularly if you operate a web startup.
- dryicerx 17y agoI'll start * Not surveying and making sure there is a market for it: A cooking recipe site with features allowing for evolving recipes... the market was too small, and after launch realized using a website along with cooking didn't go hand in hand. * Hiring or bringing in skill over will: A rockstar coder is nothing if their not passionate, that just ended in pure disaster. Getting a passionate and willing person to learn and acquire skills works better than the other.
- zaidf 17y ago1. Assuming I know what my users want. 2. Thinking that build-and-they'll-come will work. 3. Thinking that when build-and-they'll-come fails, that my product sucks.
- mahmud 17y agoNot working harder on my business when I had a job. I wish I had done most of what I am doing now when I had plenty of income and plenty of time.