I rode at least one '90s dot com into the ground on that first curve. Starting with something like $6M on day one, they staffed up, built the product over the course of a year, launched in August and hit the ground in September.
I'm following a somewhat flatter trajectory with FairTutor (my latest bootstrapped startup): Registered the domain a year ago, built a demo, spent 7 months traveling through South America talking to Spanish schools and building the product into something they'll be happy to use, filed down the sharp corners over the last month, and it should go live to paying users in about a week.
Still have about a year's worth of runway left to polish it into something good before it needs to start paying the bills.
I can't upvote this article enough. Perhaps I've seen too many friends put months into a startup, with no clear marketing / post-launch plan. The switch gets flipped, the site goes live, people patiently look at Google Analytics, and ... the users don't come. A couple of months later everyone gives up and goes back to devoting full attention to their day jobs that they never left.
That, and the article makes an important point -- if you don't have that many users, it doesn't necessarily mean that your service/app isn't valuable. Unless your product is incredibly niche, it most likely means that not enough people have heard about it yet. Get it out there!
Yeah, I think this should be required reading. I couldn't BELIEVE the number of supposed "hackers" who turned their noses up at SEO on a thread I read the other day: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1402544
I think a lot of wantrepreneurs wouldn't "lower" themselves, to SEO, cold calling, shilling at conferences, begging bloggers for coverage, etc (strangely ignoring the fact that many of the companies they admire have well-oiled sales and marketing engines).
It's like a car mechanic who opens a garage and thinks that his job should still be working on cars all day.
I think I'm going to print out "coding is procrastination" and stick it to the top of my monitor.
The gratification with coding is short term - find a problem, think of a feature and get stuck in and get it done. When it works you get a nice glow of self satisfaction.
I don't know about others, but having the self-control to not open the code editor and do something else is probably the most difficult challenge I face in getting projects out there.
That's a good article, but these strategies should be thought-out BEFORE your app is launched. In fact, way before, like before you even start writing code.
Wow, great article. I've been trying to think of how I can effectively bootstrap my company in about six months or so. Originally, I kind of deluded myself of by thinking I could build a SaaS app and I would start getting customers.
It's becoming more and more clear that the only way to get more revenue is to keep solving problems, charge for your solutions, and have patience. Easy to forget.
Founders gotta eat too. In that case, budget is a looser term.
The point is, launch isn't when the battle is won or lost. Launching is just the first time you're engaging with the enemy. So you shouldn't expend all of your resources (cash, optimism, etc.) before that point... It's a long road.
Hey,
I'm Des , I wrote the post. I agree with you, in principle, but I've also seen hackers run out of money. It's not just development costs, if your app sends texts, or uses AuthSMTP, or even requires a lot EC2 instances or a hefty Heroku server then you'll still have a few bills piling up pre-revenue.
I guess the over-arching point is that you need a cash buffer large enough to cover you for the period from when your bills start to the time when your revenue tops them, and that time is usually a long time after launch.
I'm following a somewhat flatter trajectory with FairTutor (my latest bootstrapped startup): Registered the domain a year ago, built a demo, spent 7 months traveling through South America talking to Spanish schools and building the product into something they'll be happy to use, filed down the sharp corners over the last month, and it should go live to paying users in about a week.
Still have about a year's worth of runway left to polish it into something good before it needs to start paying the bills.