What is more important in an early-stage startup?
Anshul Raghav
17 replies
We often observe that founders and VCs tend to take different paths when evaluating an early-stage opportunity. In your perspective, what holds more prominence when building a startup?
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Rick Fan@rick_fan
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You can go without a team, as many people work solo. You might not even need someone dedicated to marketing. But your product must hit the users' needs spot on; no product, no users.
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@rick_fan agree to disagree. Imagine a city hosting a circus but nobody knows about it. Those close to the venue might attend, but what if posters were plastered throughout the city? More people would show up. Now, consider, that if the event is fantastic, initial users become advocates. With early marketing, this effect multiplies, achieving goals faster. Conversely, without it, the impact diminishes, illustrating the importance of marketing even for an average or subpar product.
@anshul_raghav It's not that we don't do marketing, it's just that it's not as important compared to the product. In the early stages of a project, it's necessary to attract users to take a look, but it's even more important to retain them. The right product must hit the users' needs. To keep users, the product has to meet their requirements.
Most early-stage startups don't do enough marketing. They spend too much time building and not enough putting their idea, value proposition, messaging, mvp in front of people to:
- figure out if it resonnates
- get short feedback loops
- get great ideas from the market
I agree with @ahmed_mobin, Done well, marketing/sales is where you need to spend most of your time.
i think at the end of the day everyone realises -- the most important ingredient is distribution. distribution. distribution.
(which is what we're trying to do with our launch: www.producthunt.com/posts/findr-5)
Premarket Bell
The secret to any startup's success is this. A startup must offer a good or service that addresses a pressing issue for a particular customer base. The product won't succeed if it doesn't satisfy the needs of the intended market.
@daniel_henry4 does it apply to SaaS or every industry?
I believe Marketing is most important thing.
With marketing you will know ASAP if your mvp/product will work or not.
I think it's the team. Without a good team, the other points are impossible to realize so effective.
I am hesitating between Market and Marketing, but since they really on each other, Iād prefer to emphasize my efforts on having a very strong marketing strategy to attract my first users!
But make sure to have your MVP ready anytime! You also need to prove that you got sth in hands to land your first customers!
You need to include one important factor (which I rarely see people consider): Timing.
Microsoft had the first touch phone, but Apple made a fortune with the iPhone.
GM launched the electric car in the '90s, yet Tesla is today's most valued car company.
Not to mention Facebook, which followed Friendster in the social networking space.
But, if I had to choose from your list, as a founder, I would go with Product. As a VC obvious choice is Market.