4 Things To Successfully Launch Your Startup

You aren’t the first person to start a business. You are the latest in a long line of entrepreneurs stretching back to the dawn of time. Their work means that you don’t have to start from scratch, and you can take advantage of the learnings of the many who have gone before you to help make your startup a success.

Tony Clemendor is the CEO of Founder’s Forge and has been hosting a Startup SuperHero series to help people learn from experts. He’s worked with a lot of startups, and he knows the key principles required for success.

In the second part of this two-part interview series, I connected with Tony about the actions and mindsets needed to launch a profitable business. [Part 1]

What is the first thing a founder needs to do when building a startup?

They should start by validating the concept. What makes founders special is their ability to have unique insights and to see the world in a different way. That’s what often leads to the solutions that they come up with.

However, founders are an “audience of one” and sometimes think that a thing that bothers them, bothers enough people to represent a meaningful market. I often speak with founders that made the mistake of not talking to people in their ideal target market early in the development process. 

In addition to getting confirmation that the founder has identified the right market and that the problem is meaningful, having conversations early on will force the founder to answer the question: Where do I find my target users? That information is a valuable part of a solid go-to-market strategy.

How can you identify a business that you will be well suited for?

Solve a problem that you care about and that afflicts an audience you can relate to.  A founder has to care about both the problem and the user because that will sustain them through the difficult times they will face while building the business. 

Founders who start companies around problems they don’t really care about, for people they can’t develop empathy for, are often easily derailed at the first sign of trouble. Caring about the problem will also come through when they are speaking with potential recruits and investors, improving their chances of engaging either.

Where should you turn for advice about your startup?

Leveraging objective advisors is especially important for first-time founders.  Being a startup founder is isolating.  On top of that, most founders start with a knowledge gap in the things that they need to get up to speed on quickly. Getting informed support, not just from your friends and family, can be a great way of leveraging someone’s expertise to fill that knowledge gap, as well as providing a sounding board for ideas. 

What I often see founders doing is taking on convenient advisors, perhaps thinking that a full roster of advisors is better than none. But advisor selection should be intentional. They should be used to fill gaps and there should be clear expectations set about how often the founder and the advisor speak.

What are your suggestions for finding the right investors and getting them to invest in you?

Finding the right investors is about doing your homework. You have to research and find out which investors are investing in deals like yours. Getting those investors to invest in you is about having a solid plan for a viable business and being able to tell the story well.

—-

Knowledge, research, and grit is the key to success for a startup founder. You need to understand the market, understand potential investors, understand yourself, and find reliable advisors that will tell you the truth. Research needs to be done at every step, from the very beginning, and you need to maintain clarity when making business decisions. This will ensure that your startup company has a strong foundation for success.