Notes
If you’re hopeful and ambitious, they’ll try to convince you your ideas are impossible. They’ll say you’re wasting your time.
“That would never work in the real world.”… The real world isn’t a place, it’s an excuse. It’s a justification for not trying. It has nothing to do with you.
Other people’s failures are just that: other people’s failures. If other people can’t market their product, it has nothing to do with you. Success is the experience that actually counts.
Long-term business planning is a fantasy. There are just too many factors that are out of your hands: market conditions, competitors, customers, the economy,
Writing a plan makes you feel in control of things you can’t actually control. When you turn guesses into plans, you enter a danger zone. Plans let the past drive the future. They put blinders on you. And you have to be able to improvise. You have to be able to pick up opportunities that come along.
You have the most information when you’re doing something, not before you’ve done it.
Make decisions right before you do something, not far in advance.
Grow slow and see what feels right—premature hiring is the death of many companies. And avoid huge growth spurts too—they can cause you to skip right over your appropriate size.
Small is a great destination in itself.
And remember, once you get big, it’s really hard to shrink without firing people, damaging morale, and changing the entire way you do business.
Our culture celebrates the idea of the workaholic. Workaholics wind up creating more problems than they solve. First off, working like that just isn’t sustainable over time. When the burnout crash comes—and it will—it’ll hit that much harder. They create problems (often unwittingly) just so they can get off on working more. Your values and decision making wind up skewed. You stop being able to decide what’s worth extra effort and what’s not. And you wind up just plain tired. No one makes sharp decisions when tired. The real hero is already home because she figured out a faster way to get things done.
Let’s retire the term entrepreneur. It’s outdated and loaded with baggage. It smells like a members-only club. Instead of entrepreneurs, let’s just call them starters.
To do great work, you need to feel that you’re making a difference. That you’re putting a meaningful dent in the universe. That you’re part of something important.
If you’re going to do something, do something that matters. These little guys came out of nowhere and destroyed old models that had been around for decades. You can do the same in your industry.
The easiest, most straightforward way to create a great product or service is to make something you want to use.
When you build a product or service, you make the call on hundreds of tiny decisions each day.
Best of all, this “solve your own problem” approach lets you fall in love with what you’re making. You know the problem and the value of its solution intimately.
your brilliant idea is just that, an idea. And everyone’s got one of those.
When you’re new at something, you need to start creating. The most important thing is to begin. So get a camera, hit Record, and start shooting.
There’s always enough time if you spend it right. And don’t think you have to quit your day job, either.
Once you do that, you’ll learn whether your excitement and interest is real or just a passing phase.
When you want something bad enough, you make the time—regardless of your other obligations. Besides, the perfect time never arrives. You’re always too young or old or busy or broke or something else. If you constantly fret about timing things perfectly, they’ll never happen.
As you get going, keep in mind why you’re doing what you’re doing. Great businesses have a point of view, not just a product or service. You have to believe in something. You need to have a backbone. You need to know what you’re willing to fight for. And then you need to show the world.
You’ll turn some people off. They’ll accuse you of being arrogant and aloof. That’s life. For everyone who loves you, there will be others who hate you. If no one’s upset by what you’re saying, you’re probably not pushing hard enough. (And you’re probably boring, too.)
When you don’t know what you believe, everything becomes an argument. Everything is debatable. But when you stand for something, decisions are obvious.
Standing for something isn’t just about writing it down. It’s about believing it and living it.
If you’re building something like a factory or restaurant, then you may indeed need that outside cash. But a lot of companies don’t need expensive infrastructure—especially these days. In fact, no matter what kind of business you’re starting, take on as little outside cash as you can. Maybe eventually you’ll need to go the bigger, more expensive route, but not right now.
Great companies start in garages all the time. Yours can too.
Anyone who takes a “we’ll figure out how to profit in the future” attitude to business is being ridiculous. That’s like building a rocket ship but starting off by saying, “Let’s pretend gravity doesn’t exist.” A business without a path to profit isn’t a business, it’s a hobby.
don’t use the idea of a startup as a crutch. Instead, start an actual business.
You need a commitment strategy, not an exit strategy. If your whole strategy is based on leaving, chances are you won’t get far in the first place.
If you do manage to get a good thing going, keep it going. Good things don’t come around that often. Don’t let your business be the one that got away.
Huge organizations can take years to pivot. They talk instead of act. They meet instead of do. But if you keep your mass low, you can quickly change anything: your entire business model, product, feature set, and/or marketing message. You can make mistakes and fix them quickly. You can change your priorities, product mix, or focus. And most important, you can change your mind.
“I don’t have enough time/money/people/experience.” Stop whining. Less is a good thing.
You can turn a bunch of great ideas into a crappy product real fast by trying to do them all at once. You just can’t do everything you want to do and do it well.
Lots of things get better as they get shorter. Directors cut good scenes to make a great movie. Musicians drop good tracks to make a great album. Writers eliminate good pages to make a great book. So start chopping. Getting to great starts by cutting out stuff that’s merely good.
When you start anything new, there are forces pulling you in a variety of directions. There’s the stuff you could do, the stuff you want to do, and the stuff you have to do. The stuff you have to do is where you should begin. Start at the epicenter.
So figure out your epicenter. Which part of your equation can’t be removed?
So ignore the details—for a while. Nail the basics first and worry about the specifics later.
When we start designing something, we sketch out ideas with a big, thick Sharpie marker, instead of a ballpoint pen.
Besides, you often can’t recognize the details that matter most until after you start building.
Whenever you can, swap “Let’s think about it” for “Let’s decide on it.” Commit to making decisions. Don’t wait for the perfect solution. Decide and move forward.
The problem comes when you postpone decisions in the hope that a perfect answer will come to you later. It won’t. You’re as likely to make a great call today as you are tomorrow.
You don’t have to live with a decision forever. If you make a mistake, you can correct it later.
Long projects zap morale. The longer it takes to develop, the less likely it is to launch. Make the call, make progress, and get something out now—while you’ve got the motivation and momentum to do so.
It’s the stuff you leave out that matters. So constantly look for things to remove, simplify, and streamline. Be a curator.
do less. Your project won’t suffer nearly as much as you fear.
If you start pushing back deadlines and increasing your budget, you’ll never stop.
The core of your business should be built around things that won’t change. Things that people are going to want today and ten years from now.
Remember, fashion fades away. When you focus on permanent features, you’re in bed with things that never go out of style.
It’s tempting for people to obsess over tools instead of what they’re going to do with those tools. Use whatever you’ve got already or can afford cheaply. Then go. It’s not the gear that matters. It’s playing what you’ve got as well as you can. Your tone is in your fingers.
When you make something, you always make something else. You can’t make just one thing. Everything has a by-product. Observant and creative business minds spot these by-products and see opportunities.
Just because you’ve still got a list of things to do doesn’t mean it’s not done. Don’t hold everything If you had to launch your business in two weeks, what would you cut out?
If you need to explain something, try getting real with it. Instead of describing what something looks like, draw it. Instead of explaining what something sounds like, hum it. Do everything you can to remove layers of abstraction.
you should get in the alone zone. Long stretches of alone time are when you’re most productive.
The worst interruptions of all are meetings.
When good enough gets the job done, go for it. It’s way better than wasting resources or, even worse, doing nothing because you can’t afford the complex solution. And remember, you can usually turn good enough into great later.
If you aren’t motivated by what you’re working on, it won’t be very good. The way you build momentum is by getting something done and then moving on to the next thing. The longer something takes, the less likely it is that you’re going to finish it.
If you absolutely have to work on long-term projects, try to dedicate one day a week (or every two weeks) to small victories that generate enthusiasm.
A lot of times it’s better to be a quitter than a hero.
If you already spent too much time on something that wasn’t worth it, walk away. You can’t get that time back. The worst thing you can do now is waste even more time.
We humans are just plain bad at estimating. The solution: Break the big thing into smaller things. The smaller it is, the easier it is to estimate.
Start making smaller to-do lists too. Long lists collect dust. Long lists are guilt trips. The longer the list of unfinished items, the worse you feel about it.
Big decisions are hard to make and hard to change. And once you make one, the tendency is to continue believing you made the right decision, even if you didn’t. You stop being objective. Once ego and pride are on the line, you can’t change your mind without looking bad.
You have to understand why something works or why something is the way it is. if you’re a copycat, you can never keep up. You’re always in a passive position. You never lead; you always follow.
But there’s a great way to protect yourself from copycats: Make you part of your product or service. Pour yourself into your product and everything around your product too: how you sell it, how you support it, how you explain it, and how you deliver it. Competitors can never copy the you in your product.
If you think a competitor sucks, say so. When you do that, you’ll find that others who agree with you will rally to your side. Being the anti-______ is a great way to differentiate yourself and attract followers.
Having an enemy gives you a great story to tell customers, too. Taking a stand always stands out. People get stoked by conflict. They take sides. Passions are ignited. And that’s a good way to get people to take notice. Cold War mentality is a dead end. When you get suckered into an arms race, you wind up in a never-ending battle that costs you massive amounts of money, time, and drive. And it forces you to constantly be on the defensive, too. Defensive companies can’t think ahead; they can only think behind. They don’t lead; they follow.
Solve the simple problems and leave the hairy, difficult, nasty problems to the competition.
Don’t shy away from the fact that your product or service does less. Highlight it. Be proud of it. Sell it as aggressively as competitors sell their extensive feature lists.
worrying about the competition quickly turns into an obsession.
Focus on yourself instead. What’s going on in here is way more important than what’s going on out there.
You become reactionary instead of visionary.
And you can’t beat someone who’s making the rules. You need to redefine the rules, not just build something slightly better. If you merely replicate competitors, there’s no point to your existence.
If I’d listened to customers, I’d have given them a faster horse. —HENRY FORD
Start getting into the habit of saying no—even to many of your best ideas. Use the power of no to get your priorities straight. You rarely regret saying no. But you often wind up regretting saying yes.
Don’t believe that “customer is always right” stuff, either.
People and situations change. You can’t be everything to everyone. Companies need to be true to a type of customer more than a specific individual customer with changing needs.
So let your latest grand ideas cool off for a while first. By all means, have as many great ideas as you can. Get excited about them. Just don’t act in the heat of the moment. Write them down and park them for a few days. Then, evaluate their actual priority with a calm mind.
The requests that really matter are the ones you’ll hear over and over. After a while, you won’t be able to forget them. Your customers will be your memory.
Use this time to make mistakes without the whole world hearing about them. You don’t want everyone to watch you starting your business. It makes no sense to tell everyone to look at you if you’re not ready to be looked at yet.
When you build an audience, you don’t have to buy people’s attention—they give it to you. This is a huge advantage. So build an audience. Speak, write, blog, tweet, make videos—whatever. Share information that’s valuable and you’ll slowly but surely build a loyal audience. Then when you need to get the word out, the right people will already be listening.
Instead of trying to outspend, outsell, or outsponsor competitors, try to out-teach them. Teaching probably isn’t something your competitors are even thinking about. Most businesses focus on selling or servicing, but teaching never even occurs to them. Teach and you’ll form a bond you just don’t get from traditional marketing tactics. Teaching is something individuals and small companies can do that bigger competitors can’t. Everything at those places has to get filtered through a lawyer and go through layers of red tape. Teaching is your chance to outmaneuver them. As a business owner, you should share everything you know too.
Give people a backstage pass and show them how your business works. Imagine that someone wanted to make a reality show about your business. What would they share? Now stop waiting for someone else and do it yourself. Think no one will care? Think again. Even seemingly boring jobs can be fascinating when presented right. People are curious about how things are made. It’s why they like factory tours or behind-the-scenes footage on DVDs. The business world is full of “professionals” who wear the uniform and try to seem perfect. In truth, they just come off as stiff and boring. No one can relate to people like that. Don’t worry about how you’re supposed to sound and how you’re supposed to act. Show the world what you’re really like, warts and all.
It’s a beautiful way to put it: Leave the poetry in what you make. When something becomes too polished, it loses its soul. It seems robotic.
If you want to get someone’s attention, it’s silly to do exactly the same thing as everyone else. You need to stand out.
Instead, call someone. Write a personal note. If you read a story about a similar company or product, contact the journalist who wrote it. Pitch her with some passion, some interest, some life. Do something meaningful. Be remarkable. Stand out. Be unforgettable. That’s how you’ll get the best coverage.
Emulate drug dealers. Make your product so good, so addictive, so “can’t miss” that giving customers a small, free taste makes them come back with cash in hand.
Don’t be afraid to give a little away for free—as long as you’ve got something else to sell.
Marketing is something everyone in your company is doing 24/7/365.
You will not be a big hit right away. You will not get rich quick. You are not so special that everyone else will instantly pay attention. No one cares about you. At least not yet. Get used to it.
You have to do it for a long time before the right people notice.
Start building your audience today. Start getting people interested in what you have to say. And then keep at it. In a few years, you too will get to chuckle when people discuss your “overnight” success.
Never hire anyone to do a job until you’ve tried to do it yourself first.
you should want to be intimately involved in all aspects of your business. Otherwise you’ll wind up in the dark, putting your fate solely in the hands of others. That’s dangerous.
Pass on hiring people you don’t need, even if you think that person’s a great catch.
You need to be able to tell people when they’re full of crap. You need an environment where everyone feels safe enough to be honest when things get tough. You need to know how far you can push someone. You need to know what people really mean when they say something.
I have never let my schooling interfere with my education. —MARK TWAIN
With a small team, you need people who are going to do work, not delegate work. Everyone’s got to be producing. No one can be above the work. That means you need to avoid hiring delegators, those people who love telling others what to do.
Managers of one are people who come up with their own goals and execute them.
How can you spot these people? Look at their backgrounds. They have set the tone for how they’ve worked at other jobs. They’ve run something on their own or launched some kind of project.
When something goes wrong, someone is going to tell the story. You’ll be better off if it’s you. Otherwise, you create an opportunity for rumors, hearsay, and false information to spread.
When something bad happens, tell your customers People will respect you more if you are open, honest, public, and responsive during a crisis.
Getting back to people quickly is probably the most important thing you can do when it comes to customer service. It’s amazing how much that can defuse a bad situation and turn it into a good one.
Use the appropriate tone and language to show that you understand the severity of what happened.
Listening to customers is the best way to get in tune with a product’s strengths and weaknesses.
After you introduce a new feature, change a policy, or remove something, knee-jerk reactions will pour in. But if you ride out that first rocky week, things usually settle down.
You don’t create a culture. It happens. This is why new companies don’t have a culture. Culture is the byproduct of consistent behavior.
So don’t worry too much about it. Don’t force it. You can’t install a culture. Like a fine scotch, you’ve got to give it time to develop.
Don’t make up problems you don’t have yet. It’s not a problem until it’s a real problem. Most of the things you worry about never happen anyway. Decisions are temporary. Optimize for now and worry about the future later.
The environment has a lot more to do with great work than most people realize.
When everything constantly needs approval, you create a culture of nonthinkers. You create a boss-versus-worker relationship that screams, “I don’t trust you.”
And look, you’re not going to get a full eight hours a day out of people anyway. That’s a myth. You don’t need more hours; you need better hours.
Talk to customers the way you would to friends. Explain things as if you were sitting next to them. Avoid jargon or any sort of corporate-speak. Stay away from buzzwords when normal words will do just fine.
Whenever you write something, read it out loud. Does it sound the way it would if you were actually talking to someone? If not, how can you make it more conversational?
They’re need, must, can’t, easy, just, only, and fast. These words get in the way of healthy communication. They are red flags that introduce animosity, torpedo good discussions, and cause projects to be late.
When you turn into one of these people who adds ASAP to the end of every request, you’re saying everything is high priority. And when everything is high priority, nothing is. So reserve your use of emergency language for true emergencies.