Here’s an excerpt from Andrew’s new guest post, “4 Must Dos for Running a Startup From The Guy that Sold 2 Startups in a Year” — now live on AlleyWatch.
Of the hundreds of thousands of digital startups that will be founded this year, the vast majority of them will fail. According to CrunchBase, the two most common reasons for startup failures are “no market need” and “ran out of cash” – two outcomes that could have been prevented with more concrete planning.
Entrepreneurs cannot operate quickly and efficiently if they need to learn every business discipline from scratch. That’s why the most efficient entrepreneurs avoid reinventing the wheel by learning best practices from other successful entrepreneurs. By adopting best practices in each startup discipline, founders can save their time and creativity for problems that require their unique perspective, which increases their overall chances of success.
Founder Best Practice #1: Build Your Knowledge Base
Best practices consist of proven methodologies for executing on a specific task. Founders should take advantage of the vast wealth of startup knowledge that exists online in order to quickly get a sense of the different areas that they’ll need to master moving forward. Sites like Quora draw experienced founders who answer questions about everything from hiring processes to developing an MVP.
Founders should additionally seek out other founders with relevant backgrounds who have already experienced success. Selective networking with entrepreneurs in your vertical is a great tactic to use when you’re looking for specific answers related to your industry or stage of development. Experts are more willing to help out when you approach them with questions that are highly focused and demonstrate that you’ve researched a given topic.