RL107: Raising Capital & MVPs

Minimum Viable Product - prove demand FIRST

I love mentoring veterans who are interested in starting their own companies.

It’s incredibly fun to listen to people’s plans and dreams.

Sadly, most entrepreneurs I speak to have a fatal problem that kills their business before it launches.

These entrepreneurs believe that the startup journey looks like this -

Good idea → Raise money → R&D/Product Development → Marketing & Sales → Profit/Exit

This is the wrong answer.

Why?

1. Notice when you begin talking to customers - it’s AFTER raising money and building a product.

2. Raising money is exceptionally challenging. It’s even more challenging when you haven’t validated that there’s demand for your product (ie that customers will pay for it).

3. Building a product before validating demand is suicide - that’s how you end up with companies that create useless products without customers.

I’ve given this feedback …