Stick With It!
I've wavered a lot on my startup, other startup ideas, and past startups. I've said all along there isn't a lot of details out there on the struggle, hard-work, and challenges before a company "magically becomes a unicorn".
Don't get me wrong, Lakebed is far FAR from a unicorn or even successful.
After struggling for 3+ years and considering giving up many times. In the past month suddenly I have 2 companies willing to pay for my product/service and a non-profit asking for help.
If startup life got you down, reach out to me and I'll do my best to help. If you're thinking about giving up, make sure its the right decision.
I sincerely hope that little piece of motivation helps someone!
Posts like these are why I wish that there was maybe less obvious marketing in startup spaces. Or at least I wish there was spaces where real conversations could be about the struggle/grind/whatever you want to call it.
This can be hard, it can be lonely, it can be frustrating, and it can be overwhelming, but we're all going through the same things, right?
Don't get me wrong, IndieHackers is a great resource.
Also, congrats on the sales!
Totally agree and thanks.
I think many founders, especially bootstrappers, are a certain personality type who are often very hard on themselves, have high expectations, can be self-critical, often have imposter syndrome, etc.
I've seen posts & pics of Gates in his garage bootstrapping and struggling at the grind. But, few know those stories and certainly not often talked about.
A few years ago I registered the domain post-mortem (can't remember if it was .ca, .com, .io, etc). The idea was people from all sized companies could post anonymous post postmortems of project/startup/tech failures and what they saw from the inside. I think that'd be very helpful and a value to others.
Similarly I've heard advice that senior leadership should send out a weekly/monthly update including "mistakes I made this week" and that gives your staff permission to fail as well and helps everyone learn.
And finally, I have the idea of collecting various startup data points such as the biz category, B2C or B2B, etc. Then you could record "I tried pay per click like this and got X return on investment". That'd help others see what works or doesn't and maybe give them ideas/support.
So yeah, I wish there was way more about the early-days-struggle and how many times a founder thought about quitting or cried themselves to sleep.
All incredibly well thought out points that I completely agree with.
This especially. I don't think that there is enough of this kind of honesty. There is that old joke about being a kid looking at adults and thinking that they have a handle on everything, then growing up and realising that they're all just winging it. I wonder what things would be like if we were more open about the fact that we're not constantly perfect.
I actually really like the idea of the postmortem website. Anonymity can be powerful if used correctly, and I think this is a correct use of it. I think that all of us on IH can be scared to admit fault at times as it could be used against us and our businesses and potentially our future endeavors.