Creating and scaling a tech startup is incredibly tough. It is a mammoth task in the business and tech world, where you need so many things to fall a certain way to make it.
Making the leap from a curiosity and an idea to a profitable, revenue-generating business is huge. Most startups do not make it.
If you are a switched-on entrepreneur and overcome the biggest failures and identify your weaknesses, you can begin to put things into motion to allow your tech startup to not only survive but thrive.
The common pitfalls of tech startups can vary from industry to industry. Studies have shown that almost half of tech startups fall short because there is no market need for their product. Over a quarter die an early death because they run out of cold hard cash.
Here are the best things a tech startup can do to avoid failing in the early stages. Thus allowing themselves to realize the potential of their product and become a fully viable tech business:
Keep it Lean
A lot of focus can be put into the growth side of the business in the early days. As you may have seen with huge tech flops and scams like Theranos, you become all talk and no bite if you are too invested in marketing, sales growth, and media exposure.
Startups grow best when they keep things to a minimum to focus on the core product. It usually works through building and experimenting, then using feedback metrics to analyse, learn, and enable growth.
A lean startup is a healthy startup. Avoid going for the fancy logo, dynamic and expensive website. All that is needed for a blooming startup is a suitable legal entity, an idea, and the ability to make it a reality. Avoiding legal baggage, too many consultants, and expensive hiring can allow you to focus on the building phase.
Win the MVP
A huge reason startups end up failing is due to a huge miss when it comes to filling a market pain. Being the remedy to a pain point that is industry-wide is what startups should aim for. However, they often miss the bucket completely. If a startup is looking at creating a product to solve a pain, you need to ensure research is done to know what is needed.
Understanding the purpose or function of your product can allow you to utilize feedback and drive your roadmap down the correct path. Ensuring you have a minimal viable product is crucial to keeping a startup afloat. When building a product, you need to know the all-encompassing message behind it.
In addition, can you answer these questions?
- Why is it being built in the first place?
- Who will use it?
- Why are they going to use it?
- Who will buy it?
- What value does it deliver to them?
Keeping a core functionality list and knowing what your product needs to deliver can ensure you create an MVP. From there, the ability to grow is endless.
Some startups can fall short when collating feedback, tracking the project, and understanding the features and functions possible through an app or product development. It would make sense for these startups to bring on a digital adoption platform. A digital adoption platform can make the process of onboarding customers simpler, and provide those customers a shorter time to value for the new product. It can also reduce the amount of time their IT team spends supporting any new solution.
Get the Smartest in the Room
When building your product, you cannot afford to not have the best people on the job. Two common roadblocks startups find when trying to accomplish this often involve either overpaying talent to help them build the product or getting too many people to do it, with too many fingers in the pie. Both these issues can lead to a significant loss in cash for a burgeoning startup that needs it badly.
You need to focus on getting the very best in the door. If you do it right, it can be accomplished without surrendering too much capital. To get the best in the room, you need to get the person who truly believes in the idea. The best way to sign them to the team is to make an offer of cash and equity, allowing them to be fully invested.
Reach the Market
After you have achieved and won the MVP battle and gathered a small, lean team of talented and invested creators, you need to make sure your product can cover the target market. The big issue startups have is penetrating the market, even when they have a product with all the bells and whistles.
It is quite simple. You need to realize early that you will not have the marketing or sales power that the giants possess. You need to roll your sleeves up and get the hard hours in to put your product in front of the customer. Using successful customer interactions can help you build a solid review portfolio, which can even increase demand by 1300%.
That can mean going out of your comfort zone, but you need to find where your customers are, engage and talk about your product. It can be done anywhere, from LinkedIn to Reddit to local and regional networking and tech events. As you grow, you can think about putting in a CRO (Chief Revenue Officer) and some talented business managers in place – but for now, it is you and only you.
Soprano Media is an Israeli marketing firm created by marketers for marketers.
Established in 2018, Soprano Media represents dozens of SAAS start-ups and scale-up companies, allowing them to engage with their audience through value-driven content.
