I am one of two co-founders and we are 5 months into the journey. Our product is social media and we have around 200 users (not all active). So far we’ve been splitting everything in half, but I want to I invest 100k or more to move faster, hire part time developers, and pay for ads. The other co-founder doesn’t have the capital.

How does equity work in this case and where can I learn more? I feel like we have to value the company at X and use my funding as a % to get an equity, but we have zero paying customers, we don’t plan on generating money soon, and we are still early with many unknowns. So how do you value the company that doesn’t produce any money especially at an early stage that can fail tomorrow?

Is there a different agreement that should take place?

I'm on a tight-deadline project and keeping everyone aligned is tough. Do you guys have any tips for clear communication with clients and founders? How do you manage expectations and handle curveballs? Looking for ways to keep things smooth despite the time crunch.

Being copied sucks. You put in the work, come up with something cool, and someone else just steals it from you.

It's frustrating.

Is this just a part of business? It's hard to know how to feel.

I hate the idea of sharing less or protecting ideas though. How have you dealt with people who copy you?

Most businesses focus heavily on product development and marketing but often neglect the quality of their copy. Yet, powerful copywriting can significantly boost conversion rates, build brand loyalty, and drive long-term growth.

Consider the impact of a well-crafted landing page, a compelling email campaign, or a persuasive product description. Each word is an opportunity to connect with your audience and turn prospects into loyal customers.

Think about this: A single well-written sales page by John Caples pulled in over a million dollars. That’s the power of quality copy.

Invest in your words. Invest in your success.

What kind of copy has made a difference in your business? Share your thoughts in the comments below! 📈✍️

#Copywriting #BusinessGrowth #ContentMarketing #FreelanceWriting #MarketingStrategy

I had an agency reach out to me the other day saying they will work with me on my idea and get it "ready for development" in a week or two and I thought it was worth pondering.

I am a dev but less good on other bits and clueless on design. I just wanna build back end stuff lol. The stuff they could deliver they said was:

1. Designs
2. Product requirements doc
3. Market research & monetization plan
4. User journeys
5. Tech stack/ architecture (but tbh I can handle this so wouldn't need).

It seems like a good bundle of stuff to then take to a dev team or build myself, but idk.

Anyone used a full service product agency before? Thanks

Excited to share my AI Companion project—a supportive, empathetic companion available via call, now enhanced with guided sleep sessions, meditation exercises, and mental health tools. It respects privacy, keeps no personal data, and aims to make mental health support accessible to all.

I recently posted about my project on Reddit and got around 500 visitors in 3 days with no other marketing efforts. Now, I have a $100 budget for marketing and would love your advice on the best plan of action. Should I use Reddit ads, or are there other strategies or platforms I should focus on to maximize reach and conversion? Your feedback will shape its evolution—let's make companionship and well-being tools more accessible!

So 1,5 year ago I raised $10M series A, I was generating about $1M revenue a year (Deep Tech Company) which was on a trajectory to grow a lot. However as I got the funds, we started loosing traction, this mainly cause we had two large customers doing 90% of our revenue and instead of growing, they did less work due some changes in their business operations. We ended the year generating $200k revenue in 2023, though increase burn by at least 2x. Our product now works great, we just don’t have the amount of customers we need and our sales cycle is typically 6-9 months.

I still have about 9 months runway left, and do expect we will be able to book lots of future revenue, maybe $2M, but will probably not generate more the $300-$400k revenue this year, one of the 2 major customers are back and we are doing some other things that should give us additional revenue. However I need to think about starting to raise funds again and have no idea what to tell VCs about negative growth, any idea how I can spin this with a VC?

I have no doubt about the company and product, there are tweaks to ensure product market fit and the issues of lost revenue was also a result of internal issues (first time CEO) I fucked up many times.

Anyways, If I’m starting to raise how do I craft a story that appeals to investors, or should I beg and plead to current investors for a flat bridge round?

Update: Thanks for all the great perspectives you are sharing and very supportive, so thanks a lot! I did really fuck this up and I know that, I have also been open and transparent with investors along the way.

I just wanted to add some additional details for context as I get a lot of people saying that I need to cut hard and deep. To some extent, I have done this to the point where I think that if I cut harder and deeper I start peeling what investors initially invested in, a scalable technology business.

Was a bit vague in some of my posts on what custs I have already made, so I try to clarify.

I`ve cut from a 5 C-level team to 3, I replaced CCO from an aggressive sales person to earlier founder in the sector that sold their company to a to one of the dominant companies in the sector. The CCO is currently building the team required, we picked up some from tech 2 people, then hired 7 more making a 10 people commercial team, including marketing.

I cut all BD etc, made some cuts in tech. Moved my cofounder from tech to sales/ project management. I`ve removed anyone non-critical however, we can take out R&D entirely then we be a profitable company within few months, however this is not the vision our VC bought neither mine.

When I speak with our investors, I do not think they want us to cut anymore at least not yet, we know need to test out our new structure, that is totally focused on accelerating sales.

My main concern is that I am running out of time as I mention above, every funding round I have done before I have been pitching success stories. I have no idea on how I am going to pull this round together.

But I belive to focus a lot on our lead Series A investors and see what they need to commit is good starting point.

I have been looking for a platform where i can download bulk data, so i could train my ML models. I did not find a place where I could download data at once, so i started developing the f platform. Any idea if this kind of platform is worth developing? I am not sure if anyone would use it or if it has real applications. At this point, I am in the first stage of development, and I was planning to move forward to the portfolio and backtesting sections next. I would appreciate your comments.

I'm curious if anybody here has gone through the motions of selling equity that they've exercised from a previous company, and whether it was a good or bad experience.

A few years back I exercised some options at a company I worked for, they've recently done a private round, a new equity agreement, and a 10-for-1 split. As of last year they are valued at a frankly insane post-money. To be honest I'm not sure I'm reading my Carta profile properly, but if I am, I may be able to sell a portion of my options at a few dollars per share - units in the low 5 digit range selling for a high 5 digit range.

I've gone over the paperwork I signed so I'm relatively sure I'm taking the right steps when it comes to notice and first right of refusal / the repurchase provision, but I want to make sure I don't have unrealistic expectations.

Any thoughts or suggestions are appreciated

Edit: words and things

I was brought on as co-founder of my business after the original founder started as a solopreneur, with our original agreement being a 70/30 equity split in their favor. We’ve had mild success over the years, enough to pay our bills and grow a team, always self-funded. Given the age of the company, we’re not a typical “startup” and while we have an operating agreement, it doesn’t specify vesting period, share buy-backs, etc.

[providing as much context as possible. there’s a TLDR at the bottom]

I have been responsible for the growth of the business and the day-to-day management of the majority of our team and the majority of our paying clients for many years. My partner does manage a number of smaller clients, while primarily focusing on a software product that they’ve been attempting to get market-ready for several years. We’re not a tech company (outsourcing the development), so software is a new potential revenue channel for us and has the potential (albeit small) to lead to acquisition or a higher valuation of the company. I have pushed and pushed to launch the product as it is a great MVP, but the other partner always has a reason why it’s not ready yet or a feature that still needs to be built before it’s perfect, etc. If they were an employee, it would have been justifiable to fire them years ago.

After a decade of effectively leading this company, every cell in my body is screaming at me to leave. Covid decimated our business and I have been pushing through since then, against my best interest. The financial return is not worth the stress, and I am burnt out (like diagnosed with clinical, affecting-my-cognitive-abilities-level burnout). My partner has not pulled their weight for several years while tinkering with the software product as their moon shot exit plan. We have discussed exiting, and the potential value of the software is always dangled as a carrot, but after years of sticking around waiting for that carrot and nurturing the revenue-generating aspects of our business, I am disillusioned.

If I exit, I do not have much financial runway to figure out my next move. I would prefer to not lose my equity after a decade just in case this software play goes somewhere, but I do not want to be involved with my business partner any longer. I feel like I’m dragging their dead weight behind me. They do not have the liquidity to buy me out. Most of our clients would greatly feel the impact of my departure, despite having a good team in place. I’m sure a number of them would come with me if I wanted.

I’ve flirted with the idea of removing myself from the day-to-day and sitting in more of a passive, advisory role, but it has become clear that I need to cut ties and start fresh. I wish our operating agreement spelled this out more clearly, but we were young and dumb when it was signed and had no foresight into potentially splitting up in the future (first time founders). How do I exit this situation? Do I take a few of “my” clients and leave? Do I abandon hope of the software product ever making money?

TLDR: Burnt out co-founder needing to walk away / cut ties with my business partner who has proven to be ineffective. Op agreement is messy and doesn’t spell out this scenario. Would prefer to not lose equity after a decade of work but can’t be actively involved with this company anymore. Partner does not have the finances to buy me out.

My friend and I created a startup a few months ago. We are both technical and first-timers, so for the whole time we were heavily biased towards building instead of researching the market or talking to users. Such an approach led to us showing our prototype to the world after months of development and, classically, failing. We've spoken to some peers with technical backgrounds and their experience is similar to ours.

So now we've identified our problem, how do two technical cofounders do marketing? Are there any solutions to make it easy?

Fellow founders, please, tell us about your experience so we can learn from it!

Thanks

Hi all, please help!

I want to convert my California LLC to a Delaware C-Corp. An agency advised that I can't move my business to Delaware if I intend to continue doing business in California (I work here and we have customers nationally). I can move it to Delaware (convert to Calif C-Corp first and then domesticate to Delaware) but would no longer be able to work in California.

This is kind of shocking. Has anyone personally changed a Calif company to register into another state? Shouldn't this be a very common thing for Silicon Valley startups?

I'm seeing online guides recommending this move, but who knows if they're trustworthy or not.

Thanks all!!

As an indie hacker who recently launched a product on Product Hunt, I was shocked by the number of offers I received to boost my upvotes—for a fee. In one day, over ten different offers promised to help me secure the Product of the Day badge if I paid them. This experience left me questioning: Is Product Hunt's launch system rigged?

When I launched my product, I expected genuine engagement and feedback from the community. Instead, I found myself inundated with messages offering to increase my upvotes in exchange for money. This presents a troubling ethical dilemma. If success on Product Hunt can be bought, where does that leave indie hackers who rely on their hard work and innovation?

Hey guys, I am a finance student going into my second year, and I am very confused about what I want to do in my career. I have a strong passion for innovation and creation, but I am also passionate about finance and technology. I am spending time on both but I feel if I want to be great at one I should commit to one.

Do you guys have any advice for me?

Thanks.

Hi,

I am building a solution for wholesellers and manufacturers in India where it will help them track inventory, and order management + payments all the way to retailers while creating a headless commerce solution for them.

I am having trouble connecting with the right wholesellers in India. How do I get contacts of wholesellers? I tried indiamart but that doesn’t work. How do I show my product to manufacturers and wholesellers in India and get their feedback? Through which channel should I approach them?

I need help!

Some time this month, I posted that I would be giving out free ASO recommendations for any app link shared in the responses. I didn’t anticipate all the attention (plus the private messages). For that, I am truly grateful. What started as a boring, uneventful weekend for me quickly grew into a new product idea that I am now starting to explore.

Last year, after launching a lot of products that got nowhere—apps that barely got any downloads—I had to learn what actually drives apps to be popular on the App Store. Surely, it can’t be just the quality of the app because some really basic apps are at the top of the charts. That’s when I figured it out! Since then, I’ve used what I learned to ensure that the apps launched by the company I work for (as a software developer) remained in the top 3 for multiple keywords and maintained a steady influx of new users.

After receiving all the responses from my last post, I have decided to give starting my own growth hacking agency a chance. My primary focus is indie/super small teams, mostly because for my techniques to work, things need to happen quickly.

For now anyway, I’m open to answering any questions about anything (other than my techniques 🤫).

The official Shadcn Figma did a great job at creating their design system. But it didn't have all the components I needed to build a full shadcn interface in Figma, so I went ahead and made one myself.

Grab a copy here: https://www.figma.com/community/file/1397865073404171058

I have a niche education business that was bootstrapped.

I have about 400 users annually who pay $50/quarter with a lifetime of usually 1 or 2 quarters. So far I have managed to get this number of users with no paid marketing. We have a great reputation and our product delivers tangible results (not always the case in education services). I have a very healthy gross margin of around 80% but that is because I do everything myself.

I have been looking for ways to increase the topline. Raising prices is an option but I mainly operate in less affluent regions and am hesitant.

I am considering expanding our resources and starting to sell tutoring services. As its a niche I think we will have a lot of interest in tutoring but the margins are generally terrible.

The total addressable market is around 80,000 students annually worldwide. Again though these students are located in less developed nations.

Is the market big enough to justify the expense of taking the business to the next step?

Appreciate any input especially from anyone with similar experience. Thank you!

Hello all ! I have found out after many years of observations and practice of my own … I find myself very passionate about doing stuff around such fields I have mentioned above . Sharing knowledge through experiences that could benefit one’s growth career , depends where he/she wants to improve in general . I happen to do a lot of research around the psyche in specific , as a clinical psychologist would do to help their client. Yet I have been doing it on my own because of past experiences in life , where it became a blessing for me instead of a curse . So while doing so , I have realized that I am gaining practical skills and knowledge through experience that I would thought to share and inspire with other people who are in need and I am sure that i can help.

The question I am asking you guys is , and for those who are making it out there online ; in such fields , how do you recommend me to start and where to begin ? If I target my audiences and know my niche and do all the research regarding creating a specific creative product , which are my knowledge and skills experiences ?

Thanks in advance 🙌

Let's talk about something super important - working with values. You know how sometimes bosses and companies can be kinda mean to their workers? Yeah, it's not cool at all.

So here's the deal: no matter what's going on, don't ever ditch your values just to make a quick buck.

I mean, money's nice and all, but it's not worth losing who you are, you know?

Your values are like the roots of a big ol' tree - they keep you strong and steady when life gets crazy.

Now, let me tell you about this awesome place called Feedspace.

It's pretty special because everyone there actually listens to each other and respects what others have to say.

And get this - they don't make excuses when someone messes up. They just accept that we're all human and sometimes make mistakes. How cool is that?

It's like, imagine if everywhere was like that. People just being nice to each other, listening, and not freaking out over little stuff. That's the kind of world we should aim for, right?

So yeah, stick to your values, be good to people, and try to find places that do the same.

It makes life way better for everyone. What do you think about all this? Got any experiences with cool workplaces like Feedspace?

I'm a founding member at an early stage digital health startup and I've found that it is very hard to have meaningful conversations with potential customers, investors, etc. about what we're building without a demo-able prototype. Pitch decks and stories only go so far when you're trying to get product feedback.

I'm curious if anyone here has tried to create their startup's early prototypes/demos using ChatGPT, v0 from Vercel, or other generative AI tools, and what has worked well and not so well, especially if you don't have a technical background. How does using GenAI for this purpose compare to low-code/no-code tools like Figjam, Bubble or Unqork? Thanks for your help in advance!

We all hear about building an audience and then selling to that audience, but not all of us are the most savvy podcast creators, newsletter writers, etc.

Does anyone have some cool examples of non-obvious GTM strategies? Anything to inspire some creativity and help those who are struggling to put their product/service in front of their target audience.

I applied, did my interview, and got into a start up that was created around late March.

I got into the company last week "officially" and after a meeting with the other interns and staff: I was given the responsibility to source various grants and funds for the company, I am not entirely sure where to start. This is a start up in Canada, in Quebec. I would appreciate if someone can shed some light in this. Thank you

Pre-Comp Sci Student here,

I need to get an MVP demo up and running. Front-end is no problem for me, I am however, NOT experienced in advanced algorithm development or ML engineering, DB management, cloud service integration, etc.

The product I need to ship will use a monthly subscription model (along with some one time payment features) has a large and profitable market, it solves some outlying issues that aren't present in other apps, and will apply a core social media feature that isn't present with apps in the same market.

A discouraging roadblock is getting a multitude of initial users. This is ESSENTIAL for the platform's success, not only for feedback, but to fine-tune the ML algorithm and any other parts of the app that need polishing.

Expendable Capital is just south of $10K as of right now.

All advice, feedback, thoughts, or constructive criticism is deeply appreciated. Thank you.

What PR strategies have worked for you to show off your product and get some attention? Most tech media coverage is about funding. We're a private startup that's up and running with a working product without big funding news. Does anyone have strategies that worked for them? I can't reveal the product here but I'm looking to see if folks have thoughts.

Hi all,

I'm about to launch a social/reference platform in the visual arts space. I want to host a forum for my users where they can post suggestions on how to improve the product, support-related issues, general discussion, etc.

I was thinking of starting a new subreddit for my product, but I wanted to get opinions on other possible options before I do this. Any recommendations?

Hello Startups Founders,

I've recently been approached to help build a new IT consultancy company with two other partners, making us a team of three. I'll be handling most of the technical aspects of the business. Things were going smoothly until we discussed the shareholder agreements, particularly the cost allocations, which include:

• Office rent: $1,000 per month
• Software packages: $500 per month <-- not sure what are they using yet
• Salary for an internal employee: $30,000 (who I assumed was a shareholder at first)

The red flags:

• The internal employee, who always attends our board meetings, is actually a relative of one of the co-founders. This relationship was not disclosed to me earlier.
• I've always bootstrapped my startups, keeping costs minimal (around $20/year for email services). I work from home and use flexible meeting spaces only when necessary. I'm uncomfortable committing to long-term office leases or salaried employees before we've even started. There seems to be a strong resistance against removing these two (I am not sure if they are hiding other things?)
• Some minor lies here and there (example: I was told that the company was bought out but I discovered it was only registered few months ago...)

I'd appreciate any advice or insights on handling this situation. How should I address these concerns with my co-founders?

Hello entrepreneurs,

Since February 2023, we are developing ChatGPT-based app that allows non-technical people to find out easily information from their companies' databases using a conversational agent.

Even though at that time we saw it as a big opportunity (working as freelancers, there were multiple clients with this need), we developed it, works more than fine, but we struggle in scaling it.

Right now we are making $5000 MRR from 2 clients: 1 of them is paying $4000, the other is paying $1000.

During this time we developed a robust orchestrator that it's able to self-heal, to search for keywords in the database, even though they are not spelled correctly from the keyboard, to generate automatic plots etc. For enterprise clients, the web app is white-labeled.

Our go-to-market was a little bit unusual: after having the first successful implementation we started calling people / companies we knew to go and make demos and all this stuff. So we didn't go "online", like a classic SaaS. In this phase we had 3 kinds of responses: 1) the company does not need our solution; 2) they like it but they are afraid their data is not secured anymore; 3) they wanted different add-ons which of course posed us in a software service company.

I am writing this post to ask for advice on how should we approach on making our solution work at scale. What are your opinions about revitalising our solution?

I spoke with an entrepreneur yesterday. 22 years old. Really impressive. Going places.

When I looked at his LinkedIn profile, it was basically blank. So when we finished talking about fundraising, I asked about his background.

Didn't go to college. Has started three companies. Two failed. Talked his way into a consulting gig where he learned more ropes that anyone will learn in college.

I said "You're a serial entrepreneur!"

He thought it was a question.

It was statement of admiration.

As we discussed those failures it was clear that he learned many lessons about hiring, selling, cofounders. There's probably a dozen things we didn't discuss.

I don't know exactly why this entrepreneur kept those failures off his LinkedIn profile but I suspect it was a combination of embarrassment and a misunderstanding of the benefit of those failures.

I too have had failures. I have a rule. “No repeats”. Learn those valuable, painful lessons and move on, better for it.

In the context of fundraising, serial entrepreneurship is a bonus. Investors understand the lessons that can be learned through failure.

If your story is sharp and you understand those lessons, there's no reason to be embarassed by those failures.

The scars you accumulate during your entrepreneurial journey have tremendous value.

I hope this falls within the rules of the sub - I've read through them and don't see anything pertaining to this sort of thing, so here goes:

I am from the UK and am 35 years old. At the end of last year, I completed an MSc in Global Governance and Emerging Powers at Birkbeck, University of London. I chose that course because I am interested in emerging markets and in political risk assessment.

My BA is in Journalism from the University of Westminster (I once pursued a career in political and financial journalism, and did three very short stints in this field; two separate occasions at the world-renowned newspaper The Times and once at the Sunday Express).

I'm currently running my own business, which I incorporated just last year, a qualitative research consultancy. I'm really passionate about and excited by startups. I'm very keen to work for an innovative startup company based in London, on a part-time basis alongside my own small business, in a non-tech role, perhaps in a research and analysis, project management or in a PR or Communications capacity.

Would be happy to start somewhere on a trial basis only, and am open to equity-based opportunities if I could not be paid or negotiate a salary. Just passionate about startups, mainly in fintech but in wider tech and other fields, too.

Where would be the best place to go searching for a role, on a speculative approach basis (not applying for advertised vacancies)? Either here or LinkedIn, I know, but does anyone have any inside information on any (private, maybe) groups where people running new, innovative startups in the capital come together?

Cheers.