1–10 of 18 posts
Of late I've seen product creators declare staggering (unverified) revenues for their side-projects and make it to the front page of HN.
I've also seen people get keynote talks due to staggering user and revenue numbers they declared. Yet nobody seems to have asked for verification of their numbers.
Can you share examples of unwholesome tactics used by founders that got them results?
Have a marketplace. Buy $100 of goods from users selling stuff. The $100 is a marketing expense. Add $100 to GMV.
Have 5k users on Android, 3k on iPhone, 8k on web. Add them up to show the product has 16k users.
Raise money from an angel who owns a conglomerate. The angel forces all his businesses and people working in these businesses to adopt the app that others wouldn't otherwise trust. Use these totally legitimate clients to create glowing testimonials.
As an early stage investor, instead of putting a lump sum into the account, create a dummy company (or several) for the purpose of feeding cash into the startup. When you're raising money, just sign off half a million dollars of consulting fees to show that the startup is making money.
Create a review site targeting the users. Write a glowing review about how amazing this app is. Share it to gullible Facebook groups.
Talking about revenue without one word about profits.
Set aside a marketing budget, and then basically sell the $10 item at $9, justifying that the $1 difference is marketing. Have a marketplace. Buy $100 of goods from users selling stuff. The $100 is a marketing expense. Add $100 to GMV. Have 5k users on Android, 3k on iPhone, 8k on web. Add them up to show the product has 16k users. Raise money from an angel who owns a conglomerate. The angel forces all his businesses…
“AI” startups that are actually just linear regression/random forest as a service
Talking about revenue without one word about profits.
Talking about revenue without one word about profits.
Everyone raising money is expected to be unprofitable, no?
Wonder if you have an opinion -- has unprofitability always been this pervasive or is this how businesses are generally run?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Everyone raising money is expected to be unprofitable, no?
Unprofitability is rampant among public software companies: https://survivingtomorrow.org/why-do-so-many-famous-companie... Wonder if you have an opinion -- has unprofitability always been this pervasive or is this how businesses are generally run?
From the linked article, it says, "In 2018, 81% of U.S. companies were unprofitable in the year leading up to their public offerings."
This is the most unfair way of judging it. This is like saying students have a negative net worth a year before graduation. It's missing the point - students take debt so they can make much more money later. Startups go cash heavy and take losses so they can make money after the exit.