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A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

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Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#71

Post by johntiger1 »

3pt14159 wrote: post #26
rasengan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Working hard will not guarantee that you will be successful, but I guarantee you, that all successful people worked hard.” - Coach Kamogawa thru George Morikawa

Honestly, I'm not really sure if that's really true any more. I wasn't working hard when I bought Bitcoin at three bucks a coin. I was just intellectually curious. If anything when I was working hard was two years before that on a soon to be failed startup. We crawled the web for ads just before the ad business went hyper targeted. I made -$20k from working hard. I made a lot more from Bitcoin. I would have made way…

Great post, yeah sometimes doing nothing or something that seems unproductive pays off quite well actually! It's why I'm a little more lax when it comes to enjoying life nowadays. Ultimately, in my opinion a lot of luck is involved, so why bother? Enjoy the ride. Having said that, I still like to build things and hack just like you :)

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#73

Post by 3pt14159 »

da02 wrote: post #52
3pt14159 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I'm not really sure if that's really true any more. I wasn't working hard when I bought Bitcoin at three bucks a coin. I was just intellectually curious. If anything when I was working hard was two years before that on a soon to be failed startup. We crawled the web for ads just before the ad business went hyper targeted. I made -$20k from working hard. I made a lot more from Bitcoin. I would have made way…

How did you sell Bitcoin? For cash? Was it dangerous?

Well I mostly got out at $200 because I thought competent people regulated our economies and figured crypto would be banned by regulators, so it was pretty easy to spread it out over a couple wires. The remaining chunk I sold at the $10k-$20k window. I still think it could hit $50k/coin, but it was too large a percent of my assets and I figured I'd already made such a crazy return (1000x on average I think?) that squeezing out another 4x or 5x seemed reckless.

If only I hadn't been relatively broke when I bought in. I was suffering burn-out and basically working odd contracts here and there to keep the lights on.

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#74

Post by Shpigford »

palerm wrote: post #60
Shpigford wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The title of the spreadsheet is “Josh Pigford's Absurd List of Products, Apps, Websites & Businesses”...they definitely weren’t all full on “businesses” and the large majority of them were terrible ideas. I definitely don’t recommend most people go the route I did. :)

Which route would you recommend instead?

No clue. Everybody's route is different. This is just how I've figured things out (and I'd still say there are many things I definitely have not figured out).

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#75

Post by daveguy »

Hey shpigford, I am curious about this terrible CPA that led to a $10k IRS bill. If you had to look for a new CPA can you tell me what you would look for and what would be warning signs?

Also, great list! Did some of those affiliate sites make money even though you eventually shut them down and didn't sell them?

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#76

Post by matchagaucho »

safgasCVS wrote: post #7

I don't understand this spray and pray approach to business - I'm not businessman so I may be talking out my ass - but I would have thought business is like a long term relationship. May as well have a spreadsheet of 50 failed marriages. If you aren't in it for the long haul what are you doing?

Human relationships and projects are not mutually exclusive.

The people you meet along the way ("marriages") often carry forward into future projects.

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#77

Post by sampl »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #53
sampl wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think of it more like dating--it's normal to have 50 "failed" dates before you tie the knot. You don't commit until you find a great match. In business, this means the market actually cares about what you're making. Predicting which software businesses will find this fit is extremely hard. VCs know this, and diversify their investments among many founders (knowing one big payday can make up for 10-100 failures). Look…

"Predicting which software businesses will find this fit is extremely hard." Often a business is about the team, not the concept. Given any talented team, they an take any concept and evolve it to fit the market. Also, there's no way he was able to take any of those concepts far enough given the numbers and time frame. It can often take a small team several months to a couple of years to find out if it's going to rea…

> Given any talented team, they an take any concept and evolve it to fit the market.

I’ve come to view great teams as “necessary but not sufficient”. That is: without a great team you will fail, but even with one you still need to build something a market will pay for.

If an objectively great team was all you needed, venture investors wouldn’t be satisfied with the dismal likelihood of getting returns on startup money (compared to other forms of investing).

Re: giving concepts time—fair point, but I think you also have to consider your own time as an investment. Sure a failing project could work with 2y more effort, but is it worth two years of your life to find out if it hasn’t already worked? What if you spent that time on giving another idea a chance?

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#78

Post by Shpigford »

daveguy wrote: post #75

Hey shpigford, I am curious about this terrible CPA that led to a $10k IRS bill. If you had to look for a new CPA can you tell me what you would look for and what would be warning signs? Also, great list! Did some of those affiliate sites make money even though you eventually shut them down and didn't sell them?

Main thing is finding a CPA who has some experience with the type of business you're running. Freelancer, Corporation, etc...find a CPA who can speak the language.

It's less an issue now, but 10+ years ago, there were a lot of CPAs who didn't have much/any experience with internet-based businesses and so they weren't familiar with some of the additional bits to take in to account.

As for affiliate sites...I probably made a grand total of 50 cents from them...total. :P

Re: A spreadsheet of the businesses I've started over the past 15 years

#79

Post by zerr »

WilliamEdward wrote: post #28
zerr wrote: post #8

> Amazon affiliate sites I think this is a completely different mindset compared to engineers/"nerds", that's why most of us work for others instead of starting our own businesses.

There is nothing wrong with working for others if it fulfills you. I envy people who can have comfortable lives with happy families and a simple desk job that pays for what they need. Something in my brain is telling me I need more or I won't be happy, so I have many startups I'm working on and have exclusively begun working for myself. The grass is always greener on the other side, that much I can say. Enjoy your co…

Yes, when I hear of those who "made it" and talk that 99% of what they are doing now are meetings, PowerPoint slides, pitching to VCs, public speaking, marketing, etc... I'm thinking - but are they happy? I can't imagine myself being happy while having to do all those things... :)
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