Live data from Hacker News

How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

docs.google.com

111–120 of 128 posts

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#111
post #29

I have an interesting question. Say there is an already established business that has more than proven the idea is viable. What does it take to... join the same market space? Can you offer the same features at the same price? Can you offer the same features at a lower price? Can you offer less features at a lower price? Are there cases where there is only room for one player and no matter what you do, you will not be…

Super simple. No matter the industry, you can beat the competition with AI + blockchain written in Rust.

please dont turn this into reddit please

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Little disappointed to be so downvoted for calling this out; I don't really do it very often. Also a brit, but I didn't know that the others in the conversation were men. It's pretty easy to use `guys` instead.

"Guys" is just as gender-specific as "lads".

The defence was it was a Britishism, where guys is gender neutral.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#113
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My encouragement for you to start a business is this, 'become unstoppable'. How you become unstoppable is finding your 'why' for doing it. I think this is the hardest part... and more important than finding 'a business opportunity' because I think you need the meaning of your 'why' to sustain you through the difficulties of new venture creation, especially as you iterate through to product market fit. I think once yo…

Is... Is this some kind of parody / troll comment?

Absolutely not a troll, this is my honest and sincere advice to someone who seems to be reaching for something just beyond their grasp.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is... Is this some kind of parody / troll comment?

Not at all. It's based on one of Simon Sinek's most well known TED talks: https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_insp...

Kind of... Simon Sinek distilled what I already knew to be true, and what I live as I work towards a company that "looks after people". The rest is from hard won wisdom AKA (temporary) failure.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Guys" is just as gender-specific as "lads".

The defence was it was a Britishism, where guys is gender neutral.

I don't understand your post/replies. Do you have a problem with people using britishisms? The "defence" spelling is also a britishism, so I'm not sure where you're going with all that.

"Guys" is not any more gender neutral than "Lads" (they both are often used in a gender-neutral way, but they're etymologically male). "Folks" is what I personally use if I specifically want something gender-neutral, but "lads" is definitely appropriate if the author is speaking to men.

Which brings me back to "this is a lot of noise for nothing".

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully agree with the him, and I don’t understand why would you think it was a troll comment.

Because it's exactly the kind of stuff the OP was complaining about.

I know what you mean, but like the poster, I have an aversion for all the hustle BS advice that I think is toxic. I'm curious to find out what part of my advice can be considered 'exactly the kind of stuff the OP was complaining about'?

I truely believe that everything we create in life, which includes a new venture, can be viewed in the frame of self actualization. To me this means the motive to realize one's full potential.

To me that is the essence of what an entrepreneur is trying to do, just in the context of co-creation with the market.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#117
post #80

This is a really interesting document. I literally cringe reading it. At first I thought that I'd really like something like this document but with less random quotes, less facile language, less cheer leading, less fill in the blanks, etc. But then I thought... I wonder if I am reacting this way because this is exactly what I need to be reading. What if the way of thinking espoused by this document is precisely why I…

You don’t have to buy into motivational speaking nonsense in order to start a business, and it’s reasonably safe to ignore people who give advice in that style. So when you see Zig Ziglar and Tony Robbins quotes everywhere you can move on. The trick though is not to let your distaste for a certain kind of content-free motivational business writing prevent you from taking a rigorous and scientific approach to manageme…

One of the things I like about Zig Ziglar is that he doesn't take himself seriously. He talks about exactly that: that this stuff is nonsense and only said to make a point. The point being that you have to figure out what works for you and what motivates you. And that you can't escape understanding your motivations if you want to be successful.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Guys" is just as gender-specific as "lads".

The defence was it was a Britishism, where guys is gender neutral.

Literally the first definition of "guy" is "a man". "Guy" is only gender neutral when you're referring to a group of people.

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#119
post #61

This is a really interesting document. I literally cringe reading it. At first I thought that I'd really like something like this document but with less random quotes, less facile language, less cheer leading, less fill in the blanks, etc. But then I thought... I wonder if I am reacting this way because this is exactly what I need to be reading. What if the way of thinking espoused by this document is precisely why I…

My encouragement for you to start a business is this, 'become unstoppable'. How you become unstoppable is finding your 'why' for doing it. I think this is the hardest part... and more important than finding 'a business opportunity' because I think you need the meaning of your 'why' to sustain you through the difficulties of new venture creation, especially as you iterate through to product market fit. I think once yo…

I just wanted to say thanks for responding :-) The resultant thread was quite interesting if nothing else. But I also appreciate the advice.

I think it's really interesting how modes of communication can throw you (or at least me ;-) ). I seem to evaluate the content by the mode of communication, which is really incorrect. I suspect it was a coping mechanism I used when I was young to quickly sort the wheat from the chaff.

What others have said about your post is true for me as well. When I look at it superficially I think, "What does 'become unstoppable' mean in measurable terms". Well, it doesn't mean anything because it is not actually possible to become unstoppable in this context. You can always be stopped. But I think that leaving it there is not a good idea. The meaning of a sentence is not in the words: it's in the actual meaning that the original person intended to convey! So if I don't understand what you intended to convey, then I have missed the point entirely.

I think this is what I'm slowly learning, so I appreciate your contribution to that learning.

As for the 'why', I have a very good 'why', but the thing that is stopping me is probably that I just don't want to do it. Several years ago I thought about starting a brewery. I had the money. My friend who owned an empty factory even offered it to me for zero rent. I had the business plan. Everything was ready to go... and then I thought, "Wait a minute... working in a brewery. That's exactly the same as working in a factory. No matter how much I think making beer is cool, I don't want to work in a factory." Then I thought, "I can hire people to work in the factory. But what will I do?" And I thought of all the jobs that I could have at a brewery and I didn't want any of them. So I canned the brewery idea :-)

So for me, I think to be "unstoppable", I really need to find a job that I want to do at my new company. This is probably the biggest stumbling block I have.

Anyway, thanks again!

Re: How to Acquire Your First 100 Customers

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Lads" is an appropriate, albeit very british, way of addressing men, which the poster above was doing. Why the noise?

Little disappointed to be so downvoted for calling this out; I don't really do it very often. Also a brit, but I didn't know that the others in the conversation were men. It's pretty easy to use `guys` instead.

I didn't downvote you.

But it was a short comment intended to convey "Oops! Sorry. My bad." So you basically replied to an apology with a suggestion that the apology had committed some greater sin.

My feeling is that probably falls under the heading "Throwing the baby out with the bathwater." I don't think it qualifies as a Best Practice for improving the social climate on some metric or other.

That's not intended to lecture you. I'm just trying to make conversation on a topic I find interesting. Given the nature of the beast, I'm having very mixed feelings about commenting at all.

Post reply on HN