Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

veed.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–169 of 169 posts

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#161

Post by keithnz »

Matticus_Rex wrote: post #158
csomar wrote: post #155

Check this out: https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/18/here-are-the-85-startups-t... Many YC startups don't charge anything. Here is one that seems still to be figuring stuff out ( https://www.54gene.com/ ). One that seems to be figuring out who and how much to charge ( https://ultralig.ht/ ). In fact, I'd like that someone goes through the startups and deduce how many of these are making any money or have strategies to m…

The fact that many YC startups don't charge anything doesn't mean that this startup has a good reason not to be charging. I think the assumption that YC gave them a BS reason is absolutely unwarranted. Personally, I love the hustle. It was absolutely worth a shot, and by the next batch they'll have a lot of data to show. Most great first-time founders have no idea what the hell they're doing, and it's totally forgiva…

Yeah, I got the impression that YC didn't see why they weren't charging for what they had since it is a liked and a viable product with a pretty simple way to make revenue.

I hope these guys do well, I like the hustle also!

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#162

Post by jacquesm »

slap_shot wrote: post #92

> In March, we submitted our application, and kinda forgot about it. > Two months later we got an email saying that a partner would like to speak to us. This is a tangent, but I want to share something about my YC interview experience for anybody ever in this position. I filled out my application in February for the NYC interviews. They passed on me for the early NYC interviews, but ~2 months later I got an email for…

The obvious solution is to use absolutes 'December 2018' rather than relatives 'seven months ago'.

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#163

Post by davnicwil »

rsweeney21 wrote: post #142

> We had positive feedback from YC... There was a time when I thought positive feedback from a VC meant something. 2 startups and $16M in VC funding later I've realized that it doesn't. Having a VC tell you your startup is awesome is like having your mom tell you your startup is awesome. They have no incentive to be honest with you and every incentive to have you walk away with a positive impression of the firm. Foun…

This is a really great comment. Positive feedback from any third party, VC or otherwise, is information that can be factored into your own 'model' of whether your business is a good one but it seems to me the overwhelming factors ought to be either the real numbers you mentioned and your own (hopefully) more complete and considered analysis of your market and opportunity, using the information and hypotheses that only you have.

Positive feedback is nice but it should have zero effect on whether or not you pursue a business idea - if you weren't going to pursue the idea without it, there are probably fundamental reasons for that, that should probably override the reasons behind the positive feedback anyway.

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#164

Post by citrablue »

ne01 wrote: post #93
d0m wrote: post #13

So, that's the dichotomy of YC. YC is an accelerator, and as such, needs to accelerate /something/. If you join too early, then it's almost a distraction to getting the product out and talking to users. However, hit the sweet spot and YC is an invaluable resource to help you grow. On the other hand, YC opens the door to so many opportunities and great people, that even if you're too early, the net result is still a p…

I strongly disagree. You should never join YC. Ideas/startups that require money to accelerate are bad. Just choose a better one. Now this is my opinion. I start a startup to be my own boss and change the world on my OWN terms. Why the hell, should I go to YC to hire a boss? To grow faster? To learn how to grow? BULLSHITT! I can do both of those without their help -- call me arrogant, I don't care.

While your tone is a little off-putting, I totally respect your decision to go this route. It's not for everyone.

Do you mind if I ask what your independent success trajectory in your own business has looked like?

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#165

Post by simonebrunozzi »

> Over the space of a year, we had a 60% MoM Growth Rate, 35K MAU and a great team!

I smile when I read "X% MoM growth" and the starting numbers are obviously very little. I think it's a BS metric when presented this way.

Besides that, congrats on hitting 35k MAU. Not a small feat.

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#166

Post by soneca »

arkades wrote: post #157
soneca wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they understood the feedback and tried to react to it in the best way they could. A situation like "The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago; the second best time is today" . They can't change the past, they can try to catch up. I think they got the point precisely

I don't think they did, and I don't think you did (please read my tone with generosity; that's not meant to be an attack.) I don't believe the feedback they got was that they should be charging, and they aren't yet , therefore "the best time to plant a tree..." The question they got was "Why aren't you charging yet?", because by product and market, it seemed they ought to be. The correct answer is "This is our market…

Yes, I believe the feedback they got was that they should be charging. Maybe because it confirms my personal perspective that I think they should be charging already indeed.

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#168

Post by achenatx »

sithlord wrote: post #35
cdubzzz wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apropos of nothing, this little marketing page is pretty great -- https://www.conferencebadge.com/why-use-conference-badge

so, it took anna 10 hours, and lets assume anna gets paid 25 dollars an hour, so a cost of 250 dollars. Shelley, used the conference badge, and at 1.79 for the fully shipped version of the badge, it will cost 582 dollars. So, essentially, Shelley paid 332 dollars for QR codes and convenience. Is it worth it? probably. but maybe not.

you dont understand business stakeholders. Shelley is busy and overworked. She is relatively price insensitive, but is very time sensitive.

Our (enterprise) business customers dont care about price much, they care about things going smoothly for an event which has a ton of moving parts.

We serve a similar demographic.

Re: We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

#169

Post by bksenior »

filmgirlcw wrote: post #147
bksenior wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This read like a business school professor. All young businesses are a fluid experiment "out of business rationale" is a hindsight fluff statement. If rationale informed effective product then a lot more people were successful. Additionally, odds are that the best thing for the business (and founders) would being admitted to YC over any product change they could possible make. They had non zero odds and I think it wa…

> If rationale informed effective product then a lot more people were successful. That's not necessarily true, as plenty of businesses fail because they don't have a business plan for their product. The world is littered with great products that failed because there was no business plan or the business plan wasn't sustainable. Obviously, having a business plan doesn't make a successful product (and I never one intima…

>That's not necessarily true, as plenty of businesses fail because they don't have a business plan for their product. The world is littered with great products that failed because there was no business plan or the business plan wasn't sustainable. That observation is a long horizon observation. In the short horizon most businesses tend to stagnate and die because of interest and growth. Unless theyre trying to grow an organic biz overtime (which applying to YC seems to signal otherwise) going and getting in the ecosystem would be by far the largest upside to the biz and more importantly the entrepreneurs.

> Combining the non-zero and best thing for the biz.

These are kids who by being in YC get expert observation and access to a network that they would take a decade to build. The only scenario in which not getting in is better is if they strike some insane gold pocket and they are physically too busy to participate in YC. They had YC as a captive audience and there was precedent for flexibility, thats non zero.

same same. I hope this serves as the intro to a story titled "The time YC almost made another $5b."

Post reply on HN