Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
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Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#2> However, Shopify killed it - just because merchants were choosing our solution over theirs.
I don't see whats so suprising here.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#3I'm not a business expert or an entrepreneur, but I've been around this industry long enough to know: Unless your intention is to flip your startup into an acquisition, I would recommend against plays like this.
Specifically, tying yourself up to a closed ecosystem by building what amounts to a (albeit very nice and powerful) super-feature.
I am saying this because I work for a large-ish company where someone did this to a section of our product that was also mediocre. One of our co-founders reached out to the company and actually offered to buy them for, what I felt, was an insanely high amount for what they were building. They rejected the offer so we threw some devs and an awesome designer at the problem, made something just as good, and then shut them out. They ultimately shut down.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#4This is a very expected outcome if you are creating your business around improving a larger business' product.
You are effectively doing the product/market fit for them, for free. Once they see that your solution works, they will just knock it off, or ban you altogether.
It used to be seen by companies as bad PR/karma a couple of decades ago, but not anymore.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#5[dead]
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#6"I built my business on top of someone else's product without any gurantee whatsoever of being able to continue in the future, and when it became valuable for them to stop me they did".
Doesn't matter if you're a twitter client, a facebook app, a shopify app, a reddit client or whatever, either what you offer is negligible, or you did their research for them and now they can take over.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#7When you expand on something core to another company's platform, that is sometimes referred to as "picking up pennies in front of a bulldozer."
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#8I'm not a business expert or an entrepreneur, but I've been around this industry long enough to know: Unless your intention is to flip your startup into an acquisition, I would recommend against plays like this. Specifically, tying yourself up to a closed ecosystem by building what amounts to a (albeit very nice and powerful) super-feature. I am saying this because I work for a large-ish company where someone did thi…
I had the same thought. There is a a lot of value to be created with moves like this, but it is risky and does not have a long shelf life. Not necessarily a bad business play, but should be expected to be a short-lived one either way.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#9I'm not a business expert or an entrepreneur, but I've been around this industry long enough to know: Unless your intention is to flip your startup into an acquisition, I would recommend against plays like this. Specifically, tying yourself up to a closed ecosystem by building what amounts to a (albeit very nice and powerful) super-feature. I am saying this because I work for a large-ish company where someone did thi…
> Specifically, tying yourself up to a closed ecosystem by building what amounts to a (albeit very nice and powerful) super-feature.
Couldn't agree more. It goes something like this :
"What do you offer ?"
"Feature X on top of Y"
"What stops Y from doing it themselves ?"
Either A "Well it's not worth it" (then why do you do it), or B "Well, they haven't so far ..." in which case you have an end date already, you just don't know it yet and it's in the hands of Y.
As you said, planning to be aquired is probably the best move, second one being to plan your independence (imgur to reddit like), because otherwise your company has no real future.
Re: Bootstrapping to €600k MRR and getting killed by Shopify: Checkout X
#10When you expand on something core to another company's platform, that is sometimes referred to as "picking up pennies in front of a bulldozer."
Yes, but some times you have time to pick up enough pennies to buy the huge mansion that you see on their photos.