7 startup lessons I have found to be true
I've been working with startups since 2005. Here are seven big things I have found to be true:
1. It’s just a hypothesis until you test it
I've worked with ~300 software teams and, a long time ago, I accepted that none of us really know how people will react to our products.
Be clear about your hypothesis and find a way to test it ASAP.
2. Everything is downstream of product-market fit
Hiring, fundraising, press, and technology are all important, but ultimately don't matter if you can't find product-market fit.
(My definition is Rob Kaminski's: “PMF is when you can repeatably find, sell, serve, and retain customers.”)
Optimize everything for accelerating toward PMF. Including hiring — only hire figure-outers, not doers!
3. Markets are made up of people
When you start, focus on making something that clicks with 1 person, then 5, then 50, then 500...
Before you can find product-market fit, you have you find "product-person fit."
4. If you can’t find 5 customers to test with (or 50), you might be in the wrong business
Founders often ask, "How can I find customers to test with?" Or, "Can you introduce me to potential customers?"
Finding customers is the whole point! Customer intros are like training wheels; the goal is not to get better training wheels, but to get the wheels off ASAP so you can ride on your own.
Like Fan (J) Li, I strongly believe "you can network yourself to 4-6 of any type of user.”
And if you can't, it might be a bad market, a bad business, a poorly defined target, or another red flag.
5. Focus on one risk at a time
Building a startup is like opening the invitation box at the beginning of Glass Onion — you have to solve one puzzle before you can move on to the next.
Constantly ask yourself: "What's the next most important thing I need to figure out?"
If you try to do it all at once, you'll probably fail (and drive yourself crazy doing it!)
6. Maintain your freedom of movement
The best founders take action (talk to customers, test prototypes, launch stuff) to generate information about what's working or not working, and then use that information to inform decisions and change course if necessary.
But when you make a big decision that limits your freedom of movement — like a corporate partnership, an oversized bet, etc — that breaks this loop, and you stop learning.
7. Intuition is your most important muscle — strengthen it always!
You'll never have perfect information, so every decision depends on your intuition. THIS IS OKAY.
In fact, as a founder, your ability to make high-context, intuition-rich decisions is one of your advantages over incumbents.
Try to spend 80%+ of your time on activities that build your intuition — each one will make you better, stronger, and more likely to succeed.
p.s. If you’re a founder thinking through product-market fit, customer testing, or go-to-market risks, we work on these questions every day at Character Labs. Check out character.vc/labs to learn more or stay in the loop for the next program.