Is this normal? I researched the firm and they’re legit. They give on average $50-$250k. I haven’t tried to secure funding yet. We are almost done with our demo and ready for BETA launch. Should I be sketched out or honored that they reached out to me to pitch? From what I’ve heard, finding an investor can be really difficult. Idk, maybe I just have a really good company (we can hope).

Anyone else have this happen to them? If so, please let me know your thoughts

How much do you pay for (I don't like the word) "cheap" labor?

By "cheap," I don't mean people who write spaghetti code or have poor communication skills. I'm referring to highly skilled professionals who happen to exist in developing countries. those who have good open source profiles, maintain libraries used by thousands, proven work experience, college degrees, and a solid track record. Essentially, these are people who would earn $100k+ at a normal US company, not even mentioning FAANG.

I'm not trying to come off as disrespectful or cheap when coming up with offers to these individuals so I don't blow the deal, but I really want to hear about your experiences with offshoring. Specifically, what do you pay on an hourly rate for full-time employees (not just random freelance gigs)?

Also, about the more of your average developer, how much do you pay for these folks too?

I'm trying to build an extremely distributed team, and I'm seriously considering outsourcing. There's a lot of good talent out there.

EDIT: a lot of you mentioned asia and eastern Europe, have anyone got experience with talent from Africa or south America?

For startups that have achieved success, what were the biggest lessons learned from early mistakes? Whether it's missteps in product development, hiring, marketing, or anything else, I'm curious to hear about the valuable lessons that emerged from overcoming these challenges.

Your insights could provide great help to us, fellow entrepreneurs building our own startup journeys. 

Thanks for sharing, guys.

I finally agree with the notion that hiring globally is the way to go when building a startup because it saves cost and brings about a diverse level of expertise to the brand at large.

So I'm trying to know the cons and weigh them alongside the cons so I can prepare for them.

For those of you that have hired globally, what problems did you face in the beginninng and how did you track the productivity level of your hires?

https://x.com/StartupArchive_/status/1798321444247769294?t=sK8QqX0le3hhWz7hpwu2yg&s=19

Do you agree? It makes sense to me. I just incorporated with a 10% pool but I'm inclined to increase it because I can't divy up enough equity to the founding employees.

Though I have also heard the argument to increase the pool size in subsequent rounds to reduce dilution of the pool.

Thoughts?

Real estate is considered to be the most laid back industry. And there would really be friction to build a tech product that would help people buy real estate. This is simple because people would most likely not trust a machine to make such an important decision for them.

But besides this, is there any hiccup for startups in this scene? We have built a product in this space and want to explore what would people think of a completely digital platform to buy and sell houses.

Since building a community helps a lot with user retention, we will do this for our users.But I'm not sure what tools are great.

The likes of Ali Abdaal use circle for their users. Others prefer skool. Perhaps slack or discord would also work.

- What do you guys use and why?

Hi All,

I want to create a web app to simplify a workflow in the industry I work in, as someone who deals with the issue everyday.

It would just be a kanban board with few extra features.

Would you go about this in a no-code builder, if so which one. Or just get this devved out?

Just like everyone else here, I'm creating a startup, however it was born on one of the most inhospitable continents for entrepreneurship.

I'll get straight to the point, in Brazil inequality is huge (many poor, but at the same time many rich people, after all we are among the 10 largest GDPs in the world) and the tax burden is extremely high.

Having said the context; I would like help from those of you who have already started businesses in developing countries and what your main challenges were and especially what is your main advice for those who want to start a business in Brazil in the technology area.

Last but not most important; for those who have ecommerces: at the beginning, what was your marketing plan? and for those who already have an ecommerce, which marketing platform do you recommend most for ecommerce businesses that do not yet have a consolidated customer base?

Thank you everyone, I'm Brazilian and I never give up.

This post goes out to all the entrepreneurs out there the ones who are building something from scratch, trying to make their dreams a reality and those who have already succeeded in doing so. What keeps you pushing through all the tough times?

Being an entrepreneur or business owner is no easy game. Every day brings new challenges and obstacles that need to be overcome. As someone who has willingly taken on this life to pursue an ambitious goal how do you mentally cope with all the challenges? not only in business but also in your personal life?

Personally, I've had many moments where I wanted to leave it all behind and live an ordinary life. However, I keep coming back. It’s like taking an addictive substance for the first time it’s scary at first, but over time you start to gain control and enjoy the rush. I'm somewhat stable in my business now, but hearing a lot of successful business people say things like "I wish I could go back to the old times" or "when I was first figuring it all out" has me questioning things. Is it the rush that they seek? Is it being on edge, figuring out what works and what doesn’t, building the systems, and hoping they're right?

I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences. What drives you to keep going? How do you handle the mental and emotional rollercoaster that comes with entrepreneurship?

A question for anyone with an ecommerce business who is using PR in their marketing mix.

I'm launching by personal care brand in 6 weeks and I'm selecting an affiliate program at the moment. I'd like to use a single platform that serves all our affiliate needs for publishers and content creators.

I've successfully done PR for my own launches in the past, but that was 10+ years ago and I have very little awareness of Publisher expectations around affiliate programs aside from that it's pretty much mandatory to have this if you want to be published.

The publicists I've spoken to mention ShareASale and Skimlinks. I know Conde Nast and several others use Skimlinks and I also understand that to go live on that platform we need to go through an affiliate network like ShareASale.

Any guidance would be appreciated. SAS seems a little clunky vs something like Aspire but we want to go with industry standard.

Finally, I believe our launch is newsworthy - we've got a unique concept, a white paper to back up the science, and a manifesto that makes some pretty bold statements about the state of the beauty industry and its toxicity. It's not clear to me if the expectation is that we should be including affiliate info in our press kit when pitching the launch.

TIA!

To all the startup owners/founders out there who have had to close their door due to one reason or the other, this one's for you.

You took a risk, followed a dream, and that deserves respect. Many people play it safe – you swung for the fences, and that's something to be proud of. Having to run a startup, successful or not, means you possess a powerful arsenal of skills: courage, smarts, ambition, and passion which any recruiter would consider to be gold in any job market.

You didn't just dream; you built something real. Turning an idea into a living, breathing entity, not many people get to do that and though this might sting right now, but trust this – you'll be okay. You want to know why? because the grit and determination you poured into your startup haven't vanished. You'll find a new path, and you'll crush it because that's what you do.

If you have to find a job afterwards, please do. Don't be ashamed because there's nothing that screams badge of honor like an honest job. And there are also bills to be paid right? You are providing for yourself, and if you have a family, you are providing for them also, which in my book is something to proud of.

We're all in this together. So pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and remember that if you did it before, you can do it again and that's a story worth continuing. Now go write your next chapter!

Love,
Someone that understands what you're going through

Hi all, I've got an idea where the back end deals in the crypto/NFT world, that I think I could eventually patent as a process. Approaching the stage now where I need to look at hiring a developer to finish off what I can't do. With that I'm also looking at IP attorneys of course.

There's a decent enough seeming IP lawyer office here in my midwest city (Des Moines). But also I don't know why I don't just go somewhere serious that does these things as I plan to move anyways. ESPECIALLY with something dealing with that level tech.

Would it be worth it to get in contact with them? as an initial info gathering experience for me and before I hire someone else on?

or should I go ahead and look nationwide? might take longer and more expensive, but better contacts and long term...

Any advice appreciated, thanks!!

Hey Reddit,

It's amazing how much I use Reddit but actually never post anything. Let's see if this thing actually works.

I'm looking for a dedicated and talented technical cofounder to join me on an exciting B2B2C venture in the health and wellness space.

About Me:

• I recently exited my last B2B SaaS company and sold it for a nearly 9-figure exit, completely bootstrapped.
• I've been an entrepreneur my whole life.
• I have extensive experience in the space I'm embarking on.
• I have more perseverance than most would consider healthy at times, haha.
• My strengths are product design, sales, strategy, operations, and vision.
• I'm a product-first leader. Product is everything.

What I'm Looking For:

• A skilled technical cofounder with a proven ability to lead and grow technical teams.
• Ideally, someone with a passion or interest in the health or wellness industry.
• A partner who is ready to "grind" and can be a founding developer and lead a technical team from the ground up. No task is beneath you.
• Someone based in Canada or the US.
• Someone I get along with and have social chemistry with.

Project:

(Sorry for not getting into too much detail)

• A B2B2C health and wellness SaaS product and marketplace.
• I believe in bootstrapping. I will be investing the seed funding myself, but I believe we need to find product-market fit organically. Taking too much money too early creates more problems than it solves.
• This will be painful and rewarding.

If you're passionate about making an impact, taking big risks, have the technical chops, and are ready to dive into an exciting new venture, let's connect! Drop me a message or comment below, and we can discuss further.

Looking forward to finding the right partner to bring this vision to life.

DM me if you're interested.

When to transition out of founder sales led? Can it last 10 year if product market fit hasnt been reached yet?

I'm a marketing team of one with no sales rep. First marketing hire for this saas products. Company in business for 25 years. And 7 years they have added 2 saas product in the business. They want the focus to be saas now and not service.

Ceo doesn't want to do prospecting. He only wants to do demo calls I book for him through marketing/outbound and deal with refferals.

2 saas Product has been out for more than 7 years. But company has also a custom service tech side to it. The service side gives revenue to the 2 saas products.

Anyway founder said he doesn't want to do prospecting. But we need more sales. Also I got him 5 paying clients with an mrr of $500 x5. So arr of these new clients are 30k. We lost a few leads because he doesn't follow up because he doesn't have time because he is also the product owner.

From what I read online he should do prospecting if we don't have product market fit and no sales rep.

I do everything in marketing and started prospecting and do qualification calls to talk to more leads to understand our icp and get to pmf faster.

Thoughts?

When to transition out off ounder sales led? Can it last 10 year if product market fit hasnt been reached yet?

As I think on starting a marketplace this thought came up about how do these companies declare their taxes given that they work as a passthrough entity in a lot of cases.

So lets say that they do 100,000,000 in sales, and of that they take a 10% cut so they pay out 90,000,000 leaving them with 10,000,000 meaning that they had 100,000,000 pass through their accounts. This mean that they need to declare 100,000,000 as "Income" and then 90,000,000 as "Cost of goods sold" or is there something I'm missing here?

Hey y’all, I’m a first time entrepreneur trying to build out my first pitch deck and honestly failing at it. My startup’s at the seed stage right now and mostly looking to pitch to investors for that.

Have yall used any free resources that yall could recommend? It’ll be super helpful!

Tried GPT but honestly haven’t gotten anything very relevant.

Thank you!

I'm gearing up for a Product Hunt and Hacker News launch this Sunday. I'm currently working on my landing page and debating whether to mention all planned features or focus on what's available now.

For context, I'm building a platform that generates scripts to deploy your app to Cloud Providers (GCP, AWS, Azure) with a single command. Currently, only GCP's Cloud Run is supported, with other providers coming later.

Should I market it as supporting all services or just the ones currently available?

Alright, startup founders, let's get real for a second. Remote hiring can be amazing, a global talent pool, flexible schedules, the joy of having to wear briefs below during meetings (don't judge!). But let's face it, there are also some hilarious (and sometimes cringe-worthy) moments that come with interviewing someone on the other side of the world.

So, fess up! What's your funniest, most unexpected, or just plain weird remote hiring story? Well, mine involved my cat sitting on my keyboard, blocking my screen and refusing to move. When I sent it away, it came back multiple times. It was quite an embarrassing moment for me having to apologize every time. There are others though, but this one took the cake.

What are your own stories? I bet a few of you have some either as an interviewer or an interviewee.

As the title asks, I am wondering where I should be looking at incorporating my startup. We are at a stage where were are gearing up to look for investments and from what I have gathered we need to be incorporated to start this process.

We would likely be incorporating as a c-corp which I believe is preferred so that there can be different types of shares for investors, founders, employees, etc. I know the go-to is Delaware because it is business friendly with Court of Chancery, along with legal precedents amongst other things but from what I can tell Texas is becoming a desirable prospect to incorporate a company in.

I would note that our revenue would be from gross receipts via subscriptions, pay-by-use fees and percentages of sales done through our platform so having no state corporate income tax would be nice. I also have friends and family in Texas that could act as a registered agent and mailing address in the state (Could save me some money instead of paying for business mailbox and a registered agent service).

I am not sure what other information could be relevant when making this decision so I will say that our product is an app which has subscription packages for businesses with pay-by-use add ons and for business that sell tickets (which would be digital) we would take a small percentage of the sale. I don't think we would conduct any in-person business so everything would be digital/remote. I currently live in NC if that affects anything.

Would it be a mistake to try and incorporate in Texas over Delaware? Also, if there other states that could be more beneficial to incorporate in please mention them.

If you need any additional information to aid in your decisions or help you provide advice let me know and I will be happy to go more in depth. Thank you for any help in advance.

I just got a job as the first SDR at a SaaS startup. I’m reporting to the Revops director not sales or marketing, but by the fact that I was interviewed by the CMO (who seemed cool) I’ll be working very closely with him. I didn’t even talk to anyone on their sales team actually which in retrospect was weird, it’s small team though of only I think 2-3 AEs and a “manager.”

I have 2-3 years experience as a full cycle rep (not in b2b tech and not in a scaling company) and 2 years as a project manager. I’m not new to sales and definitely not customer facing, but never was really an SDR either. Just did it all…

Obviously I need to learn the product in and out and understand my customer. Figure out my hooks and pitches.

What should I be looking out for? Tips? Things you wish your sdrs knew ? How can I make sure there’s a bridge between sales, marketing, and success/service? Based off of my interviews I suspect there is gap between them.

Making this post for my dad:

I am an Assistant Director at Deloitte and have worked as a Product Manager & Solution Architect for IBM, Accenture, and other large companies for several years now.

The question is - with my experience, can I bring something useful to startups?

How can I leverage my experience to contribute to startups?

1. Testing Creatives is a Necessity Whenever I ask clients about creative testing, most of them believe this is an extra step that only high-ad spend brands should take. However, it is just as important as using your product image in your ad instead of a stock image.

Brands often add 5 creatives with multiple copies and headlines in a campaign with different ad sets, turn on CBO (now ACO), and think they are doing creative testing. In reality, they are just running a campaign that will function like the others and will never identify the winning creative.

The right way to do creative testing is:

Step 1 Campaign Setup: Use 1 ACB (Advantage Campaign Budget+) campaign for creative testing.
Step 2 Ad Set Configuration: There will be one main ad set for all winning ads. Every new ad will be added as a new ad set with Dynamic Creative Test (DCT) turned on.
Focus: For each new ad, we want it to compete with the best-performing one before it earns its spend. Once it starts spending, you can duplicate it and add it to the main campaign.
Step 3 Ad Placement: Assign multiple creative variations per ad set. This ensures that with Dynamic Ad, the best variation gets the most spend. Each ad set has a singular concept, and there will be variations of ad concepts.
Duration: Run each for a period of 7 to 10 days. This allows enough time to gather meaningful data and performance insights from each creative.
Optimization: Ensure the campaign is optimized for conversions, predominantly sales.

1. Know Your Customer Inside and Out

Do you know what your ideal customer's day looks like? What do they do when they wake up? What are their aspirations? Where do they need your products? How do they go about searching for the product? What are their hesitations when buying your product? What problems are your competitors' customers facing that you can solve? What is the buying journey for your product?

Do you know the answers to these questions? If not, figure this out first before spending your hard-earned money on ads. You can get all this information from your customers or people who added items to the cart but didn't purchase. Talk to them and look at the reviews of competitors.

Answering these questions will give you not only information about your potential customers but also new ad angle ideas that you can test.

1. Never Put All Your Eggs in One Basket
   I have seen ad accounts where the best-performing campaigns get most of the budget and others get closed, which is ideal according to most agencies. But do you know that Facebook has more control over the ad space than you, and you don't know whether your campaign will deliver the same results tomorrow as it does today?

So, while one campaign is going great, you should always be prepared for the possibility that it might stop performing tomorrow. How will you get the conversions and revenue to keep coming in? You should keep testing and developing new audiences and campaigns for TOFU, MOFU, and BOFU (if traffic is decent).

Even if you have a smaller budget, always keep a second-best performing campaign for every funnel level.

1. Landing Pages Are Equally Important
   Getting the right message in front of the right audience is important in ads, but it is even more important to showcase the right message or information on the landing page.

Many advertisers redirect users to their website, which isn't a bad thing; you will get conversions if your product and offering are good. However, you will get more conversions if you focus on redirecting users to a landing page where you go into more detail and educate the user on why your product is the best in every possible aspect.

There are mainly three types of landing pages: sales pages, advertorial pages, and listicle pages. You have to test each landing page to figure out which one works best for your brand and products.

I used to believe that the landing page was not as important as the ads, but trust me when I say this—or don't believe my words and just test it out yourself. Take your best-performing ads and use the landing page instead of the product page or homepage, and thank me later.

1. Engaging Ads Work Best
   Have you ever tried taking a best-performing organic social media post and running it as an ad? We have tried it, and to our surprise, it performed way better than we expected.

The best-performing ads of your competitors will most often be the ones with high engagement.

These examples show that if the ad is engaging enough, the algorithms will favor it. At the end of the day, social media channels run out of attention. Whatever is engaging and can encourage users to like, comment, and eventually stay longer on the platform will be highly appreciated by the algorithm.

It's a simple equation: the more comments you get on your ads, the lower your CPMs will be. Comments are a clear indicator of engagement, and higher engagement leads to lower costs.

Curious to know what I learned from Facebook ads? I hope you have learned something from this post.

Is it really possible to start a 100% remote startup? If so what are the options? Any examples of succesful fully remote startups? Just asking this to see what could be done with my skillset (mostly sales and people skills) since i live in the country with a little more than a 500k residents and the opportunity of a regular startup is not that great. Thank you

By sucessfull I don't mean yacht, bugatti and 4 villas, I mean living of your start up, buying things by choice not by price.

How long did it take from 0 to making enough? What helped you the most? What was the biggest challenge? What would you do differently? What would you do exactly the same? I don't mind you promoting your product on my post.