The scariest part of validating my business was not fighting skeptics. That I could handle. I freaked when people told me my idea made sense. That’s not what you’re supposed to hear. Is it?
“First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win,” is the Ghandi mantra by which many entrepreneurs live.
As a kid my grandmother told me I was a good writer, so I second-guessed myself. Grandmothers are supposed to tell you you’re great at everything, right? Only when I got positive feedback from strangers would I be satisfied.
This post is part of a Startup Edition series on validating startup ideas
People scratched their heads when I told them about my last company. As a result I mistakenly I thought I was on to something. When entrepreneur friends told me most startups need help understanding the public relations process, it made me think the idea was too simple to be valuable.
Creating a place for startups to learn about marketing seemed like a no-brainer. Surely it had been done before, but as Dan Pink says, markets are not efficient. All the good ideas haven’t been taken. New ideas must be proven.
The next challenge was dealing with perception. In order to succeed in something you must be “all in,” or it won’t work.
In journalism school my classmates and instructors spent the entire year mocking the PR profession. PR is where journalists go when they sell out. I’d argue it’s actually BuzzFeed.
Sales and marketing is a noble profession. The world is full of needs. Great ideas don’t sell themselves. Founders love to build things. Beautiful things. Useful things. But selling and promoting the things they’ve built is where many stumble. I love to help world-changing entrepreneurs tell stories that will shape the future. I’m intensely passionate about it. Helping great people spread great ideas makes the world a better place.
And it turns out that entrepreneurs aren’t the only folks who want to learn more about startup marketing. In fact, the best marketers are the ones constantly seeking out an edge. Hiten Shah once said that you must know the content appetite of your audience, and marketers are insatiable.
I thought that validating my idea would be the hard part. It wasn’t. Execution is always hard. A bad idea well executed can become something of value. A great idea with no followthrough is nothing.
Readers have come from 125 countries over the past 30 days. This blog has allowed me to create connections with entrepreneurs all around the world, which makes me feel constantly in I’d call that validated.
The hard part now is having patience. There are so many things I want to build, and so many resources I would like to provide to my readers. And I want to do it all now! But patience is a virtue.
For new readers, and those who have been here since the beginning, I’m thrilled by the surprises in store. With time, we’ll get there.
This post is part of a Startup Edition series on validating startup ideas