5 essential tips for tech startup founders

Conquer the startup world

A lot of startups fail or get lost in a feature-adding marathon before even launching the product. Well, to start with, many startups are working on products which are not solving any problems. Building a solution for a non-existing problem instead of searching for a problem and answering the real market needs might cause some difficulties, like not having customers, which is a total bummer. 

Business is business, a startup is business too

Although the startup scene is changing the business world, an entrepreneur needs to have balanced skills in many fields and even if driven by an amazing and passionate idea, can’t forget that the startup should be profitable. The sooner, the better. In a traditional business world, it would mean that having a business plan is the first thing to do. Well, there is no need to put it on paper but that would help - a presentation of main goals, deadlines, budget, market research and so on. Answers to questions like what is the business goal, who is the target group, which problem my app will solve, how to make it sustainable - should be a no-brainer for a startup founder. First of all, because you have to know your product in every detail, secondly, understanding the end user will help you build a business strategy to finally get a revenue. Even the most beautiful, state-of-art and top notch lines of code won’t guarantee the success if the startup is not inclined toward revenue from real customers. 

Keep time and budget fixed 

Realistic deadline and a fixed budget go together with a flexible scope (and that’s totally fine). Important is to remember, that deadlines and budget shouldn’t be adjusted after they are settled on solid market research. In case there is a need to change one factor - change the scope. Why knowing the budget and deadlines is so important? 

It gives a very clear vision on what should and could be achieved in a particular period of time with planned resources. Moreover, those are the fundamentals for further exploration. 

Knowing exactly how much you can spend on the project and when it should be delivered, it is easier to estimate and decide if in this case, it would be better to hire an in-house dev team or outsource it. There are many aspects that should be taken into account but the priority should be a high-quality code, in the end, this is a tech startup we are talking about! (Although, a high-quality code should be a norm in each industry when it comes to web applications.) With fixed time, budget and a solid research, it is more likely to find a software house (or an in-house dream team) that suits the startup needs.

The right people to work with

If you are a founder with a tech background, studies show that hiring quickly A-players with business knowledge is a way to success. If you have non-technical skills, then finding the right dev team is more than necessary. Don’t worry, not knowing how to write a line of code doesn’t mean that you can’t start a tech startup. 

Generally speaking, your initial human capital is crucial to be, or not to be, for your startup. The company’s performance depends on the outcome of the dream-team work, and please, don’t try to be a lonely-wolf. It might seem like a heroic act and perfectly fits into the image of a startup founder working on an innovative product with little or no money and basic tools but with a great idea and passion, however, this is just an illusion. Working hard and planning next steps is incredibly important and definitely, two (or more) heads are better than one when it comes to an overwhelming amount of job that has to be done. 

At some point, a startup founder will have to make a choice: hiring in-house or outsourcing. What should be kept in mind is that poor decisions might bring bad, bad consequences. A full-stack company that offers an end-to-end solution, especially in fields in which you are not a specialist (and maybe you can’t find the proper employees because you don’t know how to check their skills or what exactly should be done) seems a safer choice.  Of course, it is just one scenario and it also needs a lot of preparation before you hand over the project to the software house. 

Don’t forget about the UX

We talked a lot about the tech stack and yes, for a tech startup that seems a priority. But a skeleton without skin and muscles can’t do much, right? Imagine, that the dev team is preparing the core, bones, of the project. Now it is time to put some muscles, joints and clothes. This is all about UX! However, think about the UX before even starting the first line of code. UX (User Experience) is often mistaken for UI (User Interface) - and that is a huge faux pas but bearing in mind that UX is much more than UI already gives an advantage over competitors. Top software development companies are not only writing the code! A full-stack Agile experience comes to the rescue for startup founders which want to go through with the project from the early stage to the final result. It is quite important to understand how many factors are influencing the web application and how complex this process might be. Getting in touch with a software house which starts with Product Design Workshops is the way to go! Why? Not only because you get to actually discover the product journey with a team of specialists but also, because no matter how good your code would be if it is not useful for the end user - you won’t last long on the market. 

Stay lean

Reducing market risks is a good strategy for business development but how to implement it in a tech startup? Answering the needs of early customers and not trying to reach perfection but rather make it simply usable, is the right path. Shortening product development cycles is easier to achieve with smart software outsourcing. Building a Minimum Viable Product, it might help to understand the project better even for a startup funder and after that, to focus on one purpose and analytics: follow The One Metric That Matters to solve a particular problem. In this way, the process is more systematic and based on some kind of order. Chaos is not a good friend of any business, especially not for those which want to skyrocket. 

How to succeed in the tech startup world?

The truth is that some founders will make it and others won’t, like in every business, and there is no fit-them-all pattern to follow to success. Skills combined with luck are a great starting point but there is much more to be done. 

Fortunately, even if you fail, the great aspect of having a tech startup is that you actually don’t need a physical space to store products. So, instead of trying to get rid of stuff that didn’t sell well, just try another approach, find a better tech stack and solve with the code some real-life problems. 

Let’s bear in mind that we are always learning. No matter if this is a deep learning process of particular skills or getting a lesson while failing. Making mistakes is totally fine - through the whole process of web application development - only in this way it is possible to improve (and finally become a successful entrepreneur).