40 Tips to Quicky and Easily Ruin Your Web Startup

Startups are emerging every day all around the web, presenting us with their solutions to our problems. Web or mobile apps, more or less useful, they are the tools that create the workflow of any computer-litterate person today.

Some of them are really successful and manage to get a lot of funding before they start making any profits. Sadly, some of them don’t get to live up to their first birthday. I’m going to tell you why that is. This is a list of things you need to do if you want to FAIL as a startup company.

Your Ego Is The King

1. You’re the boss, founder, CEO, CFO, any-other-O and you don’t need to listen to advice other people are giving you;
2. Speaking of titles and ego-boosters, make sure to create business cards, t-shirts, rent an office even if you don’t need them! Everybody knows that one thing that makes you a great CEO is a business card. Not work. Work is for people you’ll employ;
3. Employ people so you don’t have to work! After all, being a CEO is a title with perks – sleeping ’till noon, skipping work etc. The work always gets magically done;
4. Make sure you have the highest salary. Your developers, designers and other associates work hard, but they are not on your level yet, right?
5. Apply for conferences only if there is a 5-star hotel nearby;
6. Apply for conferences only if they pay you to talk about your product;
7. Invest your (investor’s) money into a bigger office, get some new hardware and a company car would be nice;
8. Don’t answer your e-mails in the middle of the night. Let them wait, preferably a day or two;
9. Go to sleep at 10pm and wake up around 9am;
10. An eight-hour work day should be enough for you. Of course, don’t forget to take a one-hour lunch break, because we all know that healthy eating comes first;
11. There is no need for you, as a founder, to have “an idea”;
12. Even if you have an idea, it should be the one with quick (money) results. Who cares what will happen in 5, 10 or 15 years.

The Product Will Be Developed… Eventually.

13. Product… it’s still in development. It will be released in a year or two, who knows. We got our first investment, we’re rich!;
14. Don’t release a product with basic functionality. Develop it more and more until it has everything;
15. Don’t learn about problems your product solves. School was years ago and let’s face it – you know everything;
16. Don’t focus. Actually, focus on as many things as possible. You can do it!;
17. Don’t bother with creating a plan of any kind. Financial, promotional, development plan… the best moments in life are the spontaneous ones;
18. Work with thinkers, not executors. Because you need someone who will see “the big picture” and will know how to delegate tasks, not doing a thing. That’s his profession;
19. Pivot much. Pivot in the middle of the development. When a projects comes to an end, pivot a little more;
20. Hold a lot of meetings. Every morning you should have a “today meeting” and if you can, try to have an “after-lunch” meeting, just to see how everybody is doing;
21. Have unrealistic deadlines. Your developers can sleep when they’re dead;
22. Don’t look for competent workers for your project. Friends that had programming in high school will do the job as well as other, more expensive developers.

Testing and Marketing… Waste of Money

23. Your project must be closed for the public. No beta testers should be allowed, imagine the horror if a screenshot gets out;
24. Don’t market your product. Your product is so awesome that everyone will ditch the competitor and move to you, naturally;
25. Don’t communicate with the media. After all, they just want you for the page views. They don’t care about your service;
26. If you somehow decide you’d love to see your name on popular tech-blogs, make sure to spam the editors, otherwise they might miss your e-mail;
27. Don’t address each media outlet separately, instead write a PR release and fill it up with buzzwords about your product;
28. If possible, mail them twice a day, tweet them and leave messages on their Facebook wall. Heck, send them snail-mail as well;
29. When looking for a web design agency, make sure it’s cheap and can deliver a site yesterday. The client is always right, isn’t he?;
30. Pricing the product… apps that cost two or three dollars are worthless and make no money. Don’t go with the flow and price your app at two or three hundred dollars;
31. Social media is a scam. Advertise on TV, radio and local newspapers;
32. Right after the launch, give a large discount on your product or services. 70% off!;
33. Don’t listen to your customers. They’re just whining, you know that your software is 100% perfect and there is nothing that needs to be changed.

Investors, Networking and Other Nonsense

34. Invest more of your time into playing with a project management software rather than working. Try out several different project management tools as well. You’re not a real startup if you don’t have your project organized on some project management platform. Pen and paper? Meh;
35. When pitching to an investor, take your time. Feel free to make long presentations, after all, if your startup turns out to be a success, he is the one that will get rich. At least he could listen to your presentation;
36. Your first pitch to the first investor you stumble upon will get you the funding;
37. The design of the presentation for the investor is irrelevant. Content is the king!;
38. You don’t need to waste time attending meetups in your region. They’re only drinking beer and talking about some silly stuff. No networking there;
39. If you’re going to create mobile app, make sure to charge for it. People should be thankful to you for enabling them to use your service everywhere;
40. Once launched, your product or a service doesn’t need a help desk. It’s so intuitive and crystal clear that every user should know how to use it. And if they don’t, it’s their own fault, of course.

Please, don’t do any of this. Unless you really want your startup to fail 😉

Title image credit: richard-wilson.blogspot.com