DISQUS

Mashable - The Social Media Guide: 2008/08/27/startup-hacks-know-when-to-walk-away/

  • shammara · 1 year ago
    this is one of the worst articles i have ever read in my life.
  • Salil · 1 year ago
    And this is one of the worst comments I have ever read in my life :-)
  • Michael Cerda · 1 year ago
    He must not like Kenny Rogers;) [
  • lumelink · 1 year ago
    It is very important to have business model. Many social networking sites that start up bank on word of mouth and email referral to friends as their marketing strategy. It was a good article!
  • paul · 1 year ago
    I know at least five specific people who, if they'd taken this advice, would've saved themselves a total of about 10 years and loads of lost income. Thx for this.
  • Greg M · 1 year ago
    Nice job again, liking your articles. Nice to have real world perspective that not everyone in a company is normally exposed to. So often people aimlessly follow ceo's sometimes and think they know whats going on, only to get caught by surprise.

    And particularly timely given the number of companies - even some that seem to be doing well - joining the deadpool lately.
  • Daniel Buca · 1 year ago
    I like the way this article describes a real of today's market and gives some advices that not so many people give.

    There are lots of people who joined a startup and then, later, ended up disappointed by the company.
    One this happens, those people start looking for safe jobs wher they are not given the opportunity to be creative.
    As result I feel that we are loosing all, not only those people.

    Nice article :)

    Regards,
  • Brian Sherwin @ Myartspace · 1 year ago
    Sound advice.
  • Aaron Burcell · 1 year ago
    @Michael, you must be well read to attract trolls (Shammara). Congrats.
  • rick · 1 year ago
    One thing not eluded to is research can be wrong.

    Also journalists can be wrong about their perception of the market.

    We were looking at doing a managed services startup, and all the research was there, and it looked wide open, but our reliance on the research instead of the customer was not aligned.

    Do not read an article or report with out looking up those other business owners sited in the article or report, if it is going to influence you, look it up. I liked an article about managed services and looked up a MSP owner listed in the article, as his business went up 300% that year.

    Ya, what the article didn't mention was that the towns population was 1000 people.
  • Redsoxmaniac · 8 months ago
    This article is a little convoluted because it doesn't give me much information on:

    A: How to discern this information at a certain level of connection with the startup ( am I already hired looking for these clues, am I looking at prospective companies, am I a consultant/temp/freelancer looking for a solid partnership?)

    B: Whether one ( or all five ) of these issues must be raised or acknowledged to say that a company isn't going to last.


    Another point to raise is that even with this information, I can say from experience that if someone is running a start-up that is destined to fail, number five is rarely going to be a situation. Number three is a decent indicator but would have to also fall to how the company fares with number two ( acquiring a diligent business model ).

    I don't want to agree with the first poster that this is a horrible article, but for such an important business topic as getting hired/working with a start-up, this article leaves very little to guide the reader toward any direction. A re-write, with additional pointers and a better vocabulary directing the audience is very needed.
  • Ahmed S · 2 months ago
    Some very credible and valid reasons stated above, but above all data lies perseverance of the founding members. If they're passionate about something, then let it sink in for a while. Its true that the market might not accept it with open arms at first; twitter was a good example. It took some time to start up, gather confidence and funding from VCs.