Most Popular
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What is the best piece of business advice you've ever received?
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Totally honest. Jeffrey Zeldman’s Golden Rule of Web Design: “get half your money up front.” http://www.zeldman.com/daily/faq.html
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I've just found a partner, we share the same ideas for our business, have different strengths, and are ready to start. But, where do we start? What is the first step in starting a business with a partner?
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Build something. I’m hoping one of the strengths one of you is bringing to the business is technical talent. If so, it sounds like you have everything you need to get started. Digg was started by Kevin and a couple buddies he knew online. Lots of other startups were begun by one or two people in a basement.
One piece of advice for starting out though. Get the basics down on paper. No matter how much you trust your partner, it saves friendships and solves headaches to have the fundamentals of ownership down on paper. Sketch out who owns what and who is responsible for what. You won’t regret doing so.
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I would like to be a technical co-founder. I believe I have all the skill necessary. I have done independent consulting for the past 6 years and I'm currently working at a startup. I love what I do (building interesting and useful applications). I would love to find a business partner and jump into starting up a company. What are some good resources out there?
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Well, if you’ve got the technical chops I’d think you’re in the driving seat here. From what I know, there are many more would-be entrepreneurs than technical people willing to step up and co-found something. I don’t know of any resources for this kind of thing per se, but start going to barcamps or meetups etc and try to meet as many people as possible. Hopefully you find someone who has ideas you respect and how could be a great partner.
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I was recently hired on at a very young startup. I just graduate 5 months ago, and naturally this is my first job in the industry. What is one piece of advice you would give to people like me?
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Congratulations! My one piece of advice would be to involve yourself in all parts of the startup. Don’t be “the business guy” or “the designer”. Of course, you’ll have a technical role to play, but pay attention to the big picture. First of, you’ll make better decisions in your role, but you’ll also learn a ton that you can use in your future.
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How soon should a start up company think about starting a intern program?
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It really depends on your needs, but I can see doing this early on. Bringing in low-paid interns (at least in CA unpaid internships are illegal and I think they’re unethical an any case) can be extremely useful. But, interns are a responsibility as well.
At Milk, I’ve brought in a design intern almost right away, because we have significant design needs on a tight timeline. But, we have not brought in developer interns because the technical requirements are too high and our developers do not have the time to coach and oversee an intern team.
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What is the best way to validate my idea before I go ahead and build it?
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You’ve got this backwards. You will validate your idea by building it.
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You said geography doesn't really matter but you left Canada to go to SF, right? Has it been easier being the valley then in a small town elsewhere?
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I didn’t say geography doesn’t matter
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How do you find a really good business mentor?
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Reach out and contact people you admire. At least among the people I know in SF, it’s surprisingly easy to get great business people to go out and get a beer/coffee. Do it a few times and hopefully you’ll make a connection with someone who you can reach out to and email questions once in a while.
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What is the first step in constructing a business plan?
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I’ve never written a business plan. In every business I’ve been a part of, our first step was to build a product.
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Could you talk about your history as a designer?
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So many questions. I’m going to do a cop out on this one. I answered a similar question in an interview last year with David Gillis (obviously before I helped start Milk): http://uxmag.com/design/friction-can-be-a-good-thing
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What mechanism and methodologies are available to those of us who's online service is not targeted that the geek community? Building something which spreads is always hard, but finding the offline viral loop seems to be extreamly difficult. Any ideas?
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This question is too full of buzzwords. I honestly have no idea what you’re really asking. How to market to non-geeks? If so, then make a product that appeals to a niche that’s not tech geeks and pursue those people. Once they’re engaged, broaden your audience from there.
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Any tips on how to get into the startup industry as a designer?
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Go talk to startups. If you’re a great designer it’s never been a better time to get into a startup. Everyone, and I mean just about everyone, is hiring.
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How strongly would you advise against starting a tech startup without a technical co-founder? I'm an experienced designer, and I know of some companies that I've worked with before that I'd consider contracting the dev work out to, but still it seems scary not having that tech person who's 100% in, especially for when things catch fire. Thoughts?
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I hear the title “technical co-founder” being thrown around a lot and, to be honest, I don’t know exactly what it means. It’s often used to describe some MBA who brings in someone with some technical expertise to help them get going. But, in your situation you should have some technical know-how to begin with (I hope!).
If you have developers you’ve worked with before, go for it! It sounds like you know what you’re getting into. Would one of these developers consider jumping onto your project full time if it takes off? Consider seeding that idea with them early on.
This is a rambling answer but the gist of it is that Yes! it would be great to have a full-time developer working with you as a co-founder, but it’s certainly not necessary. It sounds like you know the risk of not having someone there with you, but if the trade-off is worth it you’re going in with eyes wide open.
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When talking design for business, your the only designer at Milk that I am aware of: Besides the obvious standard tools ie: photoshop, dreamweaver, illustrator etc, what must have tools do you need personally in design? Is there a specific monitor you use? Something that makes your setup unique? Or is there software thats not popular but its your choice for something?
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My setup is pretty standard. PS, Coda, Illustrator, Terminal. I use whiteboards a lot and I sometimes use a sketchbook (incl. some awesome ones with iOS templates in them called “App Sketchbook”). I also frequently use LiveView Screencaster (when it works) to see designs as I work on them on my phone, which is crucial.
Hardware. I use a huge 30" Cinema Display (just ‘cause it’s nice) and my 13" MBP as a side screen. I love the Razer Orachi mouse (can’t stand the Apple mice).
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In the article, you state, "Go hang out with product builders until you
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Go to conferences. Go to SXSW. Go to free events like BarCamps and meetups. None exist in your area? Maybe you could organize one? Or travel to one. Be humble. Ask questions. Buy beers.
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In your opinion what is the best experience for signing up new users to a service? Signup through Facebook Connect? Signup through Twitter oAuth? Create unique registration process? I know it might depend on what the demographic of the service is but with pretty much everybody having a Facebook and Twitter these days...I'm sure you get the point.
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For our first app, we’re doing: FB Connect + Twitter oAuth + native signup as as a tertiary means.
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I read your comments in the Sprouter newsletter. I'm a marketing guy & have 2 startups in production. I agree with your comments and realise I need to get to the point where I can contribute to the actual build/development and one day 'build it myself'. Any suggestions where to start? This would be an after hours education for me. Are there any online courses or tutorials you could recommend? My preference is PHP (Symfony), so that I'm learning the language my developers are using.
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There are a kazillion PHP tutorial sites out there. Here are a couple some developer friends recommend. Excited that you’re doing this!
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What makes a good cofounder? How should we divide responsibility?
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A good co-founder is someone you can trust even when it’s going rough and someone who brings unique skills to the project.
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How to determine how much money to raise?
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This is a ridiculous question.
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How is one's idea protected from being stolen by a Venture Capitalist?
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Your idea is mostly not protected. You can sign NDAs and make promises, but in the end and idea is just an idea and it’ll be awfully hard (and possibly expensive) to litigate if you think the VC stole it.
So, meet with VCs that you trust and get over the idea that your idea is worth a ton of money. The execution of an idea is very hard and holds most of the value. You’re the best person to execute on your brilliant idea so you’ve already got a leg up there.
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One paragraph on how you get most effective feedback from users in early stage prototype or alpha reviews and tools you'd use to execute this part of the process? thanks!
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I’ll keep this pithy. First is to get the product in front of people early. Don’t wait too late to get feedback. We don’t use any fancy tools other than forms on Google or Wufoo. Otherwise we just email or talk to our testers on a regular basis. But! The key to getting enough information is to track data super early and to do user testing with people. The data will tell you a lot more than what people say explicitly and watching people using your app in a user test will give you a lot of implicit feedback as well.
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3 (or more) key personal+professional traits in you that made you get to where you are right now? Is it important to "just do it" or "be successful for an entrepreneur"? Are people (online users) more forgiving now - when using a new product which is in alpha/beta stage?
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Huh, I’m not sure exactly how to answer this. I think one thing that’s benefited me is a willingness to just try things. I’ve never really had any sort of long term plans. But, when an opportunity presents itself I’ve often just gone out and given it a shot. I know a few people who have very specific life plans. But, they often turn down opportunities that don’t obviously take them in that prescribed direction. I never exactly planned to be a designer in SF, but so far so good. Who knows what I’ll be up to in ten years, but I bet it’ll be ok.
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What are the drawbacks of taking investor money? Seems that everyone these days sees it as necessary to be taken seriously?
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Your last few words are curious: “Taken seriously”. By whom? Who cares.
There are many drawbacks to taking investor money. Suddenly you have other people who want to help you make decisions and you have a responsibility to someone who isn’t you.
Take investor money if you feel you need to do so to support a team. But don’t do it “to be taken seriously”
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Hi, I am school stundent and am oppressed with design in general, I will even go to the extent of paying extra for a better looking chocolate box. My question to you is how do you go about learning code and desiring UI of a website or program for me it has just been incredibly difficult. (p.s congrats on your marriage)
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Do you mean “impressed” instead of “oppressed”!? I almost got the wrong idea to start with there. Learning to code is pretty easy when you get started. Go look at some of the tutorials on W3Schools and all around the web, begin looking at other peoples' source code on websites you like, and basically start dicking around and making some stuff. Your code will be broken and you’ll probably suck a first, but no one will die and you’ll learn a ton! Most developers learned the fundamentals this way. There are also good programs at universities and schools, but don’t wait to be taught… it’s all there on the web for the taking.
And! Thanks for the congrats.
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How did you find Kevin Rose (or vice versa)? You guys seem to have built a great relationship that has turned into a lot of business success. Any tips on how to find that sort of partnership/friend?
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Kevin actually hired silverorange to work on Digg, very near the beginning of Digg’s existence. I lead the design project, which was successful. So, we continued working together. As Digg grew, my role grew larger and Kevin convinced me to move to SF (from Canada) and join the company full time down here. Since then we’ve become great friends and he’ll be standing next to me when I get married this coming October. Not bad!
I’m not sure I’ve got any tips for creating that kind of relationship. Though one thing that’s helped is that we’re honest with each other. Since he first hired me to work on Digg, I honestly told him when I thought something was a bad idea. I became a sounding board for his ideas at a time when he didn’t have many people who’d tell him when one of his ideas stank. That honesty extends into our friendship as well. Sorry, I know this is a tad corny, but true nonetheless.
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How important is having great hair when trying to get an idea off the ground? Just curious whether I should continue or not. If it's important to have great hair but not a deal killer if I don't I will continue on.
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Yes! What a great question. Of course hair matters. I’m desperately trying to get as much done as possible before I lose all of my hair (every male on both sides of my family are bald). I need the key. http://www.hulu.com/watch/28995/the-simpsons-homer-gets-the-keys
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If you EVER find yourself in Milwaukee, I will be buying you beers, for sure! I would love to hear more about what you could have done to help Pounce succeed on a grand scale. My start-up could get very big - I mean, I appeal to a LARGE niche market (small businesses that need a simple 1-page web presence) but I am not experienced enough to know how to GROW it.
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Sure and if you’re ever in SF!
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Is it easier to start a business or maintain a business? I know both require different skill sets but based on your experience would you prefer to do another startup or become the CEO of some existing company? Thanks!
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It’s certainly easier to start something, in my experience. Maintaining something is oftentimes grueling and difficult work but that’s partly why it’s so satisfying when you’re growing a business. The short answer to your second question though: start something. It’s the exhilarating honeymoon part of a tech startup.
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Did you design the Milk business card? Why did you choose a thick stock card when they take up so much room in your wallet? Do you feel paper cards are on their way out?
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We actually had several hundred cards made in a thinner stock for our two people who actually use business cards. For the rest of us who only hand out a couple of them a month, those thick cards are so so so pretty!
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How important is web design for an online startup? Should you hire a designer to take care of this?
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I think you’re asking the question a bit sideways. I think user-centric design of a product is incredibly important and difficult. Design isn’t something you can hire someone to “take care of”
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I would be interested in know what your preferred software stack is for developing a scalable web application. Thanks
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I’m flexible. At Digg we were using a pretty standard LAMP stack for a long time on PHP. At Pownce it was similar but on Python/Django. At Milk we’re doing more straight up Python. I’m usually not the one responsible for picking our tech setup, but these seem to work for us.
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how would one start as a "UX/UI" designer? im a front end web developer and i feel like i'm doing both at the same time sometimes.
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It sounds like you’re already on your way, since you’ve being doing both anyhow. Much of what it takes to become a UI or UX designer is practice. Build things, pay attention to how people use them, do some rudimentary usability testing, iterate, and build some more. It certainly won’t hurt you to start paying attention to sites like A List Apart, UX Mag, etc. and following some great UI designers online to hear more about their craft. But dig in and good luck!
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I'm from the mid-west and are are in the middle of a sizeable start-up of a pretty cool SaaS project that we have kept under the radar. We are self-funded as I have had a previous liquidity event, but in the advertising industry. How do I find a seasoned VC guy now who can give me guidance on milestones even though we are not at a stage of needing any money? I just need good start-up advice along the way, at least for now...?
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Approach a few VCs and just ask. Almost all of the investors I know are happy to chat with people who are willing to buy them a coffee/beer. Ideally you could get introduced as a friend of a friend, but even sending a cold email would likely work. Come out to SF for a week and plan some meetings/coffees beforehand. I strongly suspect you could get plenty of free advice. My fianc
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What are the big mistakes you see new companies make?
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One thing at least: Hiring people with the expectation that more people will get more done. It doesn’t work this simply.
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Is it unreasonable to find a back end developer that can also do front-end design?
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It’s not impossible, surely, but it’s an unusual combination of skills. You’re more likely to find a combination front-end dev who can design (and even these are gems that should be cherished).
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