This 15 minute video by Michael Seibel, Managing director of Y Combinator, teaches a lot

These are the 6 lessons that I found from Michael Seibel’s video with the blend of my perspective

Note: I have only shared the points that I felt valid for today’s situation

1. Idea

Brainstorm with your teammates:

Always discuss with your teammates to make sure that each and everyone understand what you have planned and trying to build

Personal Experience:

The solution on which you are working should have some aspects with your personal experiences, this make you understand the need of your product deeply.

Daily/Weekly Problems:

Instead of dividing your startup journey into monthy or yearly problems, divide into daily/weekly problems. This will help you to achieve milestones in a faster and more realistic way.

2. Market

Make a small level of market research, check whether you have competitors in your market who are doing billions of dollars, copy them and also try to solve the pain points that they have not addressed

3. MVP(Minimum Viable Product)

LAUNCH, that’s it, don’t wait for achieving perfection in your product, it will never be achieved.

According to him, within 2 months you have to launch your product, even if it is not ready, just do it and see

4. Growth

Typical Silicon Valley investors always invest because of this

This is what he ranked about his growth strategy:

Using = Sharing:

The users that use your product should make some amount of sharing about your product, this should be built from day 1

Reference:

If you are running B2B, this is one of the most powerful way to achieve growth. Try to give some incentives in return for referrals

Ads:

This is useful but not a good way, it can be helpful when you reach a saturation point from the above 2 strategies

5. Mastering PR

In the early stages, 99% of the PRs can be made by yourself, no need of investing money of PR until you meet that exceptional situations

Michael himself said in this video that he lost around $150K dollars just for making some useless PRs

6. Fundraising Tips

• Before fundraising, generate income till you can pay the living of the co-founders

• Speed is important in fundraising: Never schedule different meetings for investors, try to put them on a same schedule, this creates urgency for investing in your company

• Have growth, this attracts investors to you not the other way around

• Try to find your initial investors that understand the problem you are solving, sometimes your initial customers can be your potential investors

6. Operations

• Spend less money, pay yourself less, no need building some fancy stuffs around that doesn’t have any ROI (Return on Investment)

• Look at how much you spend every month

Hiring

• Increase the average talent with each hiring: Always try to hire someone who is more talented than you, don’t be arrogant that you should be the smartest guy in the room

• Be transparent and clear with whom you are hiring

• Hire Slow: Don’t hire if there is no requirement, you are just increasing the cost

Conclusion:

These advices doesn’t only apply to getting Y Combinator but how you should take your startup journey to the next step.

Keep Upgrading Yourself Everyday!

P.S.: Your feedbacks and suggestions means a lot, please take some time to drop your thoughts on this