There ought to be some kind of test Advisors need to pass before they are allowed to give startup advice.

But there isn’t — literally, anyone can call themselves an Advisor and get away with it. Hell, I’m doing it right now!

Having been in the business of advising startups for decades, I can say this with conviction — most startup advisors are horrible, and they have no idea they are horrible. I’m not talking about bad actors or those trying to do something nefarious. I’m talking about the advisors who actually think they are helping, and instead are doing a lot of damage.

That’s also not to say that Advisors don’t have helpful or useful advice. The problem stems as much from their delivery as from their actual advice. Sometimes, yes, the a...

The era of the “Technical Co-Founder” is coming to a close.

It was a good run, friends. There was a time, back in the days of yore, that every aspiring Founder began a perilous quest of finding that one willing technical mind to join them and make their product dreams come true.

They would give anything (usually half the company) to convince them to join their quest, and be grateful to do so.

It was a good time to be a technical person. You were in high demand, everyone was courting you, and you had incredible negotiating power at the most critical time in a startup’s lifecycle — the founding equity division.

But then, well, AI had to come in and ruin it all. What the hell, man?

Why was a Technical Co-Founder a Thing?

For a good 30+ years, ...

Just when we thought we had finally gotten past all the bullshit of crawling out of startup mode, someone just hit the reset button on us.

“Hop in the Family Truckster, kids, we’re going back to StartupLand!”

Of course, I’m talking about the wholesale disruption that AI just put on nearly every business, and in this case, established businesses that had long since outgrown startup mode, where we thought we were safe and happy.

Startups.com has been around for 15 years (despite our best efforts), and we too have enjoyed being a well-established company that knew exactly what we sold, who our competitors were, and how we got paid.

But probably, just like your startup, all of that changed. Everything we thought was certain a year ago is brand ...

Types of Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding is the practice of raising small amounts of money from many backers online. It comes in four main types: donation-based, reward-based, equity, and debt (also called lending or peer-to-peer crowdfunding), each with different platforms, audiences, regulatory rules, and obligations to the people contributing money. The right type for a startup depends entirely on what the company can offer in exchange.

Donation-based crowdfunding (GoFundMe, Fundly, Mightycause): backers contribute money to a person, cause, or project and receive nothing tangible in return. Best for nonprofits, social-impact ventures, and personal causes; rarely the right fit for for-profit startups. Reward-based crowdfunding (Kickstarter, Ind...

Go to Market Strategy

A go-to-market (GTM) strategy is the integrated plan for how a company will reach and acquire customers. It encompasses target segments (who we sell to), value proposition (what we sell), channels and motion (how we reach them), pricing and packaging (what we charge), sales and marketing investment (how we fund the motion), and success metrics (how we measure). The discipline is aligning these components into a coherent plan rather than letting each evolve independently and produce a fragmented approach that confuses customers and underperforms. It is the single most-important strategic document at most startups.

The core components:

Target customer segments:

• Specific segments the company will focus on (and which it w...

Revenue Model

A revenue model describes the mechanics of how a business generates revenue from its customers. It includes the pricing model (per-seat, usage-based, tiered), revenue type (recurring subscription, transactional, one-time, advertising), value capture mechanism (direct payment, marketplace take rate, advertising sponsorship), and customer payment terms (annual upfront, monthly, transactional). The revenue model is one of the most-defining choices a business makes because it determines unit economics, scalability, predictability, and capital requirements. It is the answer to "how does this business actually make money?" stated with enough specificity to inform financial modeling.

The main revenue model categories:

Subscription (S...

Sole Proprietorship

A sole proprietorship is the simplest US business structure, where a single owner operates a business without forming a separate legal entity. The status is automatic by default whenever one person does business in their own name without incorporating. All business profits and losses are reported on the owner's personal tax return (Schedule C), and the owner has full personal liability for all business debts and obligations. It is the default starting point for freelancers, consultants, and side-business operators, and the wrong structure for any business with meaningful liability exposure or growth ambition.

The advantages: no formation required (you're a sole proprietor automatically when you start doing business; no f...

Product-Market Fit

Product-market fit is the stage at which a startup has built a product that satisfies a strong market demand, evidenced by accelerating, sustainable customer adoption. The phrase was coined by Marc Andreessen in his 2007 blog post "The only thing that matters," where he argued that product-market fit is the single most important state in a startup's life.

Andreessen's original definition is direct: "Product-market fit means being in a good market with a product that can satisfy that market." It is the product-side analog to [Founder-Market Fit] on the team side. When you have it, customers buy the product as fast as you can build it. Usage and revenue grow without aggressive paid acquisition. Customers refer other custome...

Business Model Canvas

The Business Model Canvas is a one-page framework by Alex Osterwalder that maps nine building blocks of a business model on a single visual canvas. The blocks are customer segments, value propositions, channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, key activities, key partnerships, and cost structure. Popularized in Osterwalder's 2010 book "Business Model Generation," it facilitates strategic discussion, business model iteration, and team alignment around how the business actually creates and captures value. It is particularly useful for established companies exploring new business models, founders pre-launch thinking through their model, and strategic planning sessions, and it's one of the most wide...

There’s no such thing as a “retired Founder.”

Just one who hasn’t started their next company yet.

I love hearing about Founders that exit, but what I always find kind of entertaining is their story about how they will now finally retire. It’s always something like “I can finally put the stress of running this startup behind me and spend the rest of my days basking in the sun and enjoying life!”

My response is always the same: “That sounds awesome… call me when you want to talk about your next startup!”

They assume I’m being sarcastic. The idea of starting another startup after just finally selling one and prepping for retirement sounds ludicrous!

And yet, inevitably, I get the call. “You know, retirement actually sucks, so I’m thinking abou...