The future of building startups.

How to start a startup

Startup

$1M+ revenue per employee
MVP speed (1x per month)
AI-accelerated
Superniche is the new niche
Community 1st, software 2^nd
No-code 1st, some code 2^nd
10^x more automated
Global teams, localized products
Pop-up digital experiences (apps that only work on certain times)
Needs the marketing holy-trinity to hit escape velocity: 1. product/market fit, 2. content/market fit and 3. community/market fit
Team is half robots, half humans
Accelerated by "boring marketing"
Multiple revenue streams
Design matters. The bar is high
Partnered w/ creators (creators are the distribution)
Feels like a game (levels, status, badges, in-app currency, challenges, collectibles/items)
Purpose-driven moonshots: societal impact matters
Product studios become the norm
99% of MVPs won't need VC

The future of building startups

Write it down.

You are 42% more likely to achieve your goals if you write them down.
In a Harvard study:

84% of people had no goals.
13% had unwritten goals.
3% wrote down goals.

The 3% were 3x more likely to succeed than those with unwritten goals.

Be honest with yourself.
You don't achieve your goals:

Daily
Weekly
Monthly
Annually

You're not alone.
94% of people don't achieve their goals.
That ends for you after you read this.

Eisenhower's Matrix.

Dwight Eisenhower was the definition of productive and once said:
I'll have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important.
The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent."
Stephen Covey repackaged it as the Eisenhower Matrix:

Buffett's rule of 5/25.

To be as productive as Warren Buffett, follow this rule:

Write down your top 25 goals in order.
Focus on the first five goals.
Eliminate the other 20.
25 goals are too many to focus on.

Discipline yourself to focus on the important goals.

Eat the frog first.

Brain Tracy said, "If it's your job to eat a frog, it's best to do it first thing in the morning."
The Eisenhower Matrix told you what to focus on and you need to focus on it first.
Start your day with your most important task.

Deep focus blocks.

When you eat the frog, you need time to do it.
A deep focus block is a time you set aside to work on your urgent & important tasks:

Turn off distractions.
Listen to classical music.
Choose a high-energy time of day.

Pomodoro technique.

Outside of your deep focus blocks, use the Pomodoro technique:

Break your available time into 25-minute chunks.
Take a 5-minute break (Pomodoro) between each chunk.
Every four Pomodoros take a longer 30-minute break.
The Pomodoro technique also helps with ADHD.

Parkinson's Law.

Never give yourself too much time.
Work expands to fill the time available to complete it.
If you give yourself more time you'll use it but won't do a better job.
Instead, always choose timelines that will challenge you to succeed.

5-minute rule.

Discipline > Motivation
You aren't always going to want to do the work, whatever the work is.
Choose to do it for 5 minutes each day:

Run
Read
Write

Work-out

If you start, you won't stop.
That 5-minutes will become 20, 30, or more.