9 practical hacks you need to know for your start up

I am a startup founder and have been running my venture – TotSmart Education for the past 3 years. Over this period, our startup has evolved and we’ve built a business around it with 400 paying customer schools. In 2016, we were adjudged the best edtech startup in the country by Unitus Seed Fund.

In this post I am capturing my learning thus far in the form of easy tips which new/prospective entrepreneurs can benefit from.

So, here are my 9 practical hacks you need to know for your start up

Pro Tip – Looking to fund-raise in this environment? Read this list backwards

1. Business Idea – Aim for >10x improvement. Be it cost, ease, benefit – think 10x. Incremental benefits often don’t make it big. Simple because there are far too many players who can compete. We at TotSmart initially faced lot of resistance with customers since they perceived our Game & Video based learning system to be similar to dozens of other apps. It was extremely difficult to convince them about our differentiation. But when we showed unique improvements in learning owing to personalization, perceptions changed. 10x vs Incremental, go for 10x. It requires lot more thinking. See how super successful entrepreneurs think about it, here.

2.Don’t Assume. We often startup because we see some need/opportunity and we feel we can serve it and build a business around it. However, key is to understand the entire scenario. Lot of folks ignore this bit. When we went into Publishing, we assumed channel margins to be universally in the range of 20-25%. However, we soon realized that for new entrants this figure was 60%+. Deep and holistic research is mandatory. Either you do it before hand or be ready to learn things the hard way.

3. Team – They say build an ‘A’ team. That’s the most difficult thing to do for an Entrepreneur (Reasons – money, venture stage etc). However, there are ways and means to get the right people working with you. Mostly this requires the founder to hustle & tap into various networks for good people. You may get a full time, a part time, a weekend employee or worst case scenario – a referral. We hired many teachers this way – some were working with big schools and agreed to help, while some other had spare capacity like a former teacher on an extended maternity break. ‘Hustle’ is the word. Don’t ever stop doing it.

4. Tech – Is your venture tech dependent and you are the business guy? If yes, DO NOT start till the time you have a full time tech cofounder. I started with outsourcing (my project was complex) and it soon became evident that it won’t work. Good agencies are super expensive and cheap ones are often incompetent. Plus at startups you need to be agile and need to iterate quickly. It just doesn’t happen without a full time & capable employee. You can get creative and get a part-time or remote CTO. It is better than outsourced tech agency, but is still not optimum enough. A good capable aligned full time tech cofounder is an ASSET. It may cost a kidney or two, but it is worth it.

5. Have deadlines & follow them – When you do not have periodic management reviews, tasks keep getting delayed. For each thing, you must have a deadline with a clear fall back option. For e.g. – if we don’t get 10 paid B2B customers by XYZ date, we will slash rates by 50% or if we don’t raise funding by XYZ date we will shut shop. Who said, being an Entrepreneur was easy and you could run away from stupid management reviews? Now you are the management. Embrace.

6. Don’t be a miser – In the name of frugality, we often become misers. You must invest in things which are critical. Be it your Brand, Logo, Trademark or staff, spend freely and adequately where it is needed. A good customer experience would go a long way, even if it costs you that 50K extra upfront to create. Our first outsourced tech agency & first designer were both cheap vs market rates. I saw them as mini victories. However, I soon realized my losses; after all, paying below market price for a crap output, is never a great strategy.

7. Accelerators/Incubators – As you hunt for funds & apply to startup competitions, you will find lot of interest from Accelerators & Incubators. These people will approach you like flies flock to a honey pot. However, beware. Most of these people are those with spare real estate & hence a co-working space. They do not know anything about startups. You should rather look for people who have a track record & have delivered time and again as incubators & accelerators.

8. PR – Must be done, pronto! Doesn’t matter what business you are in, consistent PR/Publicity is a must. It helps you get customers, investors, advisors, employees and even partners. There are 3 easy ways to get this publicity:

a) Connections @media houses – Locate, leverage & get published. Once published, shamelessly share it all across. There is no reason why your Grandma shouldn’t share it with her WhatsApp friends. Smaller/Vernacular publications are easier to find vs bigger ones. We got this for our startup. Also, one leads to another and you get lucky with genuine coverage, like this TOI coverage for us.

b) Enter & Win Startup competitions – We won a competition and got lot of coverage automatically. See this.

c) Become panelists @startup events as per your expertise – Here is what I do sometimes. Again free PR by people who matter. TIE Delhi in our case.

9. Fundraise –First things first – Get a super sexy Pitch Deck created. Covering all the points that are covered here. Also take care of these things – Guy’s 10 slider for startups. Now look for connections in the investor community and circulate. Else apply through their sites. Carpet bombing is the key here. If you are lucky and business is super awesome, you don’t need to read what follows.

Get a collateral free loan for Rs 10 lacs from any PSU bank. Under GoI’s Mudra Scheme
Get a collateral free loan for upto Rs 1 Cr under CGTMSE. Read here

I find lot of startup founders, who end up shutting down promising startups owing to cash crunch. If funding requires another 3 months, then these two can be lifesavers. Obviously there is an Interest component to this, so use wisely. But you can always go back to job and repay this amount.