Website Down…A good Startup sign, maybe?
I tried visiting IconFinder this afternoon only to be welcomed by the following message.
“The hosting of this site can’t handle this much traffic. The site is still in beta and we’re currently moving this service to a better host. Thanks for your patience.”
Ah, such sweet words. Alas…You have built it, and they have come. It’s time to scale up. As a startupper, this is what you have been waiting for. Time to drop the “beta” from your product name and go play with the big boys. The moment to ride the wave that will catapult you to the next level.
Interestingly enough, you have also arrived at the junction where most startups fail. Scale up too fast and your fixed costs will come back to bite you harder than you think. Scale up too slowly, and you will die a Friendster-like death. Some common mistakes you can avoid:
- Don’t lose sight of your 5 year plan: What!! You don’t have a 5 year plan. I am sorry, thank you for playing.
- Hire Smart: You are not Google. Get rid of the personal chef and masseuse. Only hire people that will either write code or increase your user community.
- Listen to your users: Don’t develop version 2.0 without your users. Have them drive your enhancements and new features.
- Revisit your revenue model: Project. Revisit. Project. Revisit. Project. Revisit. Still on track? Good.
- Fear your competition: They were founded on the principle of offering your customers what you don’t. A little complacency and you will join the ranks of what Friendster is to social networks, Yahoo! to internet search, GeoCities is to….well, you get the point.
- And lastly, Evangelize: You are an entrepreneur. You embarked on this path because you had a vision (what, no vision…go back to 1). No Person you hire can sell your company better than you can. As my ex-boss always used to say, “Sell! Sell! Sell!”.
Now back to my friends at IconFinder. I am hoping that they come back online quick lest I should turn to IconsGalore for my “iconic” needs.
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