48-Hour Startup Cheatsheet

"48-Hour Startup" by Fraser Doherty

Fraser's Products:

One Weekend

Tell Everyone Your Ideas

Coming Up with an Idea

Inspiration

Read mainstream blogs like The Next Web, TechCrunch, Fast Company, Wired, Springwise, Trendsspotting, CoolHunting and PSFK

What's happening in the startup world:

Your Interests

  • Write a list of all the things you are interested in.
  • From that list, pick out a few things that you are particularly passionate about or interested in.

Problems

  • Identify the problems with your chosen things.

Business Models

  • Advertising: Google AdSense
  • Affiliate
  • Digital downloads: Books, Courses, Music, Film, Software, Font, etc.
  • Drop shipping
  • Ecommerce
  • Freemium
  • Manufacturing
  • Mobile apps
  • Self-publishing: Blurb
  • Social network
  • SaaS
  • Subscription

The Idea

  • Solve some of the problems identified using one or more of the business models.
  • Use GoogleTrends to see how the popularity of a given topic is changing over time.

A Journey of a Thousand Miles

  • Break down the entire process into a couple of tiny steps.
  • For managing to-do lists use online apps like Evernote, TeuxDeux, Mindjet, and Flow.

Talk to a Customer

  • What do they think of your idea?
  • What would they expect from your product?
  • What other types of products do they buy?

The Competition

  • What they do well?
  • What they do badly?

Ask An Expert

  • Clarity.fm: Contact experienced advisors and ask whatever you need.

The Four Ps

  1. Product - what am I selling?
  2. Promotion - how will I let my customers know I exist?
  3. Place - where will my customers find me?
  4. Price

The Product

  • ETSY.com: Allows to set up a shop front instantly to make your products available to customers worldwide.
  • Prototyping: Have a fully functional prototype version that can be shown to potential customers.
  • Alibaba: Allows to contact potential manufacturing partners.

Creating a Kick-Ass Brand

Take inspiration from great brands like:

  • Method: A US cleaning products maker company,
  • Dorset Cereals: A UK granola and muesli company,
  • and Innocent: A UK smoothie and fruit juice company.

Have One Message

Pick one good reason and put all your time and energy into trying to get that one message across.

Picking a Name

Use tools like:

  • BustAName: A tool to help find domain names.
  • NameStation: Pick the Perfect Name, Find available domains, hold name contests.

Register a domain name from major providers like GoDaddy.com.

If you have your heart set on buying a domain that someone else already owns, then:

  • check out domains in 'aftersales markets' like Sedo.com.
  • contact domain owners directly by searching for the domain name on the who.is website.

Trademarks

Ensure that you are not infringing on someone else's trademark by checking on sites like Intellectual Property Office’s website in UK and United States Patent and Trademark Office in US.

Writing a Strapline

'Strapline' (slogan) is a sentence that conveys the message a business wants to send its customers.

Steps:

  1. List all words related to your product.
  2. Try the combinations of these words.
  3. Pick one that is 'good enough' to start with.

Creating a Mood Board

Collect a few images that can be used while communicating with the designer.

Best sites to look for inspiration: Behance, TheDieline, Lovely Package, Designspiration, Dribble.

Good sites for beautiful free fonts: Fontfabric.com, LostType.com, and MyFonts.com. Fonts can be purchased from sites like YouWorkForThem.

Use Pinterest or Springpad.com to collect inspiration from different places in one place.

Hiring a Designer vs DIY

  • A well-designed logo and brand image are important to attract customers.
  • Be cautious when designing your brand yourself, as it may not do justice to your idea. Investing in professional design is recommended to ensure the brand's success.
  • Find a good designer through online platforms or by researching the designers behind brands that inspire you.
  • Be clear about your brand's message and trust the designer.
  • Break the project into steps with different payment stages.

Freelance Marketplaces

  • Freelancers can be found quickly through marketplaces like Upwork, YunoJuno, and Freelancer.
  • Be specific and upfront about the project brief, including the budget, to ensure a quick turnaround.
  • Finding a freelancer in a different time zone may also be helpful.
  • Have a clear deadline and priorities to ensure the freelancer can complete the project on time.

The Objective

  • Provide a clear and detailed brief to designers for creating effective designs.
  • Specify the target audience, design elements required, and any no-nos.

The Design Process

  • When working with designers/freelancers, use mood boards and provide all the necessary information upfront to ensure a quick turnaround.
  • Check-in with the freelancer regularly to avoid wasting time and money.

Dot.com from Day One

  • It is important to have a great website for any type of business.
  • It's possible to get a professional website online in under a day even without any website building knowledge.
  • Off-the-shelf website building services can be up and running quickly without incurring the expense and delay of custom-building.
  • Initially a good off-the-shelf service is better than building the perfect system from scratch. As the business grows, a better system can be built based on the customer's feedback.
  • Shopify (along with its vast collection of plug-ins) can be used to get the site off the ground in a matter of days.

What does your site need to do?

  • Define the purpose of a website.
  • Design it in a way that engages visitors and encourages them to take specific actions.
  • Create a wireframe, consider the visitor's journey through the site, address their questions and concerns, and use visual content like photography and video to communicate effectively.
  • Observe successful competitors' sites to learn from their design and optimization strategies.
  • The ultimate goal is to convert visitors into customers by creating a clear, engaging, and effective site.

Graze.com

  • Look for inspiration from successful subscription businesses like Graze.com.
  • Study the presentation of products on their website, their messaging, and their call-to-action buttons.
  • Analyze how they encourage their customers to invite their friends to sign up.
  • Use clear images and illustrations to explain "how the service works" to eliminate doubts in the customer's mind.
  • Display what the customer is going to get and pay for clearly on the homepage.
  • Use logos of featured newspapers and magazines to add credibility.
  • Optimize and improve the initial format of the website over time.

Creating a mock-up

  • Creating a mock-up can be helpful in planning the basic features and layout of your site.
  • Balsamiq Mockups is a simple tool for creating wireframes that allows you to play around with site maps and individual page layouts.

Do-It-Yourself vs Hiring a web developer

  • If your idea is simple, you can build a website yourself without needing much knowledge of coding, software, or web development.

Some DIY services:

  • Shopify provides a basic template for creating a professional-looking website and allows you to integrate apps for advertising, customer service, referrals, and more.
  • SquareSpace is ideal for creating a simple, beautiful few pages quickly.
  • Strikingly specializes in creating one-page sites, which are great for promoting digital products like iPhone apps and eBooks.

Finding Your First Customer


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