9 Startup Lessons I Learned

My recent 5 months have been filled with the struggles of an entrepreneur as I worked with my partner, Travis (Trav for short), on Epic Day Outdoors. We’ve gone through many iterations of the ‘business’ and just around the end of the year we parted ways (I use quotations here because we never technically made any money). We separated amicably and it’s for the best. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to put in the time he was going to in the coming months, and throughout the entire process we’ve put our friendship above the business.

All that being said, it was not in vain. We both learned a number of lessons from this enterprise and the experience we gained was worth well more than the time and money we invested. Here is a compilation of startup lessons learned over the past 5 months from Trav and me.

1.) Pivoting

When we first started I wanted to strangle him for changing his mind every other day, or so it seemed. We’d make headway, then we’d change direction. We’d have a breakthrough, then we’d see a roadblock and pivot. We’d talk about strategy, then we’d go the opposite path. I was frustrated, but in hindsight this is what we needed to do. If you’re starting a business (or you have a business), don’t be afraid to cut your losses and move to the next project if what you’re doing doesn’t make sense. If we had stuck with all the things we pivoted from, we’d have wasted more time and money than we did. I had to learn to go more with the flow and be open to change.

2.) Remote Work is Difficult

We realized quickly that communication was key for us and since we live in different states, we had some obstacles to overcome. If we were going to make anything worthwhile happen, we would need to be in constant communication with each other. We G-chatted, we used Google Hangouts, we’d text, and we’d talk on the phone every day to make sure we were on the same page. And that still wasn’t enough.

Remote work is great, but for what we were doing we needed hyper-communication. I think remote work can (and should) be used as often as possible, but there are just some situations that need face-to-face communication. Had we been more stable and known our end goal(s), we would have been more successful with our remote work.

3.) Outsourcing

I had always heard and read about outsourcing and the powers of internet, but I’d never experimented with them until we needed help at Epic Day. I played with websites like Fiverr.com for logos, social media help, and even key word research with some great results (most of the time). I learned that I can get help on things quickly and inexpensively if I just go look for it.

4.) Goal Setting

Yes, I write about goal setting and I preach it all the time, but we slipped away from this towards the end of our run and it was obvious how much it affected it. I learned the importance of keeping those goals right in front of us. We lost track of them after a while because we thought we were OK without them, WRONG. Be sure to keep your goals right in front of you all the time so you know what you’re working for each day!

5.) Transparency

Trav and I came into this as open as possible. We laid all our cards out on the table and there was never any questioning of what the other person was doing or what they had in mind. We did our best to be open and honest with each other and as a result we had very few, if any, squabbles (heated debates, maybe).

When we operate with full transparency, we are able to move faster. There is no question of what the others know about, it’s all on the table to begin with and we don’t have any secrets.

6.) Podcasting

I learned how to record and produce a podcast, and it wasn’t that difficult for us to get 13 episodes strung together. This was for the two of us to get together and recap our thoughts and major happenings each week. It was an experiment that became part of our weekly communication and helped us get on the same page more often than not. If you are into that sort of thing, check it out here on iTunes.

7.) There Are No Handouts

As I came into this, I didn’t know how to do a lot of things: start an email campaign, produce a podcast, pay for promotions on StumbleUpon, etc. etc. etc. And more importantly, nobody was going to teach me.

Fortunately, we live in an age where anything you want to find is on the internet. Every other video on YouTube is a “how-to” guide of some sort and every blogger in the world has a site they want you to come learn from. If you want to find out how to do something, there is no excuse, it’s on the internet. I know that no matter what I do next, I’ll always be able to find a way to do it (or improve it) and this venture helped me discover that truth.

8.) Start Small & Build It

As cliche as it sounds, Rome wasn’t built in a day. And neither was Epic Day. Trav and I are confident that his next version of the product, EpicDay.tv, will be the best one yet. And it’s taken us this long to noodle through, as he would say, to this rendition of the product. But this is his baby now, and it’s his to focus on and build from here. We’ve started from scratch and he’s got to constantly add to the product to make it something special. Seth Godin says “showing up is underrated” and Trav has to follow that now, he’s got to show up each week to make his product better.

9.) You’ll Never Know if You Don’t Try

We learned to put ourselves out there. I talked about facing challenges a few days ago and this is exactly what I meant. If we never would have tried, we never would have learned all this. If we would have let our fear of failure get the best of us, we never would have put ours butts on the line like this. Fear is going to happen, it’s about how we face it that defines us. We didn’t back down and we’ve been rewarded with very valuable, applicable lessons that we can take into any new situation.

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How can you apply these lessons to your situation? Leave a comment below or chat with me on social media about what you took from this, I’d love to hear from you.

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Have a great weekend!