Thread by @Daniel_Kyne, One year ago, @dazoflah and I went all in on our startup [...]

One year ago, @dazoflah and I went all in on our startup @myOpinionX.

Since then, we’ve both finished college, made our first two hires, onboarded 100+ users & facilitated 80,000 votes

Here are some of my biggest learnings so far as a first time startup founder. (THREAD)

[Customer discovery is key]

In the early days, there are few things that return as much value as time spent on customer discovery.

We’ve spent about 120hrs since September alone learning about our target user’s day-to-day. It’s behind every good decision we’ve made

[The impact of good mentors]

There are times where it’s felt like we were buried in advice

The best mentors spend their time asking you questions instead of saying what to do. They dig through your interview transcripts to help you find answers. They are invaluable

[The impact of good mentors] There are times where it’s felt like we were buried in advice The best mentors spend their time asking you questions instead of saying what to do. They dig through your interview transcripts to help you find answers. They are invaluable

[Onboarding is really hard]

We really underestimated the importance of onboarding at the start

Onboarding has been our entire focus since October and the impact produced by small informed improvements to onboarding is crazy. Be inquisitive & open to changing your mind!

[Every product choice is deliberate]

In a lot of ways, the early-stage startup process is a series of decisions one after the other.

We’ve learned the hard way sometimes (time lost) that every decision carries real impact & there’s nobody to delegate the uncomfortable ones to

[Avoid feature focus]

This feels really counter intuitive at first. Surely we should talk about all our great features, no? No!

We’ve room to improve, but we’re getting more comfortable talking about the beautiful world our product enables rather than what’s under the hood

[Nothing beats excited customers]

The energy you get from users that love your product is incomparable (not to mention the referral!)

We’ve been lucky to have had the most amazing pilot customers this year. @christinef10 @helenfullen @OisinH1 @carinaginty - thank you!

[Good hires have exponential impact]

I really didn’t understand this before we brought @EamonCullen1 and Eoin onto the team a few months ago.

Their energy, fresh perspective and extra set of hands changed everything. I’m thankful every day they joined us on this journey

[Work through the ‘mind-melters’]

Seemingly impasse problems can generally be solved with a fresh pair of eyes & a whiteboard session

We’ve had some weeks where it seems like things just won’t fit together. Set a few hours aside, bring everyone together and work through it

[Research is changing fast]

It’s really exciting working on an emerging space. User research is evolving so quickly that many aspects are still undefined.

We might feel like rookies sometimes, but we’re going be part of defining this new space. And that’s exciting

[Hearing no can be good]

We spent a lot of this year on customer discovery calls with segments that weren’t a fit.

Doing call after call with people that feel a strong pain but won’t change feels frustrating - but those no’s are a runway leading you in the right direction

[Saying no can be great]

if you’re not good at this, find yourself a co-founder that is!

@dazoflah constantly helps keep me on the right track, avoiding feature creep to please any random person willing to pay us with their time or money.

[There’s so much knowledge out there]

We always separate challenges into solved vs unsolved problems. Nearly every challenge has been solved.

Read great newsletters ( @lennysan), listen to the experienced ( @BostonVC), join communities ( @productledinc). Don’t reinvent the wheel

[Support networks are vital]

having a solid team is so important for keeping moral and motivation up, but there’s something different about an external support network.

Talking to other founders is such a simple way to realise that you’re not alone in struggling sometimes.

[Self-doubt is normal]

had a laugh about this recently with @cindrellastella. The idea that founders have unwavering self-belief is bs.

There are times you wake up & wonder if you’re capable of accomplishing this. You are. And you’re no less capable for having thought that