Who needs help raising venture capital in 2024?
Entrepreneur Office Hours - Issue #212
It’s a new year, which is a great excuse to start making some changes around here. That begins with a simple tweak to how I’m titling each issue. Yes, you’re still reading Entrepreneur Office Hours Issue #212, but you’ll notice the title (and email subject line) is more descriptive so you’ll better know what to expect.
That’s a minor change. The bigger change is that, based on reader feedback, I’m working on providing more “current content” and more “actionable resources.”
By “current content,” I mean more analysis and discussion of the current business/entrepreneurial climate. For example, if the fundraising market is shifting, or if Apple releases a new, game-changing device, I’ll explore those kinds of things and, more importantly, examine how they might impact entrepreneurs and startups.
By “actionable resources,” I mean that I got tons of great responses last year to things like my mini-course and live classes. Clearly, you all need more than just articles about startups. You need resources that can help build your companies, so that’s what I’m going to try and provide.
Look for things like classes, webinars, worksheets, coaching sessions, meetups, and anything else I can think of that can hopefully bring meaningful value to the thousands of entrepreneurs in this community.
On that note, I’m kicking things off by sharing a link to a workshop I’m helping run for entrepreneurs trying to raise their first round of outside capital in 2024.
It’s a free, 3 hour workshop specifically targeted at entrepreneurs looking to raise a six or seven-figure round of financing in 2024. It’s being led by a good friend out in Austin. She’s amazing and an expert in helping seed-stage companies get their first rounds of capital, which I know a lot of you need.
Spoiler alert: There’s also talk of her hosting an in-person event that I’ll be at, so, if you’re interested, sign up for the workshop, and I’ll look forward to seeing you all there.
In the mean time, you’ll find my usual collection of articles I’ve shared and questions I’ve answered. Read them all below as we get started on an exciting 2024.
-Aaron
The MVP Is Dead — How to Avoid Wasting 6 Months Building a Crappy Version of Your Final Product
Lean Startup and the idea of building MVPs was a great first step toward better startup efficiency, but it didn’t go far enough.
The Key Ingredient to Success Most Founders Tragically Overlook
Great entrepreneurs are great for the same reason, but it’s not always obvious from the outside.
Office Hours Q&A
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QUESTION:
Dear Aaron,
I'm exploring a startup idea for an AI-powered productivity app. Before investing lots of time in developing an MVP, I know I need to validate demand. What are your best tips for creating landing pages on a budget to test core value propositions? What key elements and metrics should I focus on for the landing page to maximize learning? What common mistakes do you see entrepreneurs make when creating their first landing page? Any guidance would be hugely appreciated as I start down the path of testing my startup idea with potential users.
Thank you for your advice,
Martin
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First, I love that you realize you need to validate demand before building any sort of MVP. (I even wrote an article about that exact topic this week that you can find linked above!)
While I appreciate you’re trying to build landing pages to validate the idea, I find myself wondering if landing pages are still too much. After all, even if you build landing pages you’re still going to need to drive traffic at them.
Rather than imagining a product and building an imaginary website for it, I suggest going even higher in the funnel and trying to simply build an audience around AI. For example, can you make a TikTok account exploring popular AI productivity tools? Can you start publishing Medium articles about the AI industry? Even Threads seems to have a thriving AI discussion community.
In other words, don’t just be concerned about wasting time building an MVP. Be concerned about wasting time envisioning a product before you know you can reach people who might be interested in it.
Thanks to social media, you don’t need a product to capture an audience. How can you capture an audience interested in AI productivity? Once you have that audience, you’ll be able to figure out what they want and then deliver them the exact AI productivity tool they want.
Got startup questions of your own? Reply to this email with whatever you want to know, and I’ll do my best to answer!
