Do small startups still have a chance, or do people just pretend to like them? | Hacker News Reader

Do small startups still have a chance, or do people just pretend to like them?

Do small startups still have a chance, or do people just talk positively about them while continuing to use sites like facebook and linkedin and expecting perfect polish? For example, I started www.nextcept.com a few months ago as a venture network. I'm focusing on a unique method for co-founder discovery, and users seem pretty pumped, but if I post in various startup communities I get told I'm spamming them even when I'm just asking to for thoughts or wanting to talk about my project.

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> but if I post in various startup communities I get told I'm spamming them even when I'm just asking to for thoughts or wanting to talk about my project.

IMHO, startup communities are the worst. Most of the great startups I know avoid those communities, and are usually already a part of 500 Startups or YC.

It's also really common in these communities to post nothing of value. Everyone asks for opinions, takes a month to post a landing page, talks about an upcoming huge launch, repeats this once a month.

As a result, they get very jaded and cynical, the exact opposite of what entrepreneurs should be.

If only all that it took to get product market fit was to post in a startup forum / group. It's really hard to figure out who your customer is, how to effectively target them and how to move them through the funnel.

It sounds like you think you know who you want to target and think you know the value you provide them. I'd encourage you to try to make your first few sales manually, before trying to tackle the channel acquisition problem. You can't scale a channel before you know who to target and how to sell to them.

Good luck!

I don't think people pretend to like startups. People like to have their problems solved, and it's hard to gain their attention when everyone is clamoring for attention.

This is anecdotal, but I found it much easier to tweet something to someone 8 years ago, and get some feedback. Now, you're lucky if you get a response back.

People don't care about startups OR big companies.

People want their problems solved.

I don't care about size of a startup and whether it is startup or not.

I care about the quality of the product and support

They have a chance; of getting acquired.

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