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What Does Being A 'Startup Founder' Mean to Me?
Over the last few months that I’ve been building my startup (ServiceChat – a platform to help businesses have better conversations with their customers on Twitter) – this topic has been my constant companion. I am continuously discovering what it means to me to be a founder. There is no job description, no employee […]
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Lessons from why my startup failed: Know your mind.
I ceased work on ServiceChat – the startup that I have been working on for six months. It might not seem that long to you, but to me it is a very long time of illusions and self discovery. My learning from why ServiceChat didn’t go where I had ambitions for it to go will […]
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August 3: I Failed. Do, Learn, Adapt and Repeat Differently.
I am mothballing my ServiceChat startup experiment. After six months, I have to admit to myself that ServiceChat has no legs. People who I thought should be interested are not and actually trying to find people interested is proven too difficult for my abilities. The lack of interest is itself great feedback – if […]
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July 18: A Mixed Bag
Not sure what to make of this week. It’s a bit like being in the Tom Hanks movie ‘The Terminal’. I’m stuck but actually while I’m in this state of suspension there are really interesting things happening, but mostly I’m still stuck. Unlike Tom Hanks, my becoming unstuck is in my hands, I just don’t […]
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July 12: Traction not tractors
Traction is vital, getting early customers to commit to using what I’m offering is very important. Both are vital and important for my finances and startup growth, sure – but mostly for my sanity. I’m a maker and an artist. I make the art that is in my head. Many of the things I make […]
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July 9 – Back away from the code, slowly.
Every passing day re-affirms my fear. I have to back away from the code, close the IDE – quit doing what I love doing and start doing the other thing. You know – the other thing, the hitting-the-phone, sell-your-vision, learn-the-problems, discover-your-customers, dine-with-rejection-and-unreturned-emails thing, you know Customer Development! Now, I have a world of love […]
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July 8 – Working hard, differently
My last post was about 2 weeks ago and you might have wondered where I disappeared to. Well, I’ll tell you. I was feeling very disheartened about the lack of traction with ServiceChat. So I took some time away from ServiceChat – maintaining focus when you are down is hard, but it is […]
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June 26 – Disheartened
I’m sitting here not really wanting to do anything else but code. I know it’s wrong – I’ve built something I passionately believe is valuable but not getting to even talk to the people I believe it is valuable for is deeply disheartening. It doesn’t mean ServiceChat isn’t valuable (I honestly don’t have enough data […]
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An Experiment for Good.
This weekend I’m taking a break from ServiceChat. I’ll hang out with my family and go to some friends on Saturday for a BBQ and on Sunday, we’ll head to Salobreña for our first San Juan celebration (no , I don’t really know what it is either!). This weekend also, I want to try […]
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June 20 – Mikey's back!
The last 13 days Q: Does a daily blog have to be done every day? A: Not when it’s @mhsutton’s blog – obviously. So much has happened in the last 13 days, I don’t really know where to start. I’ve been away because I’ve been a little discouraged with the progress of ServiceChat (no, I […]