Read This if you Think You Don’t Need an Accelerator
11 Reasons Founders Give Not to Apply, and Why They’re Wrong.
“We need Investors, not an Accelerator”
Is money really the only blocker for you, going forward? If it were, then raising investment should be incredibly easy. But money doesn’t buy growth. It buys time.
Skills, knowledge, a network, and solid execution bring growth. 3 months at StartupYard is like 3 years in normal life when it comes to those factors. And during that time, you’ll develop as a company so that when you do sit down with investors, it will be them trying to convince you, instead of the other way around.
“We need €300K+ and you only offer €20K”
Why do you need €300K? Is it to develop your product, find potential customers, grow your knowledge base, and gain traction? Well, here’s some good news: the €20k we offer isn’t the attraction. It’s the ability to do all of that faster, smarter, and cheaper, and to gain access to investors who won’t return your calls now. Seed investors want to fuel growth. They want to put gasoline on a fire. StartupYard is where you start the fire. Are you already on fire? If so, we won’t waste your time.
“We Know What We’re Doing”
Then surely, don’t read this list. You’ve got better things to do! Turning down investors, hiring sales and marketing people, scaling up to meet growing demand- all the things a company does when they know what they are doing.
Well, if you’re not doing those things yet, consider this: why hasn’t that happened yet? How can it happen sooner? If you aren’t sure what the answers are, then we’d love to talk to you.
“You’re cute but we’re aiming for Y-Combinator”
You’re cute too. You know who went to Y-Combinator? Drew Houston of Dropbox. You know who got rejected the first time he applied to Y-Combinator? Also Drew Houston of Dropbox. You know who else went to Y-Combinator? Brian Chesky of AirBnB, also initially rejected from Y-C.
The question you should ask yourself is: if Y-Combinator is the key to your future, how are you going to get there? Y-Combinator cares about one thing: traction. Do you have a lot of it? Do you know where it will come from? The good news is that Y-Combinator knows StartupYard very well, and attending StartupYard is seen, at places like Y-C and TechStars, as important traction.
“We Don’t Have Time for an Accelerator”
What are you going to be doing in the next 3 months that’s more productive than taking 100 meetings with potential customers, investors, and industry experts with unparalleled connections in business?
Show us the plan that brings more long-term value to your company than that, and we’ll agree, you don’t have time for us. In 10 years and 92 startups, not one has ever said that StartupYard was a waste of time.
“We already have some customers”
Are you growing by 15-20% per month? Startups don’t die because they can’t find any customers, or because they can’t make products people want. They die waiting for the right customers to discover them.
But our startups don’t die waiting. BudgetBakers, for example, joined us in 2015 with a handful of paying customers. Today the company is growing rapidly, with over 1.6 million downloads, thousands of paying customers, and several high level partnerships. The team credits StartupYard with their turnaround to this day.
“We’ve Been through an Incubator”
Great. We’re not an incubator, and you’ll be able to appreciate the difference.
Being in an incubator is like standing at a bus stop. You’re waiting for your bus to come. StartupYard is like being behind the wheel of a bus going 200km/h, having never driven one before.
“We Don’t Want Anyone to Steal Our Idea”
You’re worrying about the wrong thing. Your ideas will be copied, if they’re good, so the only way you’re going to be able to survive is to get there faster, be wiser, and execute better than anyone else. You need a network that enables you to get there first. That’s what StartupYard helps you do.
Nobody wins in this business by being secretive. Neither will you.
“We feel it would be a step back”
A step back from what?
“Aren’t we too advanced already?”
Do you have a rapidly growing global business, selling a product unmatched by your competitors, where your only problem is the inability to hire new people fast enough to keep up with rising demand?
If so, then yes. You are too advanced for StartupYard.
“Accelerators are for kids and university students”
The average age of a StartupYard founder is around 30. Among our alumni are a Harvard lecturer, MBAs, engineers, a rocket scientist, PHD candidates in computer and data science, and 15+ year management-level veterans of major tech corporations like DHL, Accenture, Seznam, Avast, and Coca-Cola.
We invest in people who have invested heavily in themselves. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist, but we do know a rocket scientist who would strongly recommend our program.
“We’re going for an ICO”
Congratulations. That’s potentially a very interesting way of raising money. We’re not against it.
Tell us though, once you have the money, what will you do with it? Do you already have a deep network of mentors in high places that are going to help you gain credibility, and customers, and strategic partners?
The failure rate of post-ICO startups is probably going to be even higher than for startups generally. Raising lots of money never solves the basic business issues we all face.
What Our Alumni Have to Say about StartupYard
StartupYard is proud to be GAN, a highly curated community of accelerators, partners, and investors.
Meet AstraKode Blockchain: A Visual Editor for Process Data Tracing
/in Interviews, Startups, StartupYard News/by StartupYardMeet NameSpace: The Web3 Identity Provider for the Digital Generation
/in Interviews, Life at an Accelerator, StartupYard News/by StartupYardMeet Wiselli: The Future of Direct Marketing
/in Interviews, Life at an Accelerator, StartupYard News/by StartupYardMeet Puulse: The Real-Time Payment Platform for the Gig Economy
/in Interviews, Life at an Accelerator, Startups, StartupYard News/by StartupYardMeet Feedyou: The Conversational AI Platform to Build Better Relationships With Customers and Employees
/in Interviews, Life at an Accelerator, Startups, StartupYard News/by StartupYardMeet InvestBay: The tokenization platform that brings fractional investment and hassle-free ownership into real estate.
/in Interviews, Startups, StartupYard News/by StartupYard