If you are about to start a startup, venture development and a new technology business or if you are trying to grow your existing startup, this content may be for you. In this content, you can get answers to the questions we support with artificial intelligence, you will be able to access the information you need during growth and development, from the process of getting investment to building a team, calculating metrics and many more. If you are ready, let’s start our content that we dream you will grow your startup!
What is startup?
A startup is a venture established with scalable business models that have the potential to grow quickly with limited resources.
Startups are founded by small teams of people with innovative ideas, often trying to grow through technology. To build startups, high technology and high effort are applied instead of high costs.
How to Find Startup Ideas?
Finding ideas and developing a new innovation while developing a startup is of course a discipline in itself. There are situations that we need to think about and consider at this idea stage. In 3 steps, we will try to inspire by conveying them.
Team Capability – Feasibility
When finding startup ideas, the suitability of the team to the idea we find is the main point. For an idea to be truly successful, the team that makes it must know the sector in which the idea is located, the product to be created very well and be a good practitioner. For example, a team that has never been an aircraft engineer cannot be expected to produce vehicles such as iha and siha, and a team that dreams of developing artificial intelligence should have data analysis experts. In order to create your own idea, you need to make sure that the idea and the team are well matched and that you have the right team to realize the idea.
The Right Time
The biggest factor in successful ideas is time. Being able to realize the right idea at the right time is a very valuable factor in the growth of today’s ideas. For example, “Apple” was founded at the time of the first computers and “Tesla” was founded at the time of the development of electric vehicles. You need to make sure that your idea is realized at the right time.
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Product – Market Fit
The product and service you develop must have a market value. Customers are expected to want that product, desire it and be motivated to buy it immediately at the price you want. If you are making an expensive product with almost the same features as your competitors in the sector, you may have difficulty in product-market fit. In order to achieve product-market fit, you need to match the benefit you provide with the price you charge and have areas where you are superior to your competitors. For example, although BİM does not offer a quality store experience like Migros, it has achieved product-market fit with its price point and its availability in many areas.
What are Startup Business Models?
When establishing a startup, following certain business models and fulfilling the requirements of business models can facilitate all growth and development processes. Business models such as marketplace, controlled marketplace, SaaS, e-commerce, advertising-oriented growth are among the models generally used by startups.
Marketplace Model
The marketplace model brings together buyers and sellers, those looking for something and those offering that product or service. For example, in the Food Basket application, restaurants and those who order food are brought together, and in the Armut application, service providers and those who want to receive services are brought together.
Controlled Marketplace Model
This is a verticalized and principled marketplace model with many successful examples today. For example, on Airbnb, you can rent any house and stay at a certain standard. With Uber, you can get a chauffeured car service with a certain standard.
SaaS Business Model
In a SaaS business model, sales are made through monthly or annual subscriptions. For example, Spotify is both a music platform and a SaaS business model. We pay with a monthly subscription. SAP is a SaaS model where we manage our business, Netflix is a SaaS business model with content.
E-Commerce Business Model
It is a business model where orders are received over the internet. While Amazon and Trendyol are examples of e-commerce business models, business models such as Themeforest that sell online products and images developed by others are startups that work with both a marketplace platform and an e-commerce business model.
Ad Driven Growing Business Model
Business models that grow only through advertising can also grow rapidly in the digital world. YouTube is a platform where content produced around the world is uploaded and generates revenue through advertising. Media sites, news sites are examples of business models that grow with advertising.
How to Build a Startup?
There is no fundamental difference between building a startup and building a venture. But the venture model we call a startup contains technology or strong innovation because it needs to be scalable. Startup teams should be teams that can do this. For this reason, having the product or software ready, preparing the first version of the product, called M.V.P., is one of the things to be done to establish a startup.
How to Establish Startup Teams?
Teams are expected to be strong when establishing a startup. A startup can be established alone. In the startup ecosystem, one-person startups are usually not very successful. Because startups are structures that require strong competitors and strong effort. Organizations with the right task distribution of teams are much more successful.
How to Find a Team and Partner? What to Pay Attention to?
Many factors and factors should be taken into consideration when creating a team while establishing a startup.
- Skills and experience: Having team members with different skills and experiences will help you create an ecosystem that can cover different aspects of your project and work together.
- Communication and teamwork skills: The ability of team members to communicate effectively and work as a team enables them to work together efficiently. It is important to build a team that can work well with each other and exchange ideas.
- Passion and motivation: Team members’ passion and motivation for the project is important for long-term success. Building a team that is focused on a common goal and truly believes in the project ensures that things move forward and challenges are overcome.
- Leadership and role distribution: A good team should be led by a person with leadership skills. The leader organizes, directs and motivates team members. It is also important to properly distribute tasks and responsibilities within the team.
- Diversity and cohesion: Having team members with different perspectives, cultural backgrounds and ways of thinking helps to generate creative and innovative ideas. But creating a cohesive team also makes it easier to work together.
- Flexibility and adaptability: Changes are inevitable in the entrepreneurial journey. It is important that team members have the ability to be flexible, make quick decisions and adapt to changing circumstances.
Can a Startup be Founded without a Software Developer?
Of course, this question is invalid if startups are not software-oriented, but since they are usually technology-developing businesses, the most accurate fiction known to the ecosystem is that there should be a software developer team among the co-founders. Developing products and developing software with a brand new innovation requires a lot of labor, effort and a lot of testing. In order to develop these products, it can be very difficult for the software developer to create the product with external support without a co-founder. For this reason, the general opinion is that technology startups cannot be successful without a team of software developers and product developers.
How many people should a startup team consist of?
In general, the number of people in a startup team cannot be clearly determined. It can be shaped according to the needs of the product or service to be developed and innovation. The general opinion is that teams should be designed with one person in product development software, one person in marketing and sales, and one person in investment and finance. Today, there are dozens of startups that are successful with 5 or more co-founders who have come together in different ways and that have achieved great things with 2 people.
How Do Startups Get Angel Investment?
Angel investing is a financial model that makes financial investments in newly established or growing companies with low shares. Angel investors usually invest in startups with a stake between 4% and 8%.
Angel investors trust the business model, team, market fit and growth potential and invest with the goal of return on investment. While angel investors usually only provide cash contributions, there are also angel investors who provide in-kind mentoring support in addition to financial contributions.
In order to receive angel investment, startups make presentations to angel investors and explain their financial models, business models and growth strategies and try to explain that the money requested will grow their business. With these investments in startups, angel investors focus on returning their investment in a profitable way, perhaps 10 or even 30 times in 3-5 years. With this focus, they invest believing that the team will do this job.
What Startups Need to Do to Get Investment
Startup presentation: The startup team should be able to explain the market, the product, the value proposition and the future goals in a short period of time with a strong and impressive presentation.
Financial model: A financial model should be prepared in which metrics such as revenues, expenses, marketing expenses, team expenses, growth rates are calculated and planned at the end of 1 year and 2 years.
One pager: A one-page narrative describing the business on a single page, showing competitive analysis, growth, metrics and the team may be requested by investors.
Business model canvas: It is recommended to prepare a business model canvas showing how the business model works.
Suggested content: How to prepare a business model canvas?
SWOT analysis: A one-page SWOT analysis on the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the initiative is expected.
Suggested content: How to do a SWOT analysis?
Which Company Type Should Startups Establish? Types of Companies to Establish to Receive Investment (Joint Stock, Limited Liability, Sole Proprietorship)
Startups can establish 3 different types of companies: joint stock, limited liability and sole proprietorship, but generally investors expect the startup to be a “joint stock company” due to the full implementation of the terms of the contract, the chance to be listed on the stock exchange in the future and legal rights.
How Startups Grow and Develop?
For a technology company to grow, of course, it needs to do digital marketing. It is necessary to fully implement digital marketing areas such as SEO, social media, ad management, and regular marketing activities to be different from its competitors in the sector. This is essential for all startups, except for some startups’ special growth strategies such as partnerships, B2B meetings or fair events.
Startups should generate content on their websites through SEO and do SEO regularly to improve their websites. Grower’s SEO tool can be very useful here.
They should actively use social media to promote their products and services and actively reach potential customers with social media ads. Grower’s social media management tool, which both suggests content ideas and manages ads, can be inspiring for entrepreneurs.
Ads on desired keywords on channels such as Google, ads on places like YouTube and visual narratives can help startups reach customers. Grower’s ad management, analytics and recommendation tool can be an eye-opener for startup founders or marketing experts.
If you are launching a new product or service, the sales presentation you create is also very important. A simple sales pitch should clearly demonstrate the value proposition, how you are different from competitors and how exactly you benefit the customer. Social proof, reviews of companies and people who have purchased your product or service can be impressive here.
Startup Growth Centers – Incubation and Entrepreneurship Centers
In Turkey, there are many structures, both governmental and private, that support startups. These incubation centers, which are increasing in number day by day, provide mentorship, office space and some of them also provide financial support to startups. In Turkey, incubation centers established by many banks support startups, while structures established by universities also pave the way for the emergence of successful startups.
Incubation and Entrepreneurship Centers in Turkey
- Atelier Üsküdar
- BTM (Center for Information Commercialization)
- Kworks
- QNB Beyond
- ITU Core
- Floor Istanbul
- 1773 Technopark
- Tech Istanbul
- Albaraka Garage
- Workup
- Guild entrepreneurship center
- Sabancı arf
- Başakşehir living lab
- Cube incubation
- Avcılar entrepreneurship center
Incubation and Entrepreneurship Centers around the World
- Y Combinator
- Techstarts
- Station F
- 500 Startups
- Seedcamp
- Startup Wise Guys
- Plug and Play
- Founders Factory
- Startupbootcamp
- Ace Incubator
- Impact Hub
- Antler
- APX Axel Springer
- Entrepreneur first
- Atlantic labs
- Iconic labs
- Blueyard
- Wayra
- Pi labs
- Oxygen accelerator
The incubators mentioned here can offer different benefits for startups by focusing on different areas in different verticals. Therefore, it may be a much better incubation strategy for a startup founder to choose the incubation center that will benefit him/her the most instead of entering everywhere.
Successful Startup Stories
The stories of all startups are unique. Some startups reach a million users in 1 year, while others may take 3 years to get their first user. Each story has its own successes or failures. The time and metric differences in the establishment, growth and development phases of startups can differ significantly even among startups with the same business model. As Grower, we have developed an area called “experience room” for you to be inspired by success stories and learn from real experiences. Here you can see the real stories of startups and experience the growth stories of startups.
Suggested content: Experience room
While the stories of many startups show different characteristics, I would like to give you the example of Apple’s story, which is one of the most interesting stories. This iconic story has led to the growth of one of the biggest companies in the world today. To learn from stories other than Apple, you can check our “entrepreneurship movies” content. You can see movie recommendations.
It is extremely important for startups to be data-driven in the growth process. They should be looking at data such as L.T.V., C.A.C., R.O.I. and regularly observe this data.
You can try our system that we have developed to calculate marketing data, which gives you suggestions with both automatic calculation and artificial intelligence.
Calculation tool: Calculate marketing data
L.T.V.: This customer lifetime value data allows you to see how much a customer earns you over time. For example, if a person buys a 50 TL product 3 times a year, their L.T.V. is 150 TL.
C.A.C.: This data, which is the cost of customer acquisition, allows you to find out how much you get customers from the advertising you spend. For example, if you advertise for 100 TL and get 2 customers, your customer acquisition cost is 50 TL.
R.O.I: Allows you to see the return on investment. If you are getting customers with a 50 TL customer acquisition cost and you earn 150 TL from each customer, your R.O.I. figure is 150/50=3.
If you do all these calculations, you can see where your startup stands according to data such as monthly growth, customer churn rate, annual growth of the market and you can take the right steps when taking actions and decisions.
Barış Korkmaz
https://withgrower.comI try to write what I know and share content on Grower for companies that want to grow their business.
