{"id":12359,"date":"2015-08-28T20:05:07","date_gmt":"2015-08-28T09:05:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/?p=12359"},"modified":"2024-04-10T17:18:52","modified_gmt":"2024-04-10T06:18:52","slug":"6-month-startup-lessons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/","title":{"rendered":"6 Months Into A Startup &#8211; Here&#8217;s Everything We&#8217;ve Learned"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"bsf_rt_marker\"><\/div><p><em><strong>Note<\/strong>: As a startup ourselves we love to hear about other startups. We hope you will also love this story and take some important lessons from it.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We launched our software in January, just a bit over 6 months ago, and since then, it\u2019s been a world of learning. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some things we expected, and others came completely out of left field. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s a summary of the major hurdles involved in running a startup.<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>&#8220;All Cliches Are True&#8221;<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We might as well just get started with this one &#8211; cliches are by and large, true. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What are some startup cliches you\u2019ve probably heard:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It will consume your live<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s an emotional roller coaster ride<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You\u2019re always teeter tottering between break out success and complete failure<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No amount of success is enough, you always want more.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over the last 6 months I\u2019ve experienced this virtually every single day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seems like no where is safe<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Out at a restaurant &#8211; thinking about my startup. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Watching TV &#8211; thinking about my startup. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dreaming&#8230;about my startup. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It occupies a lot of mental space, and as someone who has a girlfriend who requires normal human attention, it can be difficult to turn the switch off. <\/span><\/p>\n<p>Without a doubt, it has been the most time intensive undertaking I\u2019ve ever voluntarily signed up for.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And the worst are the constant ups and downs. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the one hand, month over month growth is, more or less, on an upward trend &#8211; but we don\u2019t live month to month, we live day to day, and that\u2019s completely all over the place.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_12363\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-12363\" class=\"wp-image-12363\" src=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\" alt=\"Growth of the startup\" width=\"590\" height=\"368\" srcset=\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png 852w, https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart-300x187.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 590px) 100vw, 590px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-12363\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">How the growth varies day by day<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One day a dozen people will sign up to test it out, and the next day &#8211; no one. For one reason or another daily growth is not smooth, it seems to come in spurts, and those highs and lows create emotional highs and lows where one day you\u2019re on top of the world and the next you\u2019re wondering how it all fell out from under you. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In short, be prepared for a wild ride.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>Customer Service Is A Competitive Advantage (And Maybe Your Only One)<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Customer-service.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-12364\" src=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Customer-service.png\" alt=\"Customer service is a competitive advantage\" width=\"595\" height=\"170\" srcset=\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Customer-service.png 958w, https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Customer-service-300x85.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 595px) 100vw, 595px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although our product has come a long way, for a long time it was clearly worse. It had less features, a <a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/user-experience-website-builder\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">worse UI<\/a>, and <a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/development\/creately-just-got-faster-and-more-responsive\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">performed slower<\/a> than the other guys. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But for some reason or another, people still used it. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And for these people, and everyone since then, we\u2019ve always delivered excellent customer service. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Why?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because there\u2019s no excuse not to. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And frankly, <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/imalwayshappy2help.com\/5-customer-service-channels-every-business\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">it\u2019s a competitive advantage<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We try to be on 24\/7, because a customer who needs help wants it immediately, and if they don\u2019t get it, they might just not log in again &#8211; ever.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We even have a way to book a call with us in the app itself:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And people schedule calls with me, daily.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Plus, we\u2019ve extended our support to our website visitors through a live chat, and from time to time have caught the other guys sleeping.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s what happened while a GroupHigh visitor was waiting for a response:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I\u2019ve even tested the competitor\u2019s customer support response times, sending emails to them asking questions, only to find out it took them days to respond. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although a 14 day free trial seems like a long time, usually it\u2019s only a handful of customer log ins, which means you have to make each and every one of them count. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When people feel like you\u2019re there with them, they get a sense that they can succeed because they have an expert on the tool supporting their every action. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And, as a company, when we know we have limits as to what we can do to further develop the product, the best thing we can do is to empower our users through awesome customer support. <\/span><\/p>\n<h3>There\u2019s Always Someone Around The Corner<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we first started Ninja Outreach, we were the new kids on the block. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We focused on differentiating ourselves by having a cool brand and doing a lot of content marketing and blogger outreach to get the word out, which our competitors were not doing. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A few months later and our strategy hasn\u2019t changed &#8211; we\u2019re still cool, we\u2019re still doing marketing that no one else is doing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But we\u2019re not the only ones, and some of them are even newer than us. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just a few months ago another influencer marketing software launched, and is already starting to get exposure, to the point that some of our current customers are asking questions like:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhen are you going to have feature X like they do?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I\u2019ve gotten this question a million times before in regards to our late stage competitors, and it never bothered me too much because I knew the expectation was that we would be behind on features. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I anticipated that question.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But when you start getting that question in regards to a product that has just launched, it definitely makes you feel uneasy &#8211; in fact, this is probably how our competitors felt when their customers asked about us!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Realistically, I try not to get caught up with the competition; they do their thing and we do ours. Hopefully the market is large enough that it will never really make a difference, and often digital marketers use multiple tools anyways. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All the same, just because you\u2019re new and different, it certainly does not mean that no one else can be new and different too. The same lack of barriers to entry that allowed you to get involved and take market share are open to other people as well. <\/span><\/p>\n<h3>The Market Will Be (And Should Be) Bigger Than You Think<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We try to have a target market in mind when we design our tool. For us, it\u2019s digital marketing agencies that do blogger outreach and are looking for a software solution. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We expected that this was thousands of agencies worldwide, and it is. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What we didn\u2019t expect was how many other types of businesses would be interested in the software, such as:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bloggers doing content promotion<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Startups looking for exposure<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Small Businesses\/eCommerce sites doing blogger outreach<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sales teams doing lead generation<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Podcasters looking for guests<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The list was a lot larger than our initial thought, and I now begin to look at our market as being in the millions. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In many ways this is good &#8211; it means there are a lot of people out there interested in what we\u2019re doing. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But it also makes it difficult to tailor your marketing and copywriting &#8211; who should you be speaking on your website?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We try to mention the various things you can do with NinjaOutreach without being unfocused, for example:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But inevitably you have to lead with something that targets whoever you believe your best, early adopters are, and for us that\u2019s still about finding influencers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Ninja-Outreach.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-12365\" src=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Ninja-Outreach.png\" alt=\"Ninja Outreach\" width=\"595\" height=\"498\" srcset=\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Ninja-Outreach.png 923w, https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Ninja-Outreach-300x251.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 595px) 100vw, 595px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is going to have to suit us for now until we have a more general answer to interest people with.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>Agile Does Not Mean Fast<\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Agile is a term used often in the startup world. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It references the fact that startups can move fast and make quick decisions because they aren\u2019t bogged down by the common bureaucracy that plagues larger corporations. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If they want to change something on their website &#8211; they just do it; no manager sign off, no conversation with legal, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, in my experience this applies much more to decision making than execution. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Execution, especially in the software world, is slow, regardless of how quick you make a decision. We\u2019ve had many changes and improvements that have been sitting on the back burner for months, on account of lack of resources. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure, from time to time we have agile development, whereby a small feature we just thought of can be implemented in a day and launched to our users tomorrow, without any crazy product specs. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But more often than not, running a startup on a lack of resources is seems more or less equivalent to running an organization with limitless resources but a ton of red tape. Each has their frustrations as to why something isn\u2019t getting done as fast as we would like. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Conclusion<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, has it been worth it?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Heck, yes!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Simply put, I can\u2019t imagine doing anything else, despite the difficulties. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>What have you learned from your business?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">David Schneider is the Content Director at <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/ninjaoutreach.com\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">NinjaOutreach<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> an all in one Influencer Outreach software for marketers. He blogs about business at <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.selfmadebusinessman.com\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">SelfMadeBusinessman<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. You can also find him on twitter <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ninjaoutreach\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">@ninjaoutreach<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Note: As a startup ourselves we love to hear about other startups. We hope you will also love this story and take some important lessons from it. We launched our software in January, just a bit over 6 months ago,&#8230;<span class=\"continue-reading\"> <a href=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\">Read More<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":12363,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[14,621],"class_list":["post-12359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-experience","tag-startup","tag-startup-lessons"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>6 Months Into A Startup - Here&#039;s Everything We&#039;ve Learned - Creately Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"6 Months Into A Startup - Here&#039;s Everything We&#039;ve Learned - Creately Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Creately Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/creately\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/nishadha\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"852\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"532\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nishadha\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nishadha\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nishadha\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/3b0114786fc2afe9bb05acfea873e291\"},\"headline\":\"6 Months Into A Startup &#8211; Here&#8217;s Everything We&#8217;ve Learned\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\"},\"wordCount\":1461,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\",\"keywords\":[\"startup\",\"startup lessons\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Experience\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\",\"name\":\"6 Months Into A Startup - Here's Everything We've Learned - Creately Blog\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00\",\"description\":\"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png\",\"width\":852,\"height\":532,\"caption\":\"How the growth varies day by day\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"6 Months Into A Startup &#8211; Here&#8217;s Everything We&#8217;ve Learned\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Creately Blog\",\"description\":\"Latest Product Updates and Tips on Working Visually\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Creately\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2023\/01\/creately-logo-symbol.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2023\/01\/creately-logo-symbol.png\",\"width\":430,\"height\":237,\"caption\":\"Creately\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/creately\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/creately\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/creately_app\/\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/3b0114786fc2afe9bb05acfea873e291\",\"name\":\"Nishadha\",\"description\":\"Software engineer turned tech evangelist. I handle marketing stuff here at Creately including writing blog posts and handling social media accounts. In my spare time, I love to read and travel.\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/nishadha\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/rumblinglankan\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/author\/nish\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"6 Months Into A Startup - Here's Everything We've Learned - Creately Blog","description":"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"follow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"6 Months Into A Startup - Here's Everything We've Learned - Creately Blog","og_description":"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.","og_url":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/","og_site_name":"Creately Blog","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/creately","article_author":"http:\/\/facebook.com\/nishadha","article_published_time":"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00","og_image":[{"width":852,"height":532,"url":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Nishadha","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Nishadha","Est. reading time":"7 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/"},"author":{"name":"Nishadha","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/3b0114786fc2afe9bb05acfea873e291"},"headline":"6 Months Into A Startup &#8211; Here&#8217;s Everything We&#8217;ve Learned","datePublished":"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00","dateModified":"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/"},"wordCount":1461,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png","keywords":["startup","startup lessons"],"articleSection":["Experience"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/","url":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/","name":"6 Months Into A Startup - Here's Everything We've Learned - Creately Blog","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png","datePublished":"2015-08-28T09:05:07+00:00","dateModified":"2024-04-10T06:18:52+00:00","description":"A journey of a six month startup. Startup lessons learned, what competitive advantages can be gained and how to get through the emotional roller coaster.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2015\/08\/growth-chart.png","width":852,"height":532,"caption":"How the growth varies day by day"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/experience\/6-month-startup-lessons\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"6 Months Into A Startup &#8211; Here&#8217;s Everything We&#8217;ve Learned"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/","name":"Creately Blog","description":"Latest Product Updates and Tips on Working Visually","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Creately","url":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2023\/01\/creately-logo-symbol.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/d3n817fwly711g.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/2023\/01\/creately-logo-symbol.png","width":430,"height":237,"caption":"Creately"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/creately","https:\/\/x.com\/creately","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/creately_app\/"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/3b0114786fc2afe9bb05acfea873e291","name":"Nishadha","description":"Software engineer turned tech evangelist. I handle marketing stuff here at Creately including writing blog posts and handling social media accounts. In my spare time, I love to read and travel.","sameAs":["http:\/\/facebook.com\/nishadha","https:\/\/x.com\/rumblinglankan"],"url":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/author\/nish\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12359"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29460,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12359\/revisions\/29460"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creately.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}