Aditya Sharma’s Post

When I quit my job to start BizDev Labs: • I had $5,000 in my bank account • A global pandemic just beginning • Zero paying customers • An uncertain future ahead I also didn't have: • A clear business model • Entrepreneurial experience • An established network • The luxury of failure The first 6 months were brutal: 1. Tried launching a coaching program 2. Attempted a BDR onboarding program 3. Income dropped to practically zero 4. Doubt crept in daily from rejections But then I remembered: -> Success isn't about great ideas -> It's about resilience and adaptation -> So I just kept learning and pushing And eventually: • I grew BDL to 7-figure agency • I signed our 80th SaaS client • I made the Forbes 30 Under 30 list I never forget those challenging days. They shaped me, taught me, and drove me forward. When times get tough, I always go back to these fundamentals. It’s not meant to be easy 🤷♂️ #StartupLife #Resilience #Entrepreneurship

Be it the dot com boom, 2010, 2020 or now, ultimately it’s revenue that determines your startup’s success. As Manipal Mafia, we understand this and stand with you to build lasting businesses. This is why we're teaming up with the experts at GrowthX® for their Revenue-Led Growth Masterclass, specifically designed for founders. GrowthX, with 3000+ revenue leaders as members, has empowered startup founders to build structured revenue roadmaps and they are spilling some of the revenue secrets only their members know. If you’re a founder in Bangalore looking to build your revenue pipeline, hire for growth talent, and raise capital, don’t miss out on what GrowthX is doing this weekend. Link to register in the comments.

A good measure for the strength of a venture-backed startup, is how they perform past their "semicorn" point. Once a business valuation (or post-IPO market cap) hits the 500m, they begin to draw attention globally, as well as less experienced, opportunistic investors - but many don't live up to the promise. I had researched the market performance of such companies from the past 6 years, and found that it varies a lot depending on the type of sector/vertical they are at; 1. B2B Tech - tend to explode, achieving x100 returns, before settling on x50 2. Deep Tech - tend to creep up slowly, no major peaks or troughs 3. B2C Tech - Tend to rise, fall, then settle on x30 returns post IPO 4. B2C Goods - tend to rise sharply (x20) before crashing to near 0 returns Examples; 🦄[B2B Tech] - Snowflake (SNOW), hit 500m in 2018, grew to 80B, before settling around 50 🦄[B2B Tech] - Stripe, hit 500m in 2014, Grew to 95B in 2020, settling on 50B 🦄[Deep Tech] - Zipline, hit 500m around 2018, grew to 4.5B today 🦄[B2B Tech] - AirBnB, IPOd at 47B, grew to over 100, settled on 75B 🦄[Goods] - Oatly, hit 500m at about 2020, grew to 10B, crashed to near 0 🦄[Goods] - Allbirds, hit 500m around 2020, grew to 2Bn, crashed to near 0 Looking at this data, it is easy to understand why most VCs would have a preference to the B2B tech space, followed by a moderate approach to B2C tech and Deep Tech, and by and large - shun products and goods. Do you think I am wrong? Do you think I missed something? #venturecapital #privatemarkets #secondaries #angelinvesting #investing

📈 Why Every Startup Needs a ‘North Star Metric’ Instead of measuring everything, focus on one metric that defines your startup’s success — your North Star Metric (NSM). - For Amazon, it’s Volume in $. - For Instagram, it was daily active users. Importnatly, " Be very conscious while setting you North Star Metric ". Even a slight deviation can cause you & your team to go off-track and can result in huge loss. Having an NSM can guide your entire team and improve focus. Companies that define their NSM grow 2x faster than those who don’t. What’s your startup’s North Star Metric? #GrowthStrategy #GTM #NorthStarMetric #WednesdayWisdom #StartupGrowth

Growth Hack 8/100 While everyone is emailing “Congratulation on your latest funding round” and getting blocked, do this instead. Target: Founders of Seed-Stage Startups Goal: Book a call 1. Scrape AngelList/Crunchbase/Pitchbook to identify seed-stage startups across categories you specialize in (SaaS, FinTech, D2C, etc.) 2. Cross-reference founders' hiring plans and open roles listed (on AngelList & their website) 3. Run their LinkedIn profiles through a scraper and extract their high schools or colleges 4. Make a "dream board" on Miro and put their alma mater's mascot/logo 5. Email or physically mail a personalized dream board with note: "Your startup journey started here. Let's map what's next together." By surgically combining multiple data sources, you ultra-personalize your outreach in an unconventional way that will command attention from your ideal targets. Curiosity and reciprocity, engineered. #GTM #Marketing #Sales #Seam #Automations

🗣️ The Long Road to Profitability: Tech Startups' Post-IPO Journey - Many valuable tech companies took several years to achieve profitability after going public #TechIPOs #Profitability - Companies like Uber, Palo Alto Networks, and Shopify waited 5, 6, and 5 years respectively to report their first annual profits after IPO #GrowthOverProfit - Exceptions like Tesla and Salesforce took even longer (10 and 13 years) but maintained high valuations due to strong brands and growth potential #BrandMatters #GrowthPotential - Investors tolerate losses if companies show significant revenue growth and market potential #RevenueGrowth #MarketPotential - Tech unicorns considering IPOs should demonstrate a clear path to profitability within a few years of going public #IPOreadiness #ProfitabilityTimeline - VCs should focus on companies with strong revenue growth and market potential #VCinvesting #GrowthStage - Tolerance for extended unprofitability may be waning, especially for less exceptional companies #ProfitabilityMatters #IPOlandscape

🐧 My response to (pre-revenue) Startup founders aiming to hit $10M ARR within 24 months (with NO Product-Market Fit) 🥷 𝐁𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐉𝐏 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐚𝐧'𝐬 𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐬 🤓 Average Odds of Reaching $1 Million: ~10%. Average Odds of Reaching $10 Million: ~1-5%. Time Frame to $10 Million: Typically 5-10 years.

It's late, but I want to share something absolutely fascinating. Today, some of you would have seen that I shared the Vena Pay demo publicly, and I built in some analysis tools to see the progress of it. It has about a 1:10 ratio of users starting the demo, to finishing the whole thing. It was very easy to pass that as "oh, maybe it's not that interesting or relevant." Then, I went out to dinner with some friends. I got talking to one who is in my target audience, and I was like "oh dang, you should check this out and tell me what you think!". I watched my ideal user, get overwhelmed and confused by my demo. The statement that hit me: "I still don't know what it does". Founders, you will know your problem and solution like the back of your hand, but, you are coming from a place of knowledge, today was a reality hit of how does someone who doesn't know, interact with my product, I watched as I saw what was pressed, and a level of frustration that I was not expecting. So, tomorrow is going to be a fun day, time to build upwards and really convey the message clearly! #Startup #Founders #Building

Joining a startup 3 years ago with 0 brand recognition and less than <$500k in ARR was a risk. On paper…... When I met with everyone (all 6 people) I was sold. I was sold before I even met the team because it was something I was looking for as a seller. It was a different selling environment 3 years ago. Debt was cheap, capital was flowing, and teams were in a 'growth at all cost' mode. SDR Managers could make a $50k purchase without looping anyone else in. Times were good! The environment did a 180* and things got tough. Like real tough (ie <50% quota attainment tough), but things slowly started to get better. I finished last year at 85% and I have a positive outlook on how 24' will shake out. I was talking with Caroline and she told me about diffusion of innovation models (I scratched my head too). These models help us comprehend the adoption process of new ideas, products, or tech within societies or markets. People typically fall into 5 buckets: 1. Innovators: These individuals are the quickest to embrace new ideas/change. 2. Early Adopters: People who accept these new innovative ideas and have the resources available to test this change 3. Early Majority: This group is open to change and tends to be persuaded by observing the benefits of an innovation. They're a significant portion of the community and play a foundational role in the majority of adoption 4. Late Majority: the skeptics. These people are reluctant to adopt new ideas until the social proof is overwhelmingly clear 5. Laggards: these people are the most resistant and conservative. They may never change. When I look at this model I think we're still in the Early Adopters phase. It was only until last October that G2 gave us the Category Creator Award. What's been helping me keep grounded is to zoom out and observe the macro. Always a sucker for adages, but I feel when you're in building mode or a part of something special this classic one liner sticks "Rome wasn't built in a day" Have a great weekend ✨

"Most startups aren't failing because of bad products. They're failing because they're talking to imaginary customers." Tough luck hits you because you're probably building features and crafting messages for personas that don't match your actual paying customers. In my work with #earlystage founders, I've seen this pattern repeatedly: They invest months building solutions without truly understanding who's willing to pay. This framework helped one of my clients turn 67% of their beta users into paying customers - not by changing their product, but by finally understanding who their real customers were. Here's what you might be missing: 1. The disconnect between who you think will pay vs who actually pays Why some customers are easier to convert than others 2. How to identify and double down on your most profitable customer segments I've learned that every startup's customer puzzle is unique. If you are challenges by understanding your ideal customer profile or seeing a gap between your beta users and paying customers, let's chat. I'd love to hear your story and share how this framework might help. Book a call: https://lnkd.in/gsC2pRde #StartupAdvice #ProductMarketFit #StartupGrowth