The early days of any startup journey are exciting, sure — but also kinda terrifying. 

If you’re launching a business, the odds are stacked against you: nine out of every ten companies fail. A lack of money is the top reason startups go under, according to data service CB Insights. Similarly, PwC’s European Startup Survey identifies customer acquisition and sales as the most significant obstacles.

In Sifted’s latest report, we talked to loads of founders who’ve walked the rocky road to come up with (something like) a cheat sheet to startup success. 

Here are some dos and don’ts from startup survivors.  

1. Disagree with your cofounders

A counterintuitive one to begin with: you and your cofounders can — and should — have rows.

“Surround yourself with people with a different mindset or way of thinking,” says Thibaud Hug de Larauze, cofounder and CEO of refurbished gadget marketplace (and France’s most valuable startup) Back Market. “If you just pair up with someone from the same high school it could work, but you’ll be missing a lot. You cannot agree with your cofounders all of the time.”

“You cannot agree with your cofounders all of the time”

2. Don’t skip — or skimp on — customer research

It doesn’t matter if you’re selling HR software or semiconductors, heavy customer research from the very beginning is the only way to go. 

“This lesson isn’t hammered home and I can’t emphasise it enough: do your customer research. It’s a weekly and monthly commitment,” says Lucy Heskins, director of startup marketing consultancy Oh Blimey. “The money you think you’ll find in your segment may actually be in a whole other subsegment of the market that you think is unsexy. You can’t ignore that.” 

“I can’t emphasise it enough: do your customer research”

3. Don’t overdo the customer research either

The flipside of not spending enough time researching the market is spending too much time. 

Spanish VC firm Adara Ventures invests in early-stage deeptech startups in Spain, Portugal, France, the UK and Ireland. Partner Rocio Pillado says she’s worked with founding teams that spend years on their MVP (minimum viable product). 

“They feel like they have to build the perfect technology and get a lot of patents before going to market. Then they realise there are a lot of things to change,” she says. “I think it’s more of a European mentality. In the US it’s the opposite. They go to market without an MVP, without a product sometimes and when they get their first sale, they start working on the product. They’re not scared of feedback.”

“In the US it’s the opposite. They go to market without an MVP, without a product sometimes and when they get their first sale, they start working on the product”

4. Invest in customer channels that make sense

Don’t jump on the latest faddish thing simply because everyone else is doing it. 

“You don’t need to be on TikTok if you’re selling enterprise software for example,” says Heskins.

5. Have no shame about asking for intros

Would-be founders shouldn’t beat around the bush when it comes to asking friends and business acquaintances for help.

“My number one thing is I’m a serial networker,” says Steven Mendel, CEO and cofounder of insurance provider Many Pets. “I have no sense of shame when it comes to asking for introductions from people. Asking people that we knew who might be interested in supporting our story has worked really well for us.”

“I have no sense of shame when it comes to asking for introductions from people”

6. Carve out time to recharge

Remember that an overworked founder is no fun to be around. 

“No one wants to work with a stressed, burned-out leader or manager,” says Louise Hill, cofounder and COO of GoHenry, an app offering pre-paid contactless cards for children as young as six. “Invest time in making sure you’re focused and clear-headed. It’s not ‘me time’ if it makes you a better leader. And that’s incredibly positive for your business.”

The flipside of not spending enough time researching the market is spending too much time. 

“No one wants to work with a stressed, burned-out leader or manager”

7. Finally, don’t try to be all things to all people

Founders need an unwavering focus on their end goal to stay on track. Back Market’s De Larauze says the team lost six months when it was two years old after a big insurance company offered them a contract.

“We started to develop a whole set of features for that programme instead of focusing on our value proposition,” he says. “I think we were fortunate it didn’t work in the end, because we would have just become a service provider for a big group.”

“We probably lost a year in the early days by trying to be everything to too many prospects”

“We probably lost a year in the early days by trying to be everything to too many prospects,” says Samuel Mueller, cofounder and CEO of Swiss smart data capture and barcode scanning software startup Scandit. “It’s very hard to say no, but be very disciplined and ruthless about how you work through your leads. I think it’s definitely something I’d be better equipped to do if I did this again.”

For more advice from those who’ve lived it, survived it or made a mess of it the first time round, take a look at Sifted’s new report, Starting up smart, sponsored by Google Cloud