When to Launch Your Startup and When to Wait

Step inside the group partners' lounge to hear Y Combinator Partners Harj Taggar, Michael Seibel and Brad Flora discuss how startups should approach launching and the exceptions to the rules.

00:00 - Inside the partners' lounge
01:00 - Why don't startups like to launch early and move quickly?
01:30 - What is fast?
02:18 - V1 of Instacart
03:18 - V1 of Brex
03:59 - Founders perfect launch and why can't they move fast?
05:54 - What's the worst case scenario? What founders are afraid of?
07:42 - V1 of Magic
08:08 - Devils advocate
08:39 - Rippling
10:33 - Zenefits
11:42 - Founders common trap
12:34 - Wrap-up

#ycombinator #startup #launch

[ycombinator]

What did your company look like when it first launched?

[farhadkarimi]

this is my "what I watch while I'm eating food" type of content

[vinnysanchez]

Great talk! Loved the last bit of advice: "You choose every day you decide not to launch. You choose every day you decide to go 10 miles per hour vs. 100 miles per hour. Maybe today you should choose differently."

[expertociber]

We did a "pre-launch" with people we were already in contact with, and now are working on different "launches" (some social media, some cold outreach, we even made a free online course to get in touch with people). You need to launch today, something, because nobody is gonna care at first, it's a humbling experience.

[Okeh_Emmanuel]

The one that plagued us the most was thinking the competition will find out our weakness and execute our solution better...

Thank God we learnt our lesson and moved fast on what really matters which was getting ourself out there.

[curiousmind]

What you guys are talking about is so valuable. Especially right now as I am feeling/experiencing 95% of things that you mention. Tomorrow I'm going to 'launch' my product that is still a working progress but its main functionality works. Time to see if people will want it

[AfzalHussein]

Love these short, informal conversations. Super insightful and useful!

[stinger]

These general startup shorts are waaaay more valuable than how to get into YC shorts.
Not everyone is working on a YC type idea.

[zk]

Get Harj on more! Great to have a UK perspective

[MrMajani]

This advice worked with my first startup, but with my third startup, I went viral on launch day and now I am scrambling to make the website more scaleable

[GregDubela]

What I found is if you feel a pressure to make your launch perfect, then you are really procrastinating and not getting your product/service to market.

[Worldsbestname]

Applying for Y combinator tomorrow, been pumping the videos - thank you so much, all of you :) great content (inc. Justin’s youtube lol)

[undivideus]

expect to launch & show your products numerous times before the public gets it. doing so enables you & your product to grow and improve.

[darrylr]

Love these videos. One weird side effect of the good though about launching early I have run into is where folks want to "launch" products early and it ends up displacing doing effective early user discovery/collaboration during product development. Especially seen it happens when folks have some existing product in market and start to think, or accidently falling into, ideating stuff more in internal isolation. And in cases where they could easily reach current users of other of their products or just reach them directly in enough volume to get useful rapid feedback. And instead of focusing on users and fast iteration the focus becomes doing launches, websites, launch press releases etc. and then when the engagement is not impressive, the tendency is to blame the go to market, not the product core value prop or implementation.

[victorthefourth]

Would love to hear more about the different speeds founders move at and how they can move faster. Maybe also define faster (Number of iterations, sales, testing?)

[productivitymonster]

I launced one of my companies on the 3rd day after idea came to our mind with my cofounder. We did a telegram bot with a basic functionaility and it proved useful to the users. Nowadays I'm looking for the same timeline when thinking about new product. It also makes it so much easier to try the industry in that way. It's surprising actually how much you can do with current tech solutions, the speed to MVP is so much faster than what it was even 3 years ago.

[kelvinedionwe]

This is the best video I've watched in a while.

[DerickMasai]

I have been caught up in this mental nightmare for over a year. After watching this, I just downscaled the app in my head SIGNIFICANTLY and will ensure it is live before Saturday morning, which is about 24 hours from now. Let me try the Build Fast and Break Things style

[MikeWilliamsYoroomie]

Love these talks and this new format! Keep them coming

[Sondre]

This is an amazing conversation, and so needed to hear. Love the vibe too