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Richard Gao

When do you shut down or pivot?

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Curious to hear from founders, how do you know when to shut down or pivot? 👀 Do you stick it out till the end or succumb to shiny object syndrome? For me, it would be a lack of revenue growth even after doing everything for marketing

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Steve Perez
Knowing when to shut down or pivot depends on various factors such as market conditions, customer feedback, and financial stability.
Krishna Kumar
Lack of revenue growth is not the right indicator. What if you have stable revenues and great profits, but no revenue growth? Decliniing profitability or consistent losses would be a better indicator, in my opinion
Jordan Shlosberg
@kkumarkg Start-ups don't typically have much revenue and definitely no profitability.
Krishna Kumar
@jordans That is the wrong definition, no? Startups need to be profitable, and can be profitable
Uma Venugopal
Imho, Pivot: when you've spoken to enough users(more than 1k+ at least) and none of your sales/marketing strategies are able to retain users. shut down: when the market's too saturated or if you've started up for wrong reasons(I want to get rich quickly, blah blah, blah)
Jordan Shlosberg
@uma_venugopal 1,000 users????? If 30-50 conversations don't yield any interest, why do another 950?
Uma Venugopal
@jordans because you won't get deeper insights and enough data to draw patterns from 30-50. And figuring out things on an intricate level where you need to pivot without later regretting that you should've spoken to more users can be skipped.
Jordan Shlosberg
@uma_venugopal I'm actually going to disagree with that (respectfully of course). It's mathematically proven under binomial distributions (with 5% error) that 30+ is good enough for a focused population. I've built a large business and know personally many more founders that gave built businesses larger than mine. Not one has tried to survey 1,000 users. No doubt the insights will be better BUT 1. Surveying 1,000 users costs $20-$50k through a quantifiable survey and a full-time job if you want to do it yourself 2. The incremental information from the additional 950 has a very low incremental value. Finally, my first company (proSapient) actually does exactly this line of work and I can tell you that after 20-40 interviews, it's extremely clear where to go next
Jordan Ellis
I’m curious about this as well. I few years ago I took my first app off of the App Store because it wasn’t getting any sales. Nowadays I wonder if I had left it there, would it have have grown over so much time. I suppose any revenue, even if it’s small is better than no revenue. Assuming your product brings value, isn’t losing money, and isn't leeching time off of projects that will do infinitely better.
Peyt Spencer Dewar
@realjordanellis how long after you noticed it wasn’t getting any sales did you remove?
Jordan Ellis
@psd After about a year I had a grand total of 18 purchases at $10 bucks a pop. My next app ColorSlurp took almost two years to see any growth though, which I why I partially regret taking my original app down. All of it was a good learning experience though!
Jonayed Tanjim
An investor once advised me, "Keep building as long as you don't run out of ideas." It helped me to some extent to better understand when I should stop or pivot.
André J
Shut down when you're out of money. Pivot when your bet didn't pan out.
maryam sh
Do it while you're on your pick performance
MARIZSA
Look and listen to your analytics; what story are they telling you. What is the user base telling you? Do you have an researcher? If not, take your products to the streets and do raw and authentic research live with the people you are targeting.
Valorie Jones
pivoting has be based on data otherwise it is shiny object syndrome. Build quick tech prototypes, getting real customer/market data. I prefer to think of it as a constant series of micro adjustments as you continue to aim towards your goal.
Jordan Shlosberg
If your product doesn't resonate. If you work hard enough you can usually find initial clients. How long do those clients stick around How many referrals come from those clients Do your customer conversations inform you that you have some edge or not