Starting Up

The resources founders actually use.

Every essay, video, podcast, book and tool behind 1,046 answered founder questions, in one place, each with a note on why it is here.

What founders use most, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

  1. This is the clearest plain language explainer of the core choice behind your question: do all your products carry one name (a... Peralta Design Article · About a 7 minute read Brand Architecture Explained: House of Brands vs. Branded House Peralta Design
  2. This is the founder-level piece that answers your exact question head on: Arielle Jackson (who worked on brand at Google,... First Round Review Essay · About a 15 minute read What's in a Name? A Lot, Actually. Here's How to Pick the Right One for Your Company Arielle Jackson
  3. Neumeier's short, visual classic is the foundational reading for thinking clearly about how a brand and its products relate,... Marty Neumeier Book · About a 2 hour read (roughly 200 pages, visual format) The Brand Gap: How to Bridge the Distance Between Business Strategy and Design Marty Neumeier
  4. Most naming advice skips the actual numbers, so we picked the piece that puts them on the table: a standard domain runs roughly... Kinsta Article How Much Does a Domain Name Cost? Key Factors That Decide What You Pay Kinsta
  5. This is the bootstrapped answer to naming: no agency, no branding budget, just a working process founders actually used. The... Indie Hackers Essay How do you come up with a product name / domain? Indie Hackers community
  6. This is the cleanest, research-backed answer to the exact question, and it refuses to give you a blanket yes or no. Yohn walks... Harvard Business Review Article · 6 min read Should You Name Your Company After Yourself? Denise Lee Yohn
  7. Where the HBR piece frames the trade-off, this essay digs into the specific ways a personal name helps early and holds you back... Fabrik Brands Essay · 12 min read Should You Name a Business After Yourself? Steve Harvey
  8. Rob Meyerson is a naming consultant, and this is the clearest short read on why a brief produces distinct results: it makes... How Brands Are Built Article What to include in a naming brief Rob Meyerson
  9. This is the plainest, most tactical copywriting reference for someone who has never written a line of sales copy. Edwards skips... Goodreads Book · 265 pages Copywriting Secrets Jim Edwards
  10. This walks through real pre-launch pages and settles the exact question: it shows Cal.com running an email waitlist as the... getlaunchlist.com Article · 15 min read Waitlist Landing Page Examples That Convert LaunchList
  11. This is Google's own practical playbook for speeding up pages, organized by exactly the things that hurt on a slow connection:... web.dev Article · A hub of short articles, pick the ones you need Fast load times Google (web.dev)
  12. This lays out plainly what a custom domain actually buys you (credibility, a name you own, and business email at your own name)... HubSpot Article · About 8 to 10 minute read Custom Domains: Why You Need One and How To Get Started Lauren Farrell
  13. Collecting the numbers is easy. Knowing what they mean is the hard part, and this piece is built around exactly that. It shows... withdaydream.com Article What's a Good Bounce Rate? Benchmarks and How to Read Them daydream team
  14. This is a straight judgment call from Jason Lemkin, who has seen thousands of SaaS pricing pages, on when hiding your price is... SaaStr Essay · 5 min read Dear SaaStr: Why Do So Many B2B Vendors Not Show Prices for Enterprise Plans? Jason Lemkin
  15. Once you decide to put a price on the page, this is the practical playbook for structuring it so it actually converts. Kyle... OpenView Article · 8 min read Seven Tips to Optimize Your SaaS Pricing Page Kyle Poyar
  16. This walks through eleven kinds of social proof and, crucially, spells out what you can still show when you have no reviews... MailerLite Article · ~15 min read How to use social proof in landing pages to boost conversion (11 examples) Duncan Elder
  17. Before traction exists there is a vacuum where evidence should be, and this essay makes the case that a genuine founder... The VC Corner Essay · ~12 min read The Founder's Guide to Startup Storytelling Ruben Dominguez
  18. Most SEO advice assumes you have a live product and months of runway, so it is useless the week before launch. This piece is... Waitlister Article Landing Page SEO: The Complete Guide for Pre-Launch and Waitlist Pages Waitlister
  19. This is the comparison that actually names the thing you are worried about: with Webflow you can export your site's code and... Zapier Article · About a 15 minute read Framer vs. Webflow: Which is best? Zapier
  20. This one is honest about the hard part: reaching customers in a regional language is not the same as running your English copy... Localazy Article · ~12 min read Localization for the Indian market: reach users from the most populated country on Earth Agnee Ghosh
  21. This comes straight from Razorpay, so it is the gateway itself telling you the exact pages it checks before it will activate... Razorpay Article · ~10 min read Payment Gateway Compliance: What Your Website Needs Before You Can Accept Payments Razorpay
  22. Most naming advice stops at brainstorming, this one is a plain five step sequence for actually checking whether a name is free:... Carry Article · ~10 min read How to Choose a Business Name: A 5-Step Availability Check Jaiya (Carry)
  23. This is the piece that put the phrase minimum viable brand into circulation, and it argues the opposite of both extremes: you... Harvard Business Review Article · Short read, roughly 5 minutes Start-Ups Need a Minimum Viable Brand Denise Lee Yohn
  24. This is the honest counter to the assumption that brand is a consumer, website thing that B2B founders can skip. Salinas argues... IE Insights (IE University) Essay · ~10 min read The Strength of a B2B Is in Its Brand Gabriela Salinas

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Playbooks

A goal, and the route through it a step at a time.

Find an idea worth pursuing Spot problems worth solving and find the one that actually fits you. 4 steps Validate before you build Get real evidence people want it before you write a line of code. 4 steps Understand your customers Talk to real users, define who you're for, and read the market clearly. 4 steps From idea to first customers The idea-stage spine: find a problem, prove it, talk to customers, and land the first ten. 4 steps Build an MVP without code Ship a first version with no-code tools before you hire anyone. 4 steps Build and launch your first product Turn a validated idea into something real people can use. 6 steps Find and work with developers Hire, brief, and work with builders without getting burned. 4 steps Name and brand your startup Name it, design an identity, and say what it does in a line. 3 steps Build a landing page that converts A page that loads fast, earns trust, and turns visitors into signups. 4 steps Get your first customers The scrappy, unscalable work of going from zero to your first paying users. 5 steps Sell it yourself, founder-led Reach out, run the conversation, and close before you have a sales team. 4 steps Grow with content and SEO Compound reach with content, search, and a founder audience. 3 steps Grow with paid ads Spend that returns: the channels, metrics, and loops behind it. 4 steps Price and package your product Charge for value, package it right, and check the numbers work. 3 steps Bootstrap instead of raising Fund growth from revenue, and keep control of your company. 4 steps Raise your first round Understand the game before you pitch: whether to raise, from whom, and on what terms. 5 steps Find a co-founder, split equity Find the right partner and split equity without regret. 3 steps Set up the company right Incorporate, split equity, protect your IP, and make your first hires. 4 steps Survive founder life Mindset, burnout, the leap, and the parts nobody warns you about. 5 steps Build in India The India-specific playbook: schemes, government, enterprise, and the local market. 5 steps

The questions founders start with

I want to start a startup but I don't have an idea. Where do I even begin? Stop hunting for a billion-dollar idea and start collecting problems. The best ideas come from noticing things that annoy you or people around you ... Beginner 19 resources → What does 'validating an idea' actually mean? Validation is gathering real-world evidence that a specific group of people has a painful problem AND will change their behaviour (pay, sign up, sw... Beginner 20 resources → Do I actually need a co-founder, or can I go solo? You don't strictly need one, but the data says teams outlast solos: complementary skills, shared load, and someone to argue you out of bad calls al... Beginner 3 resources → What actually counts as an MVP, and what's the smallest one I can get away with? An MVP is the least you can build (or fake) to test your single riskiest assumption, not a shrunken version of your dream product. Ask 'what's the ... Beginner 20 resources → How do I talk to customers without them just telling me what I want to hear? Stop pitching and start interrogating their past. Ask about what they actually did last time the problem hit, what it cost them, and what they trie... Beginner 23 resources → How do I actually get my first 10 customers when nobody has heard of me? You go get them by hand, one at a time, email people you already know, people your investors/friends know, and strangers in the exact niche you're ... Beginner 19 resources → How do I decide how much to charge for my product? Stop guessing and stop pricing off your costs, price off the value the customer gets and their willingness to pay. Talk to customers about pricing,... Beginner 3 resources → Should I raise venture capital or bootstrap my startup? Raise VC only if your business needs a big pile of cash to reach escape velocity before someone else does, and if a 10x-in-a-few-years outcome is g... Beginner 3 resources →

Questions for your situation

The Aspiring Founder The Idea-Stage Founder The Builder The Launcher The Grower The Student Founder The Indie Hacker The Technical Solo Founder The Non-Technical Founder The Domain Expert The Women Founder The Anywhere Founder The Corporate Switcher The Repeat Founder
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