Starting Up

The resources founders actually use.

Every essay, video, podcast, book and tool behind 1,327 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. Gupta's core argument is the mental unlock most founders need: teams are wired to add because launches get rewarded and... Product Growth (Aakash Gupta) Essay · About 15 minute read Addition by Subtraction: The Art of Killing Features Aakash Gupta
  2. Patrick McKenzie is one of the clearest writers on the line between bespoke work and a repeatable product, and this essay maps... Kalzumeus Essay What Consulting Companies Can Learn From Product Companies Patrick McKenzie (patio11)
  3. Written by a startup CTO, this is the clearest short piece on the exact shift you are facing: the moment it stops being just... Jake Spracher (startup CTO, ex-Apple) Article · 8 to 10 min read Code Review for Startups Jake Spracher
  4. This is the rare piece that actually answers the numbers question instead of hand-waving. It tells you to build a pipeline of... justinmckelvey.com Article · ~20 min read Founder-Led Sales: Close Your First 50 Customers Justin McKelvey
  5. When you are chasing your first 10 customers, you do not need Salesforce, you need one place to see who you contacted, who... Notion Marketplace Tool · Free Notion template Simple Sales CRM & Pipeline (Notion template) Laura Miller
  6. Walbaum ran ops at Uber, Meta, and Rippling, so he writes from the exact judgment call in the question: when has the manual... The Operator's Handbook Article How to win by doing things that don't scale Torsten Walbaum
  7. This is the real founder story behind the meme: Chesky and his cofounder flew to New York and knocked on hosts' doors, then... Masters of Scale Podcast Airbnb's Brian Chesky in Handcrafted (Masters of Scale) Reid Hoffman (host), with Brian Chesky
  8. If the word selling makes you flinch, this essay meets you there. Roy is an engineer who reframes sales as problem solving with... Engineering Sales (Substack) Essay · Short read, roughly 10 minutes I'm Not a Sales Guy. I'm an Engineer Who Learned How to Sell David Roy
  9. SaaSBoomi is the community of Indian SaaS founders, and its Deep-Dive episodes are founders talking plainly about how they... SaaSBoomi Podcast SaaSBoomi Podcast (A Founder's Deep-Dive) Suresh Sambandam
  10. If your customers run their business on WhatsApp, you should meet them there instead of dragging them into email or a portal.... Wati Tool Wati (WhatsApp Business API platform) Wati
  11. If you are tempted to get all 10 customers at once with a launch, this piece sets honest expectations using survey data from... Indie Hackers Article · ~8 min read What Results Can You Expect from a Product Hunt Launch? Vasyl Holiney
  12. Video Why Startups Fail (with Tom Eisenmann, Harvard Business School) Tom Eisenmann, Harvard Business School
  13. This is the tactical playbook for actually doing what the framing essays recommend: pick one city and one vertical, then... Sharetribe Marketplace Academy Article · Article, roughly 12 to 15 minutes Focus your marketplace on one city and one vertical Juho Makkonen (Sharetribe)
  14. Where the Altman essay tells you why retention matters, this one gets concrete about the first weeks: it argues churn... Appcues Article · ~15 min read How to reduce customer churn: a 3-stage SaaS retention framework Katryna Balboni
  15. A plain, practical breakdown of what a soft launch is actually for (testing, feedback, fixing before the crowd shows up) versus... The LaunchPad Agency Article · Approx 10 minute read What is a Soft Launch vs. a Hard Launch? A Comprehensive Guide Sean Angus
  16. Video · Approx 20 minutes The Best Way To Launch Your Startup Kat Mañalac
  17. Before you tweak the page again, this gives you a concrete test to check whether it even communicates. You show someone the... Maze Article · ~10 min read Five-Second Testing: Step-by-Step Guide + Example Maze
  18. The embarrassment you feel comes from thinking a launch is a one time coronation, and this piece quietly dismantles that. Arvid... The Bootstrapped Founder Essay · Long read (full interview essay), about 25 minutes Marc Louvion, Becoming a Product Launch Beast Arvid Kahl
  19. Marc Lou built and launched more than ten products in a year, so nobody has more lived data on what launching over and over... Indie Hackers Podcast (episode 272) Podcast · About 52 minutes Escape Rooms, Side Project Marketing, and Getting to Ramen Profitable with Marc Lou Courtland Allen and Channing Allen (with Marc Lou)
  20. The fix for feeling repetitive is giving each launch a genuinely different reason to exist, and this guide lays out that menu... Appcues Article · Long guide, about 20 to 25 minutes The Ultimate Guide to Product Launches Appcues
  21. For Indian B2B, LinkedIn is closer to a real launch surface than Product Hunt ever was, because the decision-makers you are... LinkedIn Tool · Ongoing LinkedIn LinkedIn
  22. This is the balanced take you want before you decide: a waitlist can be a real growth lever or it can be a black hole where... Venture Curator Article What's a Good Waitlist Conversion Rate (and How to Increase Yours) Sahil S
  23. Before you copy a waitlist because everyone else has one, read Arvid Kahl's honest counterpoint on manufactured scarcity. His... The Bootstrapped Founder Essay Artificial Scarcity Damages the Creator Economy Arvid Kahl
  24. Most launch-post advice stays abstract. This one hands you the actual artifact: a full maker's first comment written in plain,... DEV Community Article The Product Hunt Launch Playbook That Actually Works (With a Real Example) Atlas Whoff

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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

What are good startup ideas in India right now? The ideas Indian investors are backing in 2026 sit in a few places: AI built into one industry's daily work (vertical AI for B2B, where software fu... Beginner 5 resources → How do I find product-market fit? Narrow until a small group cannot do without you, then widen. Pick the segment where usage is strongest, talk to those people every week, and chang... Intermediate 9 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 → How do I build an MVP for my startup, step by step? Write down the one assumption that kills the idea if it is wrong, then build the cheapest thing that tests it and get it to real users within weeks... Beginner 9 resources → Which tool should I use to analyse qualitative data like interview notes? For a founder with a dozen interviews, Gemini Notebook, which is free, or Claude, free or $20 a month on Pro: load the transcripts, ask for the rec... Beginner 6 resources → How do I get my first client as a freelancer? Your first client is most likely someone who already knows you or someone they know, so start there before marketplaces. 1) Pick one service for on... Beginner 6 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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