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. A practical, listen-on-a-walk companion to Founding Sales where Kazanjy walks through the actual anatomy of a founder sales... First Round Review Podcast (In Depth) Podcast · ~60 min Founders: Here's How to Get Your Sales Pitch in Ship-Shape Peter Kazanjy (host: First Round) In 8 answers
  2. Video · ~20 min How to do customer interviews? | Rob Fitzpatrick, author of "The Mom Test" Rob Fitzpatrick In 8 answers
  3. When there is no category report to point at, you have to build the number yourself, and this is the essay that teaches you... Andreessen Horowitz Essay · ~20 min read 16 More Startup Metrics Anu Hariharan, Frank Chen, Jeff Jordan In 8 answers
  4. Judging whether people will actually change their behavior comes down to how well you can hear intensity in what they say, and... deployempathy.com Book · Full book, roughly 250 pages Deploy Empathy: A Practical Guide to Interviewing Customers Michele Hansen In 8 answers
  5. When you are the only one selling something like your product, cost-plus and competitor benchmarks give you nothing to anchor... Wiley (2016) Book · Book, ~240 pages Monetizing Innovation: How Smart Companies Design the Product Around the Price Madhavan Ramanujam and Georg Tacke In 8 answers
  6. The India-specific piece that tells you where the split actually gets signed. It separates the founders' agreement (equity,... Treelife Article · 10 min read Founder Vesting in a Shareholders' Agreement: What Startup Founders Must Know Treelife In 8 answers
  7. This is the checklist and the template in one, written for Indian Pvt Ltd reality, not a US Delaware copy-paste. It walks all... iPleaders Template · 25 min read Co-Founder Agreement for Indian Startups: Clauses and Template (2026) iPleaders In 8 answers
  8. The global playbooks assume a US-style buying process; this one is written for the Indian enterprise reality, where the sale... Blume Ventures Article · 25 min read The Rough Guide to Building an Enterprise SaaS Dhandha in India Blume Ventures (with Aakrit Vaish, Haptik) In 8 answers
  9. The government's own comparison, and it leads with the exact filter you need: if you are raising funding, the decision is made... Startup India Article · 12 min read Types of Businesses (Sole Proprietorship, LLP, Private Limited, OPC) Startup India (DPIIT) In 8 answers
  10. A hands-on companion to The Mom Test with more structure on who to talk to and how to run the process. Alvarez is strong on... Cindy Alvarez Book · ~240 pages Lean Customer Development Cindy Alvarez In 8 answers
  11. Consumer PMF advice does not map cleanly onto B2B, where deals are few, considered, and slow, which describes many Indian... Lenny's Newsletter Article · ~3,000 words A guide for finding product-market fit in B2B Lenny Rachitsky In 8 answers
  12. If you would rather hear the Pattern Breakers thinking as a conversation, this episode covers it with concrete stories and... Lenny's Podcast (lennysnewsletter.com) Podcast · ~90 min Pattern Breakers: How to find a great startup idea Lenny Rachitsky with Mike Maples Jr. In 8 answers
  13. Hall's book gives you the research discipline behind good interviewing: how to avoid leading a witness, how to write a... A Book Apart / Erika Hall Book · ~120 pages Just Enough Research Erika Hall In 8 answers
  14. FSSAI's own order setting the food licence tiers in force from 1 April 2026: Registration up to Rs 1.5 crore turnover, State... fssai.gov.in Article · 4-page order FSSAI order: revised turnover thresholds for registration and licences (13 March 2026) Food Safety and Standards Authority of India In 8 answers
  15. The government's own summary of PMEGP, the credit-linked subsidy for new micro enterprises run by KVIC: the subsidy is 15% of... myscheme.gov.in Article · Scheme page Prime Minister's Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP) Ministry of MSME, on myScheme In 8 answers
  16. An August 2026 guide to the Legal Metrology rules every packed product meets: the Rs 500 one-time registration for... calcguru.in Article · 12 min read Legal Metrology and LMPC registration in India 2026 CalcGuru In 8 answers
  17. The government's own May 2026 summary of startup tax benefits under both Acts: the 80-IAC holiday (section 140 of the... startupindia.gov.in Article Tax Playbook for the Startup Ecosystem (May 2026) Startup India (DPIIT) In 8 answers
  18. A state Legal Metrology department's own FAQ: who counts as a packer, the declarations every pre-packed commodity must carry,... weightnmeasures.delhi.gov.in Article · PDF FAQ Legal Metrology (Weights and Measures): FAQs and packer registration Department of Legal Metrology, Government of NCT of Delhi In 8 answers
  19. Steli Efti (YC alum, co-founder of Close CRM) is one of the most trusted voices on startup outbound and cold email, practical,... Close Article · article series The Close Sales Blog (Steli Efti on cold email & founder sales) Steli Efti In 7 answers
  20. Lenny's Newsletter is the most trusted operator-written resource on product, growth, and monetization, drawing on data from... lennysnewsletter.com Article · newsletter archive Lenny's Newsletter, Growth, Business Models & Monetization Lenny Rachitsky In 7 answers
  21. The most accessible book for non-finance founders on reading a P&L, balance sheet, and cash flow statement. It demystifies the... hbr.org Book · book (~304 pages) Financial Intelligence for Entrepreneurs Karen Berman & Joe Knight In 7 answers
  22. The single most useful mental model for whether you actually need to raise. Graham's 'default alive vs default dead' framing... paulgraham.com Article · 10 min read Default Alive or Default Dead? Paul Graham In 7 answers
  23. The largest and most credible free co-founder matching platform in the world, with vetted founders and 100,000+ matches made.... ycombinator.com Tool · Free platform, ongoing Y Combinator Co-Founder Matching Y Combinator In 7 answers
  24. The canonical primary source on the mindset shift before you start up, Graham's Stanford lecture directly addresses whether you... paulgraham.com Essay · ~6,000 words Before the Startup Paul Graham In 7 answers

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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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