Tanmay Pandya的动态

The average age of a YC startup founder is 29 years old. In the next 5 years, I think this may increase to 39 years old. Here’s why: BACKGROUND A few weeks ago I was Austin for a RB2B offsite. On the sidelines of our meeting Adam, Diana and I were reflecting on how it is becoming harder to sell technology but easier to build technology. And it is a complete flip from before. On the flight back I realized this will have a huge impact on how startups are funded... ? In the past: - VCs invested in founders that were hands on with technology - They could code themselves or attract others - They had high energy and were knowledgeable about new technologies - Selling was much easier. Brute force worked.? - They were often selling to first time buyers that were not savvy.? - Typical profile: An engineer with 5 years of experience with good pedigree In future: - Selling is becoming harder while building a technology is becoming easier.? - Buyers are no longer naive. They have a ton of information. Their decision making process has gotten complex.? - There's increased competition not just from local players but also global vendors - All this is making GTM and selling more difficult.? - Founders that already have an audience will do much better to get to Product Market fit.? - Typical Profile: A Sales Leader or a Marketing Lead with 10-15 years experience that is a trusted advisor for buyers in a given domain In the past, the only way VCs made money was through homeruns and 15x returns. However, with rising economic uncertainties, the VC math may change for some segment of investment and a slightly more experienced GTM profile will appear like a good bet for investment. If you are in Sales or Marketing and have entrepreneurial aspirations, your time is here. GTM is getting complex. Stay ahead of the curve with modern GTM strategies and build an audience that trusts you. This audience will be key to you launching your next venture.?

Great insights! I completely agree that the landscape for startups is shifting. As technology becomes easier to build, the challenge of selling it effectively has become the new frontier. Santosh Sharan, your point about founders with strong sales and marketing backgrounds thriving makes a lot of sense. Do you think this trend will also reshape how early-stage companies prioritize their founding teams? Will we see more VCs favoring teams where sales and marketing leads take the spotlight over technical founders in the initial stages?

With all due respect, I am willing to bet (all in?) against the prediction, "The average age of a YC startup founder is 29 years old. In the next 5 years, I think this may increase to 39 years old." Here's why: Most of the zero-to-one startups (creating new markets) will need to heavily leverage AI (and other next-gen technologies) to not just build their moats, but to even earn their right to play at the table. This is where 39 year olds will have a tough time competing with the 20 year olds. Older people are at a huge disadvantage, as they have been hard-wired to think of traditional approaches to solve problems. AI-first generation will easily beat them. It seems like selling is getting harder, just because most startups are still indulging in the games/rules that were set by the previous generations. The new tech (AI) will lead to emergence of new business models, where not having exposure to previous-gen business models will become an advantage -- allowing for discovery of radically different pathways suited for modern ways of solving problems. There are always exceptions, and there are older people who think and behave very differently from the majority at that age. However, if I have to bet based on age, I would be heavily biased towards the 20 year olds vs. the 39 year olds.

As AI makes it easier to build technology, sophisticated go-to-market will be critical to success. You enhance your go-to-market, you need to use machine learning and data techniques, like: – customer segmentation – LTV analytics – A/B testing and multivariate testing – customer research – churn and customer satisfaction modeling Go-to-market will get more complex, so you will need to use more sophisticated tools ...

Startups that raised money leading up to 2021/22 are learning a hard truth (if they are still around): Growth at all costs doesn’t work when the market shifts. Back then, it was all about: ?? Hypergrowth ?? Massive hiring ?? Sky-high valuations VCs were funding anything that moved, and companies scaled fast—sometimes without a clear GTM strategy, efficient sales motion, or true product-market fit. Then 2023 hit. The rules changed. Revenue wasn’t enough. Burn rates became existential threats. Investors started asking about profitability. Survival meant making hard choices. Here's what we did: 1???Got ruthless about our ICP & buyer journey. Instead of chasing any revenue, we got laser-focused on who we serve best and how they buy. This clarity made everything downstream—messaging, sales, and marketing—far more effective. 2?? Built an efficient, repeatable GTM system. Once we knew our ideal customer, we designed a process to engage, educate, and convert them consistently. This wasn't about brute-force sales but about building a scalable engine. 3?? Scale only once the unit economics work. Only after we nailed our ICP and GTM strategy did we invest aggressively in scaling. With a clear playbook, every dollar spent on sales and marketing had a predictable return. Do I wish we did this sooner? Sure. Is it harder than it sounds? Yes. The startups that ignored this reality are struggling or gone. The ones that adapted are now chugging along in a market that rewards discipline. If your company had to make hard choices to survive, what worked for you?

5-point strategy for conquering the market with a startup I came across this strategy in a post by Santosh Sharan, and here are the key points he emphasizes: 1. Capture Attention Better Than Your Competition. 2. Just Be Different. 3. Refuse To Copy Your Dominant Competitor. 4. Relentless Focus On Optimizing The Low End Of The Market. 5. Be the best at something and don't try to be good at everything. Using Gearheart.io as an example, I will show how these points can be put into practice. 1. Capture Attention Better Than Your Competition Think globally, act locally. Inspired by business futurist Adrian Slywotzky at UCU Business School (LvBS), we’ve been generating buzz for Gearheart right here in Silicon Valley, since I moved here. What we’re doing: - LinkedIn activity to create valuable content for startup founders. Startups usually do this, not dev agencies. - Sponsoring and organizing our own local events in San Francisco and the Valley. - Building a community of allies by offering value to startups before we even start working with them. 2. Just Be Different - We have the mindset of entrepreneurs, having built our own startups, while also operating as an offshore team. - We specialize in B2B SaaS platforms that focus on creating time. - We’re located in hi-tech hubs like San Francisco and London, giving us access to a valuable network and exceptional expertise. 3. Refuse To Copy Your Dominant Competitor With countless competitors, we studied the market to see what everyone else was doing the same, and then chose to do things our way. As a startup founder myself, I speak the same language as our customers. 4. Relentless Focus On Optimizing The Low End Of The Market We combine the expertise and presence of an American agency that knows how to build products for this market, while leveraging offshore pricing by building teams in Ukraine and working remotely - a practice we’ve been mastering for over 12 years, long before COVID. 5. Be the best at something and don't try to be good at everything We focus on building B2B SaaS platforms designed for efficiency and speed, essentially creating time for our clients. That’s our niche. P.S. I invite you to apply this model to your business and share it in the comments.

This list contains 8,000+ YC founders from S05 to W23 who are behind some of the most innovative companies in the world I’ve networked with hundreds of startup founders using this goldmine of contacts, and now I’ve decided to share it — for free. Here’s what’s inside: → Complete Batch details (S05–W23) → Founders Linkedin → Companies they’ve built Why is this valuable? YC founders are some of the most well-connected entrepreneurs, leading fast-growing startups across every imaginable sector. If you’re in B2B, SaaS, or just looking to build relationships with high-impact individuals, this list could transform your outreach game. Who’s this for? ?? Agencies looking to partner with disruptive startups ?? VCs and investors looking for their next unicorn ?? B2B companies selling to high-growth founders ?? Anyone interested in connecting with the YC ecosystem Here’s how to get it: Like this post ?? Connect with me so I can DM you ?? Comment "Growth" below, and it’s yours! (Bonus): Repost this, and I’ll send it to you on priority. Founders' emails added too to list for people who repost :) PS: → If you need ideas on how to use this list for sales, partnerships, or outreach, feel free to DM me. Happy to share actionable tips! ??

Over the past 10 years, I’ve bootstrapped startups $0-$1M three times. Each time was TWICE as fast with HALF the resources. Here’s the breakdown of what I did, how long it took, and how many FTEs we had: 1. Robly Email Marketing January 2014 - May 2015 - Took 17 Months, staff of 25 when we hit it - Entirely sales-led - We had a call center to book a $35/mo subscription and did a 1-to-1 manual onboarding (it was a really, really good list) - Stalled out at $3m ARR, sold to PE in 2020 for $10m 2. GetEmails (now Retention.com) November 2019 - April 2020 - Took 27 weeks, staff of 6 when we hit it - Did Facebook ads, drove a 15min demo - Diana Ross did a thousands of them - Currently $21.7m ARR, 27% total margin 4.5 years later 3. RB2B March 2022 - June 2022 - Took 16 weeks, staff of 5 when we hit it - Founder-brand driven Inbound-led Outbound (mostly Linkedin) - Check out our dashboard (in comments ??) for up-to-the-minute metrics TAKEAWAY: Startups are HARD. The longer you do this, the more skilled you become at the craft. We’re all looking to capture lightning in a bottle. Each swing you take, you’re closer to it. Keep building.

Not cut out for the VC world? ???? Spent a year developing, got some users, even made that first sale. Start-up's ready to fundraise but gets hit with "not venture-backable." So, what’s the deal with not being cut out for VC? Let's break down 5 reasons you might get this label. 1?? Tiny Market. VC math is simple: Enter at a $10M valuation and exit at $1B in 5-7 years. To play this game, even snagging 0.5% of a market should rake in $100M in annual revenue, bumping your valuation to at least $1B. Audience question: What if our small market lets us grab 10% and make $100M? Sure, it’s possible. But snagging 0.5% of a massive market is way easier than dominating 10% of a small one. Betting on start-ups in tiny markets? Too risky for investors. Easier to pass and say “not venture-backable.” 2?? Few Customers Available. Imagine the market's loaded with cash but has only a handful of customers. Scenario: You’re selling water purification tech to big energy companies. They've got deep pockets for this tech, but maybe there are just 4-5 players in the whole country. Can you build a business here? Definitely! Each deal could be lucrative. Will VCs bite? Probably not. The challenge here lies in constantly finding and keeping those few clients. It's tough to break into such markets and requires costly marketing strategies. In niche markets like these, scaling becomes an uphill task. VCs steer clear as they prefer scalable growth within their portfolio startups. #startups #venture #markets

??**Launching Keystone 2.0!**?? New Mission: B2B SaaS founders ?? $10M ARR without venture capital. WHAT’S NEW? 1. Keystone Growth Advisory is now a full-service growth firm for bootstrapped B2B SaaS founders who want to grow to $10M ARR without venture capital. We specialize in: ? GTM Strategy ? Sales Execution ? Alternative Capital? 2. We designed a Growth Audit. It's the fastest way to uncover how to unlock revenue growth and cash flow without raising venture capital. 3. Check out all the details on our new website. BACKGROUND We started Keystone 13 months ago to help B2B SaaS founders access expansion capital without using debt or equity. We still do that. To date, we’ve helped founders individually unlock hundreds of thousands of dollars of expansion capital, all without using debt or equity. I’m very proud of that. But… I knew the Keystone team was capable of so much more. As we grew, founders started asking us for help in other areas like: 1. Go-To-Market Strategy 2. Sales Execution 3. Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) We said “Yes” to a lot. Here’s what we accomplished in the past 6 months: 1. Partnered with a founder and became his end-to-end sales team. ?? In 90 days, we built a multimillion-dollar pipeline and expect to close it in the next 90 days.? 2. Helped a founder bring 2 new SaaS products to market. ?? Validated their messaging, product-market fit, and ICP. 3. Built a strategic growth plan integrating a founder’s GTM strategy and financials all into one comprehensive FP&A model. ?? He uses this as his revenue and cash flow bible as he continues to scale. 4. Launched a competitive replacement program for a bootstrapped company. ?? Helping them convert customers from their VC-backed competitor. 5. Revamped a founder’s pricing and how they present it. ?? Significantly increased their Total Contract Value and the amount of money they’re getting paid upfront. The common thread: All these founders were bootstrapped and trying to grow to $10M ARR WITHOUT venture capital. TAKEAWAY Growing a SaaS company to $10M ARR without venture capital has its own unique challenges. Founders stand a better chance of making it with 2 things: 1. Cash flow-focused strategy 2. Tactical execution It was clear that my experience and passion for growing businesses without funding aligned directly with the bootstrapped founders who were asking us for help. So, I ran point on strategy. Jack Day and Noah Meltzer executed. We’re the Bootstrapped Bandits.?? ?? To kick things off, we’re doing the first 10 Growth Audits for under $200. It includes a detailed Revenue Analysis Model and a 90-minute strategy session with me. ?? Check out all the details on our new website ?? If you’re a founder or you know of a founder trying to grow to $10M ARR without venture capital, DM me. #SaaS #startups #GoToMarket #funding