Category: Entrepreneurship

Be Compelling, not Genius

Be compelling, not Genius

A lot of times, you would have this pure genius idea that you know no one else has thought of (hmm, not sure about that). This is something that can blow the world away. Honestly, you have no clue if this genius idea would work or not, but it’s really awesome, and it would be SO amazing if it worked.

On the other hand, there are some ideas or solutions that you know is pretty compelling, but not as “sexy”. I would say, if this is your first project/startup, focus on the compelling one.

A lesson from the birth of Viralogy.com

So when we were conceptualizing Viralogy.com in December 2008, we were stuck between 2 ideas: one that was “genius”, innovative, and fun, but somewhat shaky. The other one was more “compelling” but not as mind-blowing. I mean, a Social Media Rank is cool and meets a big demand in the social mediasphere, but it’s not like the newest patented technology that will lead an undiscovered industry for the next two decades. It’s simply something that is needed, and no one else is doing it.

We all wanted to do the genius and exciting project, but it was also pretty shaky. There were too many possible scenarios that it didn’t work out. It was a brilliant way to coorindate many moving parts together to create value for all sides and make money. However, with so many moving parts, the stars have to align for all of that to continuously work out without any trouble.

If this is your first project, choose the compelling project, and put your genius into that

Finally, we decided that the genius project was too shaky, and don’t want to work for 3 years and have everything fall apart. We then picked the more compelling one. However, at that point, we didn’t know if this compelling one could make money. We then put in some of our creative juices and then came up with something cool that could make money (That actually wasn’t compelling and we switched away a bit afterward). We also put in a lot of work to make sure that this “compelling” idea is fun, exciting, and even sometimes sexy. And that is the birth of Viralogy.com.

To prove a point, within our first month of official launch, we garnered around 20,000 unique visitors, 30% of them from Direct Traffic. Three months into the project, we’ve developed a strong brand name, achieved a Pagerank of 5 (for Viralogy.com/blog), obtained over 100,000 blogs with 1.2M blog calls, and solid traffic. We got to this point because unlike many other “innovative” startups, we were compelling, and we used our creativity to push it through.

Trust me, even if you think something is compelling, there’s still going to be so many variables that get in your way that require your brilliance to solve. For the same reasons, Good to Great tells you to do what you are the best at in the world, not what’s the coolest or most popular.

If this is your first project, pick the compelling solution, use your genius within that, and build a foundation/reputation that can support your other brilliant ideas.

Mousetrap on Termites: Build What Your Customers Want

(Viddler Screwed Old Users by deleting all their videos, so no video here 🙁 )

Don’t create the perfect product. Create what your customers want

A lot of times, teams try to produce the most perfect piece of product they can imagine. They want all the features, all the bells and whistles, and all the design implemented before they can launch it to their audience. By doing so, they spend a lot of time and money. When they finally launch it into the market, often times they realize that this is not what the customers want, and they have to revise it anyway.

Don’t make the perfect mousetrap if your customer has termite problems

Some people can spend years trying to build the perfect mousetrap, and then realize that their customer only has termites at their place. Now all that work is wasted. It would be much more efficient if you talk to the customer first, see what problems they have, go visit their house, or even live there for a few days to see the problems!

Building the best product by yourself means you assume that you are 100% like your customer

When you are trying to build the best product by yourself, you are building something that pleases you, not your customers. The only way this can work, is if you are 100% representative of your customers, which is rarely the case. Don’t be arrogant and think you know more about the customers than themselves. That might be true, but you would have better odds talking to them first about it.

A recession is the best time to invest in startups, but not the best time to raise funds

Invest in early stage startups in a recession

A recession is the perfect time to invest in startups because

1) You get MUCH better deals with valuation
2) Each dollar gets you more stuff
3) A much bigger talent pool (not just labor pool) that are unemployed and ready to move to a startup
4) Competition Haven: large companies are not expanding but shrinking; new companies are scared to start

One of the few problems with startups in a recession, is that they have no cash to take advantage of the benefits. But if you are an investor, you solve that problem! Before your cash was just necessary to not fall behind. Now your cash becomes a competitive advantage!

Startups should not waste time raising money. Focus on being lean and sustainable

Raising money is time consuming and dysfuctional for growth (like digging for water in a dessert). Instead of begging for money from people who don’t want to give you, focus on making your business more valuable.

Be as lean as possible. Your goal is not to run fast like a cheetah and burn out. Your goal is to be a cockroach and survive lava. As time goes by and the economy recovers, you will be the last man standing. Battles are won not by how many enemiese each side has killed, but who has the last men standing.

The Art of Being Bad but Good Enough

The first launch is usually crappy

Whenever we first launch a product or make a business plan, we would be so proud of it and send it to everyone. A month later, we think it’s so crappy that we are embarrassed to send it to anyone. Then we make a super improvement and think it’s the best thing in the world again. After a month of sending it to everyone, we realize it’s so hideous that we don’t want to send it to anyone again. We did that for half a dozen times.

Sometimes we tell ourselves, “If it’s good enough to be sent to everyone during the first revision, it should be good enough when it’s version 4. We don’t need to wait 2 weeks for version 5 to come out.”

Improve your product with your users/customers

If it takes a year to create a good product, taking a year and improving it at home will not be anywhere close to launching it early and using the rest of the time to improve from customer feedback. As long as you are responding to them and improving fast, they will be patient with you.

Even if you disappointed the first 100 people who used the site, you make sure that the Millions of others use a good product later on. Plus, the first 100 will hear it if you do a good job a year later and come back to it.

Take rare criticism seriously

Most of the time, you will hear people saying how good your stuff is. However, pay extra attention when someone says you need to improve, especially when it’s someone with more experience.

People don’t like to tell you negative things, so when you happen to hear one, it might be a rare opportunity for you to realize what are the biggest things you need to work on.

Stress of a Startup CEO

Running a Startup is stressful

Think of running a startup like preparing for a test, in which if you failed, you will get kicked out of school and end up wasting the last 3-4 years of schooling.

Now think of it as a test where if you failed it, a dozen of your friends in the same school will get kicked out and will have wasted 3-4 years of their lives too.

Finally, don’t think about it as a test you are preparing. Think about it as daily pop-quizzes that you don’t know what will be covered, and if don’t do well, you and all those friends will get kicked out of school.

That’s the stress of a Startup CEO.

When you are living for others, it’s hard to care about yourself and friends

I don’t necessarily do a super great job, but I try very hard to pass all the pop-quizzes and solve all the new problems that arise daily.

That’s why if you are my friend, I beg you to be understanding when can’t hang out very often and just have fun with you.

I’m not just doing this for myself. I am doing this for everyone who gave up high paying jobs, a more comfortable life, and better relationships for the vision that I brought them on to. I brought them onto the journey, and I have to try my best to make sure that if we one day do fail, it is not because I only put in 99% of my energy.

The Three Phases of a Startup

I’ve always believed that there are three phases of a startup, and they are:

I. You run the business

During this time, you are setting everything up. if you work harder, the business moves faster; if you don’t work, the business does not move at all. You can still deal with fulltime jobs, school, or other things since there is a lot of flexibility.

II. The business runs you

After a certain point, you start to lose control of the progress of the company. Tasks arise by itself in the business: your customers are demanding service, your employees need direction, problems need to be solved. At this point you can’t choose to stop working or work slowly, because this world does not wait for you, and being slow on progress simply means death for the company.

III. The business runs itself

Hopefully, after a lot of hard work, you will reach the point where the business runs itself. Systems are set up, revenue streams in, employees not what to do. If you take a vacation and come back, the business would become stronger itself. This is when you can fully work ON your business, not IN your business (thank you Michael Gerber). Sadly, very few business actually get to this state.

How I started my Entrepreneurial Career Freshman Year in College


When I talk to my friends outside of the startup world, one of the most common questions I get from them is “how do you start?” I usually tell them, “You just start. Figure out what you want to do, find people who have complementary skills to do it with you, and learn everything you can from the internet.” Then they’ll usually follow up with “But I don’t have a lot of money or any great ideas. Isn’t it very risky?”

You don’t need a lot of money or a great idea to be an entrepreneur

Many people have the false impression that they need a lot of money and a great idea to be an entrepreneur. That’s actually not true. Sure, its risky, but if you don’t have much money, what’s there to lose? Since I was 18, I started an online retailing company selling electronic products, a company that imports components of construction machinery (didn’t take off due to partnership misalignment in values), a non-profit for professional networking services, a small business consulting company, the premiere business organization in UCLA (not really a company, so consider that taking a break), Future Delivery and the company I have right now, RewardMe.

The first step towards entrepreneurship could be small

When I first started, I obviously didn’t have any money. The whole thing came as an accident when I raffled myself two football tickets and sold them on eBay. I felt something was lightened up within me, as if I have found a calling. So then I decided to trade TI-83 Calculators, which is something everyone needs for school. I would go on eBay during hours when everyone was asleep so I can buy the calculators without anyone bidding against me, and I would sell them during times when there were a lot of bid competition. If you used eBay before, you know it’s all about how many people are bidding against each other when your listing ends. Just like that, I would buy a calculator for $40 at 2AM, and then sell it for $60 at 1PM. A pretty good margin.

However, I was not satisfied. I kept finding people on eBay selling brand new products that are a lot cheaper than retail prices, and I wanted to do that too. I thought that these people must have bought in bulk and I would never be able to compete with them. But I lightened up when I found out about Dropshipping.

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