Startup Urban Legends You Need to Avoid
As you enter the world of entrepreneurship there will be many misconceptions you need to come to grips with. Some have glimmer of truth while others are completely baseless. These startup urban legends are destroying the entrepreneurial spirit and driving many people towards business failure.
The most interesting of all is The Myth About Creation Myths, an insightful article exposing the myth about great businesses starting in garages just like YouTube and Apple.
In other words, companies aren’t born in garages. Companies are born in companies.
Consider two of the founders of YouTube, Steve Chen and Chad Hurley. Both cut their teeth at PayPal–in fact, Hurley was one of PayPal’s first employees and even designed its logo. (He is also the son-in-law of James Clark, who founded Netscape and Silicon Graphics.) Top-tier venture-capital firms were calling them, offering money, counsel, and connections, within months of launch. That’s not quite as uplifting as hearing that twentysomething buddies created a cool site to swap videos with friends.
Aside from these garage stories there are many other myths haunting starting entrepreneurs:
“The Best Advice is Free” is one of the seven deadly small business myths listed by IdeaMarketers.
Read why routermods.com thinks “a brilliant idea will make you rich” is one of his Top Ten Geek Business Myths.
On the other hand, “It’s hard to get a bank loan to start a business” is a startup myth according to Business Opportunities and Ideas.
