How We Did It

Aspiring entrepreneurs have a number of concerns that stop them from launching their own business - How do you pay your monthly bills when you are not making money? How do you find the right manufacturer so that you do not get swindled? How do you find the right developer? How do you actually find customers? What happens if you fail and do not find a job again?

Unlike what is commonly believed, most entrepreneurs are pretty risk averse. What separates them from aspiring entrepreneurs is their ability to take calculated financial decisions and actually doing things that they are passionate about. So how do you be like them?

In this book, author Anand Srinivasan; a digital media consultant and a struggling entrepreneur himself, talks to 100 different entrepreneurs about the challenges they faced while starting up and how they overcame them. Entrepreneurs interviewed include the likes of Matt Barrie from Freelancer.com; the world's largest online freelancer marketplace, Beth Shaw from YogaFit; the world's largest Yoga training school and Dianne Crowley from Wild Wing Cafe; a popular restaurant chain in South Eastern USA. The list of interviewed entrepreneurs include people from all hues and backgrounds - people who grew their business as a side-job, those who risked it all and jumped in to entrepreneurship, mommy entrepreneurs who had to take care of children, entrepreneur couples who did not have the luxury of a stable spouse income.

The idea for this book is simple - we want to understand the struggles of entrepreneurship from multiple perspectives; including those who failed and had to go back to a regular job. This is a book targeted at all aspiring entrepreneurs and those like the author himself who are still struggling to make their business successful. Get to learn the tips and tricks that made other entrepreneurs successful. Learn how they really did it. List of chapters 1: Validating Your Business Idea
2: Setting Your Finances Straight
3: How To Fund Your Start-up
4: Finding The Right Manufacturer
4a - Setting Up Your Own Manufacturing
5: Finding A Development Team
6: How To Get The Very First Customers
7: Getting Those First Big Customers
8: Tackling The Chicken & Egg Problem
9: Growth vs. Revenue - What Comes First?
10: What Do You Charge Your Customers?
11: Challenges With Increasing Demand
12: Strategies To Retain Your Customers
13: Handling Negative Press & Reviews
14: Achieving Work-Life Balance
15: Entrepreneur Couples And Finance Planning
16: Female Entrepreneurs' Challenges
17: Raising Kids While Starting Up
18: Tech Startups Outside USA
19: Hiring - Mistakes & Lessons Learned
20: How Important Is A Co-Founder?
21: Rejected By VCs. Are VCs Necessary?
22: Start-up Failure - How Do You Recover?
23: Risk Taking For Starting Up
24: Selling Your Business
25: The Lows Of Entrepreneurship
26 - Lessons From Startup Journey