Today we talk through a system to help you start the business you don't feel ready to start. We do this because that's the only type of business there is. You're never going to feel prepared so you can't let that fear paralyze you.

We talk through the three main gaps that keep founders from starting - the Knowledge Gap, the Network Gap, and the Product Gap - and describe a method that'll help you navigate each. We get a little help from a startup idea Brian's been kicking around, a turtle swimming across the Atlantic Ocean, and the Backstreet Boys.

• Tacklebox
• Idea to Startup Newsletter
• Idea to Startup Bot
• Big Fish
• Put Your Ass Where Your Heart Wants to Be
  

00:30 The Business You’re Not Quite Ready to Start 01:31 The Three Gaps
03:28 Why Turtles Swim Across the Atlantic Ocean
07:11 Smooth Jazz
07:40 Before You’re Ready
08:16 The Customized Diet Idea
10:20 The Notion Idea Template
12:06 The Knowledge Gap - The Expert Interview
15:51 The Network Gap - The Monthly Newsletter
17:48 The Product Gap - The Marathon Shoe and The Knowledge Spectrum
21:33 The End - Action Reduces Fear

Most people's startup approach is haphazard. It's a combination of instincts and reactions and luck or happenstance. People who succeed are far more purposeful. Today, we'll help you take your idea and yourself seriously. We'll build your entrepreneurship handbook - the thing that'll let you make tough decisions at scale.

• Tacklebox
• Idea to Startup Newsletter
• Byldd
• "I'm a Neuroscientist, and these are 5 things I do every day"

1:00 Your Entrepreneurial Self
2:35 The Dads
7:00 Byldd
8:04 Why Find Your Lobster Failed
12:40 The Serious Email
14:12 Entrepreneur or Tourist?
15:13 Your Entrepreneurship Handbook
20:30 The End - Implementing

Today, we'll help all the non-storytellers tell a compelling story about their business. We've got a framework that'll walk you through the ingredients of a compelling story, and a mise en place-inspired approach that'll help you get to story market fit. We've got some rules, some variables, some accelerants, and an example about a service that helps Airbnb hosts launch their own interior design businesses.

• Tacklebox
• Idea to Startup Newsletter
• Building a Story Brand
• Your New Life Will Cost You Your Old One
• Work Clean - The Life-Changing Power of Mise en Place
• How to Write Essays that Spread

00:30 Storytelling for your startup
03:24 The Two Reasons for the Barefoot Son Story
07:09 Smooth Jazz
07:37 The Three Ruls of Good Storytelling for Entrepreneurs
08:45 Rule 1: Good Stories Are About Speed
10:44 Rule 2: You Don’t Matter
11:39 Rule 3: A Good Story is Earned
12:22 Mise En Place
14:10 The Ingredients of Your Story
17:09 The Accelerants
19:24 Airbnb Interior Design
23:23 The End: Montaigne

Today, we'll talk about one of the most common hurdles entrepreneurs run into - getting tempted by a new idea a few months into working on their main idea. We lay out a framework to identify the first principles of the new idea fast so you can decide if it's worth a pivot. We also dig in on why the urge to pivot shows up, procrastination, and how to win a baking contest. And, English Lords from the 17th century.

• Tacklebox
• Idea to Startup Newsletter

00:26 Intro
05:40 Chronic Pain Side Idea
08:30 Smooth Jazz
09:00 All Babies Are Cute
13:00 Internal vs. External Signal
14:01 Why You Have a Lawn
16:50 What to Look For in a New Idea
20:30 How to Win a Baking Competition

Today, we'll help you pick your startup's first customer segment. This decision dooms a huge percentage of first time entrepreneurs - if you don't understand what the job of your first customer segment is, you'll likely pick a customer incapable of doing it. Your first customer has a unique responsibility that no other customer will have - you need to choose them carefully.

Conversely, if you choose the right first customer, you'll set yourself up for serious growth.

We go through the five characteristics your first customer needs, give a preview of what your successful startup will look like, and help a listener find the first customer for their Myers Briggs startup.

• Byldd
• Tacklebox
• Getting Real (museum curator reference)
• Everyman Espresso (☕️ 🐐)

Timestamps

00:27 First Time Entrepreneurs vs. Second Time Entrepreneurs
03:20 The Idea: Personality-Based Management
06:29 Why You, Why At All, Why Now
08:55 Byldd
09:55 The Story of Your Successful Startup
15:35 The Five Necessary First Customer Characteristics
16:41 Characteristic One: Pain
21:51 Characteristic Two: The Knowledge Spectrum
25:43 Characteristic Three: Measurement
28:24 Characteristic Four: Influence
29:48 Characteristic Five: Frequency
31:45 The End

Today, we help you become the type of founder who relishes uncomfortable things that lead to successful startups. There are no real secrets in the startup world - the hard, proactive, uncomfortable work leads to businesses that matter. This work doesn’t happen without a system.

Today we help you build that system, using The Costanza Swap, The Three Levers of Resilience, and The Failure Case.

Hoo ahh.

• Byldd
• Tacklebox

00:24 Doing Things You Don’t Want To Do
02:45 Why the Eisenhower Box Doesn’t Work for Entrepreneurs
03:30 The Al Pacino Problem
04:45 Creating Content
08:00 Smooth Jazz
08:30 The Costanza Swap
10:15 One Out, One In
11:20 The Three Levers of Resilience
12:40 Scheduling
13:24 Committing
14:30 Dissecting
17:40 The Failure Case
21:15 Happiness

Today's classic episode will help you get the first version of your product up and out this weekend.

We use a three-part framework to help you focus in on the one core feature you've got to nail that can be built by someone with no technical or product building skills in an afternoon. We also find your customers inertia and ride that wave to make it easier to use your product than not.

We get help from an airbnb for lawn equipment startup and move the ball forward on the chronic pain idea.

• Byldd
• Tacklebox
• Tacklebox Newsletter
• The Personal MBA

0:55 The Two Questions Entrepreneurs Have About Products
2:35 A Great Product Does Two Things
4:26 Entrepreneur Baggage + Airbnb for Lawn Equipment
6:29 A Mindset for Today
8:13 Step One - Process
8:53 Organ Donors
9:55 Inertia
11:35 Chronic Pain
13:07 Frank’s Process
14:50 Harry Potter and Being Chosen
15:43 Step Two - Metrics
17:12 Chronic Pain Ex-College Athlete SOM
18:35 Outcome not Features - The Product is Irrelevant
19:16 The Five Marketing Archetypes - STTC, Pain, Cost, Apparate, Urgency
20:19 Step Three - Delivery (The Product)
20:32 Warby Parker
22:23 The Twelve Forms of Value
25:49 The Venmo Accountability Group

Today, we talk through a 4-part system to generate ideas - one that'll tap into your brain's natural ability to develop novel solutions rather than just waiting (hoping) inspiration will strike. We'll do it with a little help from a baseball training facility, a corked wine bottle, and an MRI startup.

• Tacklebox
• Idea to Startup Newsletter
• Fermenting Ideas
• Pod: Customers speak Problem
• Pod: How to Create a Strategy for your Startup
• Readwise
• Idea to Startup Bot

00:26 Idea People
02:47 A Baseball Training Facility
04:45 Inversion
07:46 Smooth Jazz
9:24 Part 1: Identifying the Problem
12:34 Part 2: Collecting
17:22 Part 3: Chewing
20:14 Part 4: Testing
21:37 The End + How to Start