Turn Your Startup Idea Into Reality With This Blinkist Guide
Around the world, there were more than 1,200 unicorn startups — companies valued at over $1 billion — in October 2022. Want to add your company to that list in 2023? One of the first steps in any successful startup’s journey is getting funding.
But launching and funding a startup isn’t something they teach you at school. And while there’s plenty of advice online, it’s hard to tell what’s coming from true experts and what’s worth your time.
To help you achieve startup success, turn to the guide called “Fund and Launch Your Startup” all about — you guessed it — how to start and get funding for your business idea.
It’s narrated by Soraya Darabi, the founder and general partner of Venture Capital firm TMV. As well as being an investor herself, Darabi has some impressive accolades to her name: she was named one of the “100 Most Creative People in Business” by Fast Company, a “30 Under 30” by Inc, and a “40 Under 40: Women to Watch” by Fortune Magazine.
Darabi’s guide can be found on the Blinkist app, which gathers key insights from nonfiction books and shares them as bite-sized explainers you can listen to in 15 minutes. There are 5,500 titles to choose from across 27 categories like entrepreneurship, leadership, and personal development.
As well as bite-sized explainers, Blinkist offers guides, which are short courses narrated by an expert or thought leader. They only take an hour or two to work through, but they’re packed with advice. The expert shares their own advice, powerful ideas from books they think are valuable, interactive exercises to guide your learning, and useful recaps so you don’t forget the key messages.
In “Fund and Launch Your Startup,” Darabi shares her advice on navigating the confusing world of startups. Here’s what you can expect to learn in the Blinkist guide.
1. Venture Capitalists Look for Founder-Market Fit When Deciding Which Early-Stage Startups to Fund
Secrets of Sand Hill Road
- 19 min reading time
- audio version available
Darabi kicks off the guide by sharing Blinkist’s explainer of Secrets of Sand Hill Road by Scott Kupor. She says this explainer is the perfect primer for understanding how venture funding works from the inside.
One key piece of advice from the explainer? Think about your founder-market fit. Pitching VCs can be a daunting task, especially when you’re trying to sell them on your early-stage idea. One thing investors will be looking for when you don’t have data or sales to back up your idea is founder-market fit, or how you or your founders are uniquely positioned to bring your company to life based on past experience.
2. Adopt a Growth Mindset and Learn from Your Failures
Mindset
- 15 min reading time
- audio version available
There’s a disheartening statistic that 90% of startups fail. And even if your startup does explode, there’ll most likely be a few setbacks along the way. But Darabi argues we should learn from these failures and adopt a growth mindset to become more resilient and believe you can always keep learning and growing.
To help you develop a growth mindset, the guide includes Blinkist’s explainer of Mindset by Stanford psychology professor Carol Dweck.
“Becoming is better than being.”
3. Find Common Ground When Negotiating
Getting to Yes
- 18 min reading time
- audio version available
Darabi says one thing that’s almost more inevitable than failure in the startup world is negotiation. You may have to negotiate when securing funding, hiring a team, or bringing on manufacturers or distributors.
For successful negotiation, you need to find common ground and make a compromise, instead of focusing on “beating” whoever you’re negotiating with. Everyone should walk away feeling like they’ve won.
This chapter of the guide includes insights from Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton.
“People listen better if they feel that you have understood them. They tend to think that those who understand them are intelligent and sympathetic people whose own opinions may be worth listening to. So if you want the other side to appreciate your interests, begin by demonstrating that you appreciate theirs.”
Learn From More Guides on Blinkist
Beyond learning how to launch a startup and secure funding, Blinkist’s guides cover everything from rebooting your creativity with music producer Kirk Thompson to improving your sex life with marriage therapist Shadeen Francis.
Here’s how the app works.
Brush Up on Your Business Knowledge in 15 Minutes a Day
Beyond guides, you can explore Blinkist’s library of 5,500 nonfiction books. For each one, the team of expert researchers, writers, and editors have pulled together the most important ideas, actionable advice, and memorable anecdotes into one easy-to-digest bite-sized explainer.
Choose from titles in 27 categories including entrepreneurship, psychology, mindfulness, and politics, so beyond startups, you can increase your knowledge of just about anything.
Plus, the team adds 70 new titles every month, too, including trending titles and New York Times bestsellers.
Learn the Secrets of Startup Success On the Go
You don’t have to find time to sit down and read these explainers, though. Each one is available in audio form, so you can listen and learn on the go while traveling to work, on your morning walk, or doing chores around the house.
You’ll also find Shortcasts on the Blinkist app, bite-sized episodes of leading podcasts like Daily Stoic with Ryan Holiday or The $100 MBA Show with Omar Zenhom.
–Karen Trepte, HuffPost
One of the World’s Best Apps
Blinkist has won awards from the likes of Google and the United Nations, and it’s been praised by everyone from The New York Times to Forbes.
What’s more, tech giant Apple called it one of the top 20 apps for lifelong learning and even named it one of the world’s best apps.
Why is Blinkist loved so much? Because it makes a real difference to people’s lives. The app helps 91% of users create better habits and 87% make positive changes to their lives — all from what they learn on the app. Plus, 95% of users read significantly more now than before they started using Blinkist.
24 Million Users Turn to Blinkist to Learn and Grow
Blinkist has 24 million users around the world and they’ve given the app more than 94,000 5-star ratings across app stores. Here’s what some of them have to say:
–5-star review
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Want to learn from Blinkist’s “Fund and Launch Your Startup” guide? Download the app to get started.
