4 Signs You Belong In a Startup Accelerator for SaaS Founders

0:00getting into an accelerator can drastically change the trajectory of your startup as a program director at Tiny Seed I've reviewed thousands of applications and I've noticed four commonalities among Founders that go on to find a lot of success in our program in this video I'll share a few signs that you might be a great fit for an accelerator like Tiny Seed I'll also share my number one signal that to me Sayes a Founder is not ready for a program like Tiny Seed but before we get to the list first let's define what exactly is a startup accelerator a startup accelerator is a program that helps early stage businesses grow faster

0:34that they normally would have by themselves by providing resources such as education mentorship a network and oftentimes funding accelerators are often industry specific so for example tiny C focuses on B2B SAS companies and usually are in exchange for Equity making them long-term Partners in your business all right so let's get to my list number one you know your numbers and you're focusing on the right ones there's a lot of of metrics that you could and probably are tracking in your business but some metrics are a little bit more important than others at Tiny Seed a few of the metrics that we tend to focus on especially in applications

1:11are Mr churn and LTV or ACV so that's lifetime value or annual contract value and that's because these are metrics that show us a general picture of how your business is performing at the same time there's a lot of metrics that really don't give you as much of a full picture view some people call these vanity metrics at Tiny Seed we have a Founder who lovingly coined these candy metrics and I really love this term because it kind of captures how these metrics can be attractive or tasty to consume but they don't really have a lot of nutritional value so these metrics would be things like email subscribers

1:49free trial users or unique visitors and while these are really interesting metrics without the full context of how they're growing your paid users they're just not as useful number two you're experimenting especially when it comes to marketing and sales the founders that I see go on to find the most success are the ones that are spending a lot of time experimenting tweaking and just generally working on finding the right marketing and sales channels for their business an accelerator is going to be able to help you with your general strategy and improving your Marketing sales but ultimately it's your job as the founder to implement the knowledge

2:26that you're getting from the program of course you don't need to be a marketing expert by any means but you should be spending time messing around trying out new channels just seeing what's working in the business something I tend to see a lot in Founders especially technical Founders is a tendency to want to focus on just building the next future because marketing isn't their core skill set and I get it I used to be a Founder myself and I was the builder type and marketing and sales scared the crap out of me but ultimately these are skill sets that you need to build and get out of your

2:56comfort zone number three you coachable so in my mind coachability is two things it's one that you're going to use the resources being provided to you and two that you are vulnerable as an accelerator we have a lot of resources that we know can help grow your business but on your side we need you to actually Implement and put these resources and suggestions into place the founders who I've seen get the most value out of a program like tiny seed are the ones who are seeking to use all of the resources they have available another part of being coachable is being vulnerable in an accelerator program you're going to

3:32be receiving a lot of feedback and you need to be able to lower your defenses and not explain away this feedback for example in tiny C we run masterminds these are groups that meet every other week and are kind of like accountability groups they meet to share the challenges that the founders are going through and help each other move forward but these are only useful if you're willing to realize that uh you don't know everything and that different people from different perspectives might be able to provide an Insight you haven't considered before so if you are going to join an accelerator remember to take advantage of all the resources and be

4:07open to criticism number four you are fast and furious this is a completely original never used before term that I used to describe Founders that just have this this itch this drive this need to always be moving forward to never be satisfied with a status quo Founders like this have a way of just implementing things quickly they move fast and they're comfortable with the fact that nothing's going to be perfect at the beginning but they get started anyway these Founders realize that experimentation is key often times you don't know if something will work in the business without giving it a shot first so give it a try and use what you learn

4:45as evidence moving forward in a minute I'll share my one red flag that says to me you shouldn't be applying for an accelerator but first I wanted to share that our accelerator Tiny Seed will be opening up applications soon Tiny Seed is a year-long accelerator program for ambitious B2B SAS Founders our program includes direct mentorship from some of the most prominent names in SAS you'll be getting direct feedback on topics you need to master such as Marketing sales hiring funnels pricing and m&a the program also includes masterminds and access to a community of like-minded SAS Founders sharing knowledge and growing together and of course you get the right

5:22amount of funding too if you're a B2B SAS founder who knows you could be growing faster if only you had access to the right resources we'd love to see you apply for Tiny Seed you can head over to Tiny seed.com slapp and applications are opening soon now the reality is that not every company should apply for an accelerator in fact most probably shouldn't which leads me to my red flag that a Founder probably isn't a good fit for an accelerator program and that is if you're just looking for funding if you're just looking for funding that's absolutely fine there's no problem with that it's just that an accelerator

5:58probably isn't your best option option and that's because an accelerator is never going to be the cheapest money that you can find and that's because the main value proposition of an accelerator is not the funding the real value you get is in the mentoring the education and the guidance to grow your business either way whether you're considering an accelerator or just funding there's a lot to take into consideration make sure to check out this video to avoid the biggest mistakes we see Founders make in early stage funding thanks for watching