As a guy that spent five years getting paid to dole out advice to startup companies I know good advice when I see it. And Fred nails it again.
All too often during my time at ATDC I would see entrepreneurs go from advisors, fellow entrepreneurs, mentors, pitch practices, potential investors, and VCs (more often than not not potential investors) and outline their businesses. And getting a lot of feedback. And that feedback was often conflicting based on the listener's personal experience and what they would do if they were you. Entrepreneurs would often come to me with this conflicting advice and a pretty simple question. Something along the lines of "what should I do?" or "what do you think?"
My answer was also a question. "What are you hearing from your customers and prospects?" That is what really matters.
The footnotes version of Fred's advice.
- Keep a list of feedback and look at it over time to identify emergent themes that you might want to act on.
- Give all feedback a bias discount.
- Listen to the market, not advisors/mentors/investors.
Mr. Market is the best advisor. It's a great quote from a VC.