A fantastic guide to Bootstrapping your business and even getting started with it.

From Page 21 of the manifesto -

Hereʼs how Id used the seven bootstrapper tools::

1. Nothing to lose: The method used by Id threatened to destroy software distribution as we know it. Which was fine with id, but not so fine with the guys at the big software companies. There’s no way in the world they would have had the guts to do this themselves.
2. Happy with small fish: Because Id didn’t spend any money on advertising, and because it had developed the game itself, it didn’t need Doom to be the best-selling computer game of the year to be happy. Even 30,000 sales would have been enough to make the venture successful.
3. Presidential Input: Id had total consistency. The game was designed, marketed, licensed, and managed by the same four people. No miscommunication here.
4. Rapid R & D: There were no budget committees, no marketing schedules, no organizational charts to get in the way. (It’s interesting to note that it took three times as long for id to create Doom’s sequel. The game’s makers had apparently forgotten what they had learned about rapid R&D.)
5. The Underdog: Consumers love to root for the hippies at id. It makes them more likely to spread the word and to buy (not copy) the final game.
6. Low Overhead: There’s no question that high overhead costs would have wiped these guys out.
7. Time: They knew they could ship when they needed to, instead of when shareholders demanded a new influx of sales. Because they controlled time, they could use it to their advantage.

For more of such brilliant stuff, read the book in full screen mode here.

Or download it here and read it at your own pace.

Energy is always crucial factor in your personal as well as professional success and very few people actually realize this fact.

Robin Sharma shares six rules to superior energy.

1. Eat less — Eat until you are enough, but not until you are full (borrowed from Mahatma Gandhi)
2. Eat nothing post 8pm
3. Cut back on white food — Sugar, Pasta, Bread and replace it with fruits and vegetables
4. Drink more water than you ever imagine drinking now — Clean thinking + a lot more energy
5. Daily movement (Exercise) — Clear thinking & Feel good
6. Replacement food — Don’t do away with sweet things, but replace them with fruits or muesli or cereal.

Is getting up early relevant?

The best of the best, are those who have trained to get up early.

It is a competitive advantage ( ), because most of the other competitors are asleep. ( )

Give yourself a 60 minute leadership hour, just as the best practice their art.

So how do you get up early?

• Get super fit — Lot more energy, Lot more passion and you’d just need much less sleep.
• Get a weekend massage — It isn’t a cost, but an investment. It improves circulation and helps you get more energized.
• Eat less food, manage your diet and you’ll have more energy.
• Get up in the morning, write in a journal and dump all your worries, tensions and stress. The more you worry, the more energy you dissipate and the more sleep you need.
• Find ways to love your job, to be passionate about your job and be the best in your job.

Seasoned serial entrepreneur Marc Andreessen shares his three criteria for a successful start-up:

• There must be a substantial market opportunity
• A product that’s a 10x better solution, and
• An outstanding team.

He goes on to state that there can be some compromise in the product area, but that the other two legs of a burgeoning business must stand firm.

Don’t miss the video alongside here!

This presentation delving into the alchemy of Business Model Innovation by Alexander Osterwalder focuses on Your Business Model: How to Identify and Improve it.

Don’t miss the presentation along side!

1. Be Narrow

Focus on the smallest possible problem you could solve that would potentially be useful.

2. Be Different

First of all, realize that no sufficiently interesting space will be limited to one player. In a sense, competition actually is good—especially to legitimize new markets. Second, see #1—the specialist will almost always kick the generalist’s ass. Third, consider doing something that’s not so cutting edge.

Get a good, non-generic name.

3. Be Casual

We now into an era of “Casual Web” ~ for people with lives as well as broadband.

Create services that fit in with—and, indeed, help—people’s everyday lives without requiring lots of commitment or identity change.

4. Be Picky

With features, employees, investors, partners, press opportunities and almost everything you do as a startup.

One of Google’s biggest strengths—and sources of frustration for outsiders—was their willingness to say no to opportunities, easy money, potential employees, and deals.

5. Be User-Centric

User experience is everything. It always has been, but it’s still undervalued and under-invested in. If you don’t know user-centered design, study it.

6. Be Self-Centered

Great products almost always come from someone scratching their own itch. Create something you want to exist in the world. Be a user of your own product. Hire people who are users of your product.

7. Be Greedy

Design something to charge for into your product and start taking money within 6 months.

Done right, charging money can actually accelerate growth, not impede it, because then you have something to fuel marketing costs with.

8. Be Tiny

One way to do this is to use turnkey services to lower your overhead—Administaff, ServerBeach, web apps, maybe even Elance.

9. Be Agile

Initial assumptions are almost always wrong.

That’s why the waterfall approach to building software is obsolete in favor agile techniques. The same philosophy should be applied to building a company.

10. Be Balanced

Nature requires balance for health—as do the bodies and minds who work for you and, without which, your company will be worthless. There is no better way to maintain balance and lower your stress that I’ve found than David Allen’s GTD process. Learn it. Live it. Make it a part of your company, and you’ll have a secret weapon.

11. Be Wary (Bonus!)

Overgeneralized lists of business “rules” are not to be taken too literally. There are exceptions to everything.

Some deep stuff to think about.

Get the original article here. Enjoy!