Unit Economics 

Growth  is always a focus for  startups , since a  startup  without  growth  is usually a failure. However, how and when to grow is often misunderstood.  YC  is sometimes criticised for pushing companies to grow at all costs, but in fact we push companies to talk to their users, build what they want, and iterate quickly.  Growth  is a natural result of doing these three things successfully. Yet,  growth  is not always the right choice. If you have not yet made something your customers want - in other words, have found  product-market fit , it makes little sense to grow (The Real  Product-Market Fit    https://www.michaelseibel.com/blog/the-real-produc...  by  Michael Seibel ). Poor retention is always the result. Also, if you have an unprofitable  product ,  growth  merely drains cash from the company. As PB likes to say, it never makes sense to take 80 cents from a customer and then hand them a  dollar  back. The fact that  unit economics  really matter shouldn’t come as a surprise, but too many  startups  seem to forget this basic fact ( Unit Economics  by  Sam Altman    https://blog.samaltman.com/unit-economics).

#Y Combinator   #Startup School   #Geoff Ralston   #Michael Seibel   #Product-Market fit   #Growth   #Fundraising   #Unit Economics