Startup Guide: 10 Most Searched Questions on Startups

A startup means to start something economically. But this is not all, it is much bigger than you can’t think of.

This startup guide is for young minds who have a great unique Idea and want to develop a base then this startup guide is for you.

In this post, you’ll find the most common questions people are searching for concerning startups.

If you’re unable to grow your startup, these best online resources for startups and entrepreneurs will surely help you out.

Without any more ado, let’s take a look at what all these questions are and their answers.

10 Most Searched Questions on Startups

In this startup guide, let’s move to each question one by one and see what are these questions and what are the best answers to these questions.

1. What exactly is a Startup?

This is the 1st and most searched question that I am answering in this startup guide.

The startup is a new building company managed by an individual founder or group of founders, which is in developing mode. It is generally small when it starts and initially financed by self and investors.

The startup as by the name is not just about starting something, it is about thinking innovative and start working to discover something new. Inferior planning is also a type of innovative startup.

The startup is known for the high failure rate, but some of the startups which succeed are the companies that become influential and have large operations.

The process starts with thinking differently, doing well market research, and developing a business model around a product, service, process, and platform.

2. What is a startup fund?

A startup fund also known as startup capital is the amount of money required to start a business or a venture. It includes capital required for:

1. Premises i.e. Office space
2. Licenses and permits
3. Research and development
4. Inventory
5. Human resource
6. Manufacturing and developing
7. Marketing
8. Other and Miscellaneous expenses

All of these are the basic fund required by a startup to start.

3. What is a startup investment?

Startup investment is the investment invested by the investor by putting down capital in exchange for a portion of ownership in the company and rights to the profit and control in management.

One of the main non-conventional approaches to support a startup came through Kickstarter. With the presentation of crowdfunding, anybody would now be able to back an undertaking or battle in return for early access or an item markdown. Crowdfunding allows anybody to subsidize a fruitful startup, yet doesn’t give much comeback to the financial specialist. It opened the way to the “regular person” financial specialist who could deal with different thoughts and figure out which was meriting a little individual venture.

4. What are the different stages of startup funding?

Apart from the best tools for startups to grow, the startup fund is a crucial step to grow the startups. It is divided into 5 major stages. I am going to let you know about each stage in detail in this startup guide below.

But you must know that these 5 stages are not the only way of funding. The exact stages of funding cannot be determined because we don’t know about the exact sources of funding from the vital list of the capital arrangement, but these 5 are the top ones, this means most of the startup uses these funding stages.

4.1 Seed Capital/ Seed Funding

As known by the word “Seed” it is the basic source of capital for a startup used for market research, analysis, and plans layout purpose, arranged from own savings and/or acquisition from parents, guardian, and any known person.

4.2 Angel Investor Funding

Angel investors are the individual or groups of individuals outside friends and family who provide funds for future needs. The capital funded by Angel Investor is the 2nd stage of funding and is generally followed after seed funding i.e. once after layout plan is prepared.

The amount of capital received from an Angel Investor as a loan that is convertible to preferred stock. If your startup is fund-raising at this stage, your plan of action canvas ought to be demonstrated.

4.3 Venture Capital Financing

Venture capital is the capital required to expand the startup to a large area or a large number of persons or to extend product lines and marketing efforts.

As it is the 3rd stage of funding, the startup here already started functioning here. It is not essential that a startup must be in profit to acquire Venture Capital Financing. Different rounds of financing at this stage may happen, and investors may likewise offer to join the association and give extra mastery.

Different rounds of funding are Series A, Series B, Series C Rounds, etc.

In A series funding Pusher, a real-time developer tools provider raises $8Mn in Series A Funding.

A recent example of C series funding is Revolut – A fintech startup that raises $250M in Series C Funding.

4.4 Bridge Loans & Mezzanine Financing

Now, organizations might be looking at the accompanying kinds of changes that require extra finances:

• An IPO (first sale of stock)
• An Acquisition of a Competitor
• A Management Buyout

To do as such, they can take advantage of mezzanine financing or “extension” financing.

Mezzanine financing is frequently utilized 6 to a year before an IPO and after that, the IPO’s returns are utilized by the organization to pay back the mezzanine financing speculator.

4.5 Initial Public Offering (IPO)

As you know IPO means offering shares of the companies in the open market to the general public, it is also the same for startups. Here money from the public is invested in the startup concerning the number of shares issued to them. Angel investors also invest here in case they see a startup getting better day by day and achieving its goals.

After the IPO, investment opportunities for a developing organization can be utilized to draw in top ability and the expanded access to capital can give assets to drive the force of your business forward. When you are on the NASDAQ, simply make sure to quit calling yourself a startup, you are in the major associations now.

So, these are the top 5 stages of Startup funding.

5. How do you start a startup?

It is the most common question that is commonly searched for in the startup guide. How should I start a startup?

And the answer to this question is “Don’t worry”. Just start doing whatever idea you have, from whatever you have. Seems to be easy? The answer is NO!

You need to follow these 10 simple steps on how to start a Startup.

Here you just get motivated and start doing things that will take you to another level. But, once you start you have to face various difficulties because the startup is not an easy setup that will directly install to your accomplishment of the dream.

You need to be motivated to do so and avoid these top 10 reasons why new startups fail.

1. Just start doing
2. Start with what you currently have.
3. Develop and follow a systematic routine
4. Hit along with motivated persons
5. Ask someone for advice and help
6. Hire coworkers and contract labor
7. Search out a cofounder – Work with the person who pushes you to the extreme.
8. Spend time and money on market research and study
9. The product, services, process, and a platform analysis
10. Talk to potential customers

6. What is a startup plan?

A startup plan is just like the strategy that players made in any sport, just to win the game and beat all the outcomes. Same in the startup, the plan is the layout that is prepared by doing future planning and aggressive market research.

A Startup Plan is fundamentally the rundown of everything that must happen to get the business up and running from the underlying plan to exploring areas to securing merchants to motivating licenses to stock the racks to opening the ways to showcasing and publicizing to overseeing development without any end in sight.

Endeavoring to dispatch a business without a startup design resembles traveling along an awe-inspiring, mountain street without a guide, driving at high speeds, while wearing a blindfold. Here are some key things you ought to incorporate into your startup design.

7. How much money does it take to be an angel investor?

To become an angel investor you 1st needed to be an “accredited investor”. An accredited investor is the investor “Under the federal securities laws, a company that offers or sells its securities must register the securities with the SEC or find an exemption from the registration requirements”

An accredited investor with a million dollars or who has invested assets can become an angel investor. It is not easy to become an angel investor, you need to follow serious regulations and market flow to do so.

8. What is a fair percentage for an investor?

The fair percentage is not fixed, it is determined by the current market position, funding round, and type of startup it is.

If this is your first subsidizing round and you are more than a 1 part-establishing group, don’t weaken over 20%, in a perfect world around 10%. You should work in reverse from that point and choose how much money to rise. I say this since you should have around 70% accessible between organizers, to weaken in additional financing rounds. The maths work this way: 100%-20% to financial specialists, 10% for ESOP Pool = 70%. On the off chance that you have effectively fund-raised from loved ones or some other financial specialists previously, lessen the 20% as needs are.

9. What do you need to start your own business?

A great startup starts with an idea and that idea is converted into action along with a mentor who can be your startup guide. Like any huge objective, if you begin by separating it into littler undertakings, you’ll have the capacity to handle enough of the activities important to begin. Here are seven approaches to separating the procedure and streamlining beginning with your own independent company.

1. Idea
2. Plan layout
3. Initial money
4. Knowledge
5. The legal structure of your business
6. Name and registration of business
7. Business location and market knowledge

10. How do you build a brand?

Building a brand is not an easy task. It’s required your hard work, knowledge, skill, and the way you think to build a brand. Here are the steps to build a brand.

Here is how you can grow your brand on Instagram.

1. Research your target audience and your competitors.
2. Decide how you want to be seen
3. When building your brand, think of it as a person.
4. Pick your focus and personality.
5. Choose your business name, logo, and slogan.
6. Aim to build long-term relationships with your customers.
7. Develop a marketing strategy.
8. Always consider your branding when communicating with customers.
9. Apply your branding across your business and evolve it as you grow.
10. Continuity in organization and customer satisfaction.

Other than this startup guide, you need to work hard and must follow standards to create a successful brand. Overall, this is just a startup guide, and you need to be passionate to achieve your goal.

Further reading:

11 Best Startup Ideas in India [UNDER ₹10,000]

How to Get Startup Ideas: 3 Secret Techniques