Ask HN: Non-VC backed founders, any tips on growth?
It would be helpful to know a bit more about your situation; if I were on your board, here are the starting questions I would have to help you figure out what you want to do.<p>* Are you definitely dominant in your niche? If so, how long can you remain so while &#x27;just&#x27; reinvesting profits? How big is the niche?<p>* Presuming you are and can definitely stay the dominant one, are there target areas next to your niche you&#x27;d like to go after and can&#x27;t because of capital?<p>* Would additional capital let you add revenue through new features &#x2F; adjacent product enhancement?<p>If the answer to any of these is that more capital would be helpful, either to make more money, stabilize the business, or grow the value, then you need to figure out how you want to take that money on.<p>Generally there are three ways businesses get additional capital: equity finance, debt finance and trade partners.<p>My guess from your question and how you explain your business is that if you sit down and take a cold hard look at where your business is at, then you will conclude you have some real risks, and money will help mitigate those risks.<p>This is a tough mental game to play as a startup founder, you have to stop thinking product vision for a little bit, and switch it around, and be like &quot;I&#x27;m X product manager at Y company &#x2F; just VC funded &#x2F; my enemy from junior high who is rich, and I want to fuck us up and drive us out of business. How do I do that?&quot;<p>Once the business is real, and has real ongoing value, then <i>part</i> of your job is mitigating those risks. Usually the right way to do that is to grow the business into a dominant market position so that you&#x27;re not vulnerable, and that&#x27;s (part) of the thinking behind taking money -- so that you can grow rapidly, and get through that risk period where anyone might notice you&#x27;ve got something good here and come take it away from you.<p>So, how do you figure out debt&#x2F;equity&#x2F;trade? Short answer is that trade is almost always preferable if you can get it -- details depend on your product and industry. Between debt and equity, it varies, all the time, and will vary at the stage your company is at.<p>In brief, though, at its best, you&#x27;ll bring on real partners with VC money, people who will guide you, kick your ass, help you, and end up with a significant portion of your company in exchange. (At it&#x27;s worst, it&#x27;s much, much worse than that). If you bring on strategic investment from the in-house VC teams at your customers, that has a different flavor. If you get big enough to have an interesting stable return rate for Private Equity, that&#x27;s again a different flavor, with different expectations about your team -- it doesn&#x27;t sound like you&#x27;re their yet, BTW. :)<p>Debt comes in two flavors, recourse and non-recourse, essentially are you going to give them your house if you fuck up -- and they&#x27;re priced differently, and it&#x27;s harder to acquire non-recourse financing.<p>Enjoy where you&#x27;re at! It&#x27;s nice to have something working. And, finally, remember you cannot undo an equity round - they lost longer than many marriages - so tread carefully.