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Comment by pdog | Hacker News Reader

Great interview. Most people would have given up after two years of zero growth and paltry revenue.

Almost every company ever took two to three years to establish themselves. It's not all that incredible.

That simply distinguishes every successful business ever (with a few lucky exceptions) from the ones that failed because their owners gave up too early.

Two years is about a minimum that you should be prepared to dedicate to your newborn business if you are at all serious about it.

I've written a bit about this here:

https://jacquesmattheij.com/it-takes-three-years-to-build-a-...

> That simply distinguishes every successful business ever (with a few lucky exceptions) from the ones that failed because their owners gave up too early.

How do you know when to give up though? I've developed a great product, spent 4 years working on it and still only make enough to cover hosting bills. I'm toying with the idea of Throwing in the towel, but I'm plagued with "what ifs".

4 Years is getting to the point of having to admit defeat, though there are examples of companies that hit their stride that late or even later. The biggest - and most important to me - indicator is if there is a trend or if it is flatlining. If there is a trend and you have the stamina keep going, if it is flatlining or even declining it might be the point to throw the towel in, but first have a chat with some other people to see if they can spot something obvious (but not obvious to you!) that you might do to improve things.

Love this. I think early on I had the same idea as the commenter above—that 2-3 years without results is the anomaly and means it's time to move on.

Hopefully we can tell more stories to show that two years really should be your minimum commitment to just get traction.

Just tweeted your link, let's see how fast we can get your from $600K to $1M and up ;)

Best of luck!

Echo'ed. SaaS founder here. We had two years of slow growth before the product/market fit hit and now, years later, we're generating millions in revenue. #1 piece of advice I give to SaaS founders is to watch the talk, "The Long Slow SaaS Ramp of Death" by CEO of Constant Contact. All good cooking takes time!

This talk is so good.

Yup. My precarious period was juuuust under three years. It's eerily consistent, from other stories I've heard.

It's probably not a favorable idea here, but luck probably plays a large part in converting from X to Y a month. Of course, perseverance over a two-year period increases your chances, so it still has a ton of value.

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