A founder's guide to surviving the first year
How to dodge the party, call your friends, and find the guy with the Porsche.
This is part of The Unsexy. A series for capable people who are ready to trade the excitement of new ideas, for the power of unsexy, consistent output.
For 99% of us, our first shot at building something of our own is a beautiful disaster.
We’re working off a mental map pieced together from half-remembered podcast clips and advice that sounds like "common sense."
The problem?
Most of that map is wrong. It's a nfriendly guide that leads you directly into the most common, soul-crushing traps.
I've seen this movie before, with founders from Palo Alto to Shanghai. The ones who survive that brutal first year aren't the ones with the most dazzling ideas. They're the ones who, at three critical moments, made a move that felt wrong but was strategically right.
This is about aim. Let's fix your aim.
#1, Think Smaller. No, Smaller Than That.
The first distraction is always a big, sexy trend.
AI. Web3. The Creator Economy.
You feel that pull, right? That urgent whisper that you need to "get into AI."
This is the first trap. For a new founder, a big trend is a party you weren't invited to. You'll burn all your energy just trying to get in the door.
The smart move is to find one tiny, un-sexy, solvable problem for a specific group of people inside that trend. Forget the party. Find two people in the corner having a miserable time and become their hero.
The formula looks like this:
[The Big Trend] + [A World You Know] + [A Problem You Can Solve] = A Business.
Not "Let's do AI"
But "Let's use an AI tool so my lawyer friends can stop billing hours to draft mind-numbing contract clauses."
Not "I'm going to be a Creator."
But "I'll help my favorite Substack writers (who are great at writing but awkward on camera) turn their essays into simple, shareable videos."
See the difference?
Specific. Solvable. And most importantly, sellable.
The right move feels like you're thinking too small. It feels like you're leaving a massive opportunity on the table.
You're not.
You're finding the one small patch of solid ground where you can actually build something real.
#2, Sell to Your Friends First.
Okay. You have your tiny, specific offer. Now what?
Every instinct in your body is screaming at you to hide behind your laptop and sell to anonymous strangers on the internet. It feels safer. Less cringe.
This is the second trap. Selling to strangers when you have zero track record is like choosing to play the game on Hard Mode. Trust is the currency, and your wallet is empty.
The smart move is to make your first sales to people who already know you.
Yes, it feels weird. Salesy. Deeply uncomfortable. I know. That feeling of awkwardness? That's the secret. That's the price of admission.
Your friends give you something priceless: the permission to be clumsy.
🔳 They'll forgive a cringey sales pitch. They’ll give you brutally honest feedback without ghosting you. They are your safe, real-world training ground for the terrifying act of asking someone for their money.
You’re not looking for customers. You're recruiting your "First Believers."
#3, Chase Clients, Not Clout.
Here comes the third and most seductive trap: the chase for an audience. "If I can just get to 10,000 followers," we tell ourselves, "then the money will follow."
A year later, you might have the followers, but you also have an empty Stripe account. You’ve spent a year becoming a minor internet celebrity instead of a business owner.
The smart move is to forget about followers and focus obsessively on your first high-value client. One person who pays you $5,000 is infinitely better than 10,000 people who give you a "like."
High-value doesn't mean ripping people off. It means finding and solving an expensive or very painful problem.
The local car wash offers a $20 clean to anyone. But they also offer a $2,000 ceramic coating service to the guy who loves his vintage Porsche more than his own kids. That second one is a high-value business.
The right move feels like you're ignoring growth. You're not. You're focusing on the only kind of growth that matters in the beginning: profit.
The Real Goal of Year One
We need to redefine what a "win" looks like in your first year.
A "win" IS NOT having a huge, world-changing idea.
A "win" IS solving one person's boring, specific problem so well they thank you for taking their money.
A "win" IS NOT having 10,000 followers.
A "win" IS having a single client who happily pays your high-ticket invoice, proving your business model isn't a fantasy.
At first, these three move: go niche, sell to friends, get one big client, all seem like separate tactics. They’re not. They are stitched together by a single, powerful thread.
They are the fastest possible path to proof.
Proof that your idea is valuable. Proof that you can sell. And proof that you can deliver. You get all that before you run out of cash and, more importantly, before you run out of morale.
You’re building a small, solid, profitable core. That core gives you the leverage and the right to chase the bigger, sexier things later on.
You aren't just building a business. You're building proof.
Hi!
I'm Yuehan. After a decade spent building businesses in both the West and China, I'm sharing my most valuable, road-tested lessons right here on Substack.
Since I'm starting from scratch on this side of the world, your support means a great deal. If this piece resonated, a restack or a simple ❤️ is massively appreciated
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“The smart move is to find one tiny, un-sexy problem inside that trend and solve it. Forget the big party, find two people having a miserable time in the corner and help them.”
This x100. Great content, subbed.