“When should you quit your tech startup?” is a very likely question that is often asked by most entrepreneurs whose startups doesn’t just cut it. Your startup might at a time, come to an unfortunate point where revenues dwindle, profits reduce, there is a drastic reduction in the number of customers and many more like it. But the question is, should you actually call it ‘quit’?
There are a whole lots of factors that could make you consider the ‘quit’ option. What now matters is if you allow those factors to influence your latter decisions. But then, there are times when you might have no choice than to give in. These are the times we want to talk about.
Yes, you might be experiencing revenue and profit reduction, even customer loss, but before you even think of quiting as an option, you should look at the reasons why you are experiencing those. Is it that that the customers are jumping ship to a competitor, or to a different industry entirely. The former suggests they (the competitors) are doing something you’re not, while the later means there is no more market for you (you should consider quiting here).
Taking you down memory lane, John D. Rockerfeller’s kerosene was once used to light homes in the united states some time back. But when J.P Morgan found someone who could create electricity, he took most customers from using kero as a light source, to use electric light. He did not come as a competitor, he created a different market.
Relating the above to our present market, lets assume Hotels.ng start experiencing the above factors, losing lots of customers, and after proper checking, they discovered another hotel listing platform is where they (customers) have been jumping ship to. At this point, they can now devise means to regain their customers back from the competitor.
But on another hand, assuming they discovered that people have lost interest in using hotels generally, triggering the loss of customers, maybe there is now an increase in the number of people patronising guest houses. Hotels.ng would do well to quit the hotel market, and launch into the guest house market to remain relevant in the scheme of things.
Another great example was the period of time Nokia lost relevance, precisely when the smartphone revolution came to Nigeria. But what do we have now, Nokia now have a display of smartphones in their name, and are still relevant. Now, that is what a wise tech entrepreneur does. They don’t quit, they follow the trend.
When should you quit your tech startup?
So, on the question, “When should you quit your tech startup?”, i’d tell you that you shouldn’t quit at all. What you need to do is to be creative if you are losing to a competitor, or fine tune your startup to follow the trend if you are losing to a different market entirely.
Have you ever been in this position before? How did it feel like? Did you ever think of quitting your tech startup? Let’s hear you.
