0How to start a start-up: A n00b’s guide to getting rich quick

Step 1 – Think of an idea

Some people say inspiration is required for an idea. But who has the time for that? Ideas are available aplenty, but implementation of the ideas is another story. Just search for failed ideas that could have worked had the situation been more ideal. Look through failed Kickstarter campaigns or Dragon’s Den ideas that were shut down, and pick one. Here are some examples:

Hardware: The ‘everything’s-going-to-be-okay’ doll; Bluetooth enabled butt plugs; reusable silly string; a portable hype man; potato-based clean energy, robot paper-boy.

Software: DrinkedIn; RaceBook; Kick-a-Republican; Exorcist contact agency.

Step 2 – Come up with a name

One of the most important things to figure out when starting your own company is what to name it. The goal is to make the name match your company’s product and vision, while simultaneously dumbing it down to cater to the masses. The tried and tested formula is to take a word associated with your product or service and change up its spelling in order to sound kool and relatable, while also kinda revolutionary. Here are some tips:

• Vwls are strictly optional

• Excessive vowels are acceptable

• Adding e’s to the end of words without e’s is totally fine

• Add i’s before everything

• Ryte it lyke u saye it (the letter ‘y’ is your friend)

• Replace k’s with q’s and q’s with k’s (at the start of the name)

• Replace other k’s with c’s and c’s with k’s

• Replace ph’s with f’s

• Invent new words by combining two completely unrelated words

• Capitalize at RANdoM

• Pick a word in a foreign language to sound exotic, something south American or south-east Asian

If all else fails, make up a word! Just make sure it’s under 3 syllables and hasn’t already been taken.

Step 3 – Make a logo

A logo, along with your company name, are all that separate you from the competition. You might think making a logo is easy and can be done in a couple of hours on MS paint. However, it would be far more advisable if you found the nearest arts student and paid them $100 to do the job professionally using professional software such as Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. If you’re too poor to afford this, however, here are some tips:

• Use whacky fonts – they’re eye catching

• Make your logo a swirly spinny circular thingy. Potential investors will be mesmerized.

• Inverted and upside-down letters are in

• Moar colours are better

• Make use of your company name, especially any i’s and o’s

• Omit the horizontal line on A’s

If you follow these tips, you might end up with a reasonable logo that doesn’t look too half-assed. If you want better I recommend selling a kidney and coughing up those hundred bucks.

Step 4 – Hire a team

You have this grand idea that can potentially change the world, but you don’t want to do any of the work, right? That’s why you need a team: a dedicated, talented bunch of co-ops who won’t demand a single share of the company. All you need to do is advertise, but that’s easier said than done. You need to be unabashedly aggressive if you want people working for you. Walk into classrooms and rudely interrupt lectures to advertise. The students would welcome the distraction. Spam all the university Facebook groups with posts; some of them are bound to leave and impact. Print flyers and leave them all over campus; in classrooms, gym lockers and washroom stalls. Don’t discriminate based on faculty, because you’ll need those business students to pretend to know about management and stuff.

Step 5 – Pitch at all the pitches!

So you have an idea, a brand and a team. Where’s the money already? Unfortunately, more work is required (I know, right? Ugh). On the plus side, the existence of pitch competitions has made it extremely easy for a person with a pretty face, winning smile and basic competency in PowerPoint to win big bucks. When putting together slides, make sure to use big words and high res pictures. Gifs are always a crowd pleaser. Try to tell a story and strike an emotional chord; something generic like your dog dying when you were seven and you coping with the loss by trying to come up with an idea to end world hunger might work. Also, don’t be afraid to shit-talk your competitors; you will come off as assertive and dominant. Investors like ‘disruptive’ entrepreneurs.

Step 5 – Profit

Celebrate your achievements using the riches you have acquired. Buy some weed. Rent a yacht. Order the services of a prostitute. Hookers and blow will get you in the good books of your fellow entrepreneurs, and boost your image in the general public eye as well.