Start-up mis­takes that cost you time and money — and how to avoid them.

Start­ing a busi­ness is excit­ing, chal­len­ging and full of decisions. Many mis­takes hap­pen, espe­cially at the begin­ning — some are harm­less, oth­ers can be really expens­ive. To pre­vent this from hap­pen­ing to you, in this art­icle we show you the most com­mon start-up mis­takes and how you can avoid them in prac­tice.

1. start without a clear goal.

Many start with an idea, but without a clear goal. What do you want your com­pany to have achieved in 12 months? Who are your cus­tom­ers? Where do you want to go?

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• cre­ate a com­pact busi­ness plan or a busi­ness model can­vas
• Define your tar­get group and your bene­fits
• Set meas­ur­able mile­stones

Extra tip: Use the Busi­ness Model Can­vas instead of a clas­sic busi­ness plan. It is more prac­tical, quicker to cre­ate and helps you to under­stand whether your busi­ness model really works and how you can earn money with it.

2. too little focus on liquid­ity.

A great clas­sic: you pay atten­tion to turnover, but over­look the run­ning costs. Without a pre­cise liquid­ity plan, insolv­ency is often only a mat­ter of time.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• Cre­ate a real­istic liquid­ity plan for at least 12 months
• Always keep an eye on pay­ment tar­gets, dun­ning peri­ods and fixed costs
• plan a fin­an­cial buf­fer for bad months

3. want to do everything your­self.

Many founders want to do everything on their own at the begin­ning: Web­site, account­ing, mar­ket­ing, legal mat­ters. This saves money in the short term, but costs time, nerves and qual­ity in the long term.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• Out­source tasks that slow you down or don’t suit you
• Use tools and auto­ma­tion (e.g. for account­ing, schedul­ing, CRM)
• Exchange ideas with oth­ers (net­works, start-up for­ums, meetups)
• use Shelf com­pan­ies, to greatly shorten the start-up pro­cess. You save on form­al­it­ies and are able to act imme­di­ately.
  More on this here →

4. no leg­ally secure start.

Found­ing a com­pany without a com­mer­cial register entry, miss­ing art­icles of asso­ci­ation or without a GDPR-com­pli­ant legal notice? Many under­es­tim­ate the legal aspects — and risk warn­ings, pen­al­ties or los­ing trust.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• Get advice on the choice of legal form and con­tract design
• secure imprint, data pro­tec­tion, terms and con­di­tions & busi­ness regis­tra­tion from
• Use our samples and check­lists for a clean start
  To the FAQ sec­tion →

5. approach­ing mar­ket­ing too late or unstra­tegic­ally.

Just because you’re there does­n’t mean that any­one knows you. If you only start mar­ket­ing when your web­site is ready, you will lose valu­able time.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• Build up your vis­ib­il­ity par­al­lel to the found­a­tion
• Use social media, land­ing pages or small events to get star­ted
• Define clear mes­sages and a simple com­mu­nic­a­tion goal
• develop a Go-to-mar­ket strategyHow do you reach your ideal cus­tom­ers? Are you focus­sing on inbound, out­bound, part­ner net­works or events? These ques­tions should be con­sidered right from the start.

6. not want­ing to under­stand cus­tom­ers.

Your product is not for you — it is for your tar­get group. If you develop without your cus­tom­ers in mind, it will be dif­fi­cult to reach them later on.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• con­duct inter­views, sur­veys or test runs
• work with tar­get group pro­files / per­so­nas
• Act­ively pur­sue feed­back and adapt your offer
• Cus­tomer inter­views are not a „nice-to-have“, but a must. Only those who really under­stand the prob­lem of their tar­get group can develop a func­tion­ing busi­ness model.

7 Delay too long or act too quickly.

Both are dan­ger­ous: those who plan forever never get to act. If you start too quickly without being pre­pared, you risk set­backs.

This way you avoid the mis­take:

• Start with an MVP (Min­imal Viable Product)
• Plan, but don’t lose your­self in per­fec­tion­ism
• Get feed­back before you scale up

Con­clu­sion: Found­ing is learn­ing — but you don’t have to exper­i­ence everything your­self.

Many mis­takes can be avoided if you think about them early on and seek sup­port. A clear plan, an hon­est look at your fig­ures and a good net­work will help you stay on track right from the start.

Do you want to set up a com­pany but don’t want to run into an open knife?
Then let’s look together at how you can get off to a clean, struc­tured and stress-free start:
Get in touch now →

Fur­ther recom­mend­a­tions:

• Found a lim­ited liab­il­ity com­pany →
• Found a UG →
• Buy shelf com­pany →
• FAQ on the found­a­tion →
• Open a busi­ness account →

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