Everywhere you look, technological change is in the news. It’s fueling innovation and giving rise to new business models.
These same forces are collapsing barriers to market entry and lowering capital investment needs for startups.
Christian startups are making historic advances in how the gospel is shared.
It’s hard to believe that four years have passed since the company we started developed a digital broadcast app and content syndication network.
We are small, nimble and laser-focused on making digital broadcasting available to virtually anyone – an agent of change in how faith messages are delivered and shared.
After a three year building phase, we launched commercially a little over a year ago.
Since then, we have been able to work on some awesome things. The app is a fully integrated audio and video solution. The platform is HTML5 compatible and works with Chromecast, Apple TV, Roku, and Amazon Fire. We’re working with over 100 top-tier content partners.
We have a wide range of business clients – broadcasters, churches, ministries, individual entrepreneurs – and work across traditional, digital and social mediums. We are entirely focused on innovative, creative and effective digital broadcasting solutions for our clients.
Looking back, it is amazing how far we have come. But we’re still constantly learning and storyboarding for the future. We believe our best days are ahead.
A friend asked what I have learned from the whole experience. I’m still learning every day, but here is a list of ten short insights and lessons I’ve learned on the job so far.
Ten lessons
1. Focus on where your strength comes from. Fulfilling your dream will require you to get out of the boat and onto the water of impossibilities. You will face challenges, difficulties, storms, fear. When we find ourselves weak and in situations beyond our control, I believe Jesus is right there to help. Call out to Him. Trust Him. You might just walk on water.
2. Learn fast. The odds are stacked against you. But succeeding against the odds is part of the drive. Learning as fast as possible can even things up and give you the confidence that this can work.
3. Start small and humbly. Let God unfold his timing for fulfilling the Big Dream.
4. Talk to people: customers, users, creators. Show them a model of your platform. See what they like and what they don’t. Be willing to make adjustments. The tweaking never ends.
5. Embrace the inevitable delays. Delays come with innovation and building new things. Be patient. Waiting is sometimes God’s way of leading you into something better.
6. Avoid the “paralysis of analysis.” This is the condition of spending so much time thinking about a problem that you lose the ability to act.
7. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. If you try too hard to avoid failure, you’ll avoid success. Have confidence in your God-given abilities. Effective problem solving comes from experience. New ideas often seem crazy at first, failure is a learning experience, and with God all things are possible.
They were unlearned and ordinary men, and they recognized they had been with Jesus. Acts 4:13
8. Be open, collaborative, and helpful. A digital age startup is the perfect platform for collaborating with others, creating community and combining different competencies around a common gospel-focused strategy.
9. Don’t try to be the next YouTube. Be known as a company that does one thing exceptionally well.
10. Tell your story effectively. Have a compelling story of how technology is changing the world and changing lives and that God still condescends to use a bunch of unlearned ordinary folks to carry on the Great Mission.
One of the best things about working for a startup is never hearing “that’s not how we do things around here.” Someone has said startups are the next move of God. So, what are you waiting for?
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