Starting a business can be thrilling and exciting, but also a bit daunting. It takes a lot of grit, patience and hard work before you start to see results. Many startups die 1-3 years after launch. While there are many reasons for this, one of the main reasons is a lack of expert startup advice.
Here are 25 of our favorite startup quotes from seasoned entrepreneurs to keep you motivated and moving in the right direction.
1. “If something is important enough, or you believe something is important enough, even if you are scared, you will keep going.” –Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX
2. “Only the paranoid survive.” -Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel
3. “You have to see failure as the beginning and the middle, but never entertain it as an end.” -Jessica Herrin, founder and CEO of Stella & Dot
4. “Success depends on employees. For me knowing and connecting with my employees is very important.” -Divine Ndhlukula, founder and managing director of DDNS Security Operations Ltd
5. “Don’t let others convince you that the idea is good when your gut tells you it’s bad.”
-Kevin Rose, co-founded Digg
6. “Don’t get distracted. Never tell yourself that you need to be the biggest brand in the whole world. Start by working on what you need at the present moment and then what you need to do tomorrow. So, set yourself manageable targets.” -Jas Bagniewski, Co-Founder of Eve Sleep
7. “If you can offer a free tier that provides a lot of value, it will naturally help your product to spread much more rapidly.” -Melanie Perkins, Co-founder of Canva
8. “In the age of transparency, honesty, and generosity, even in the form of an apology, generate goodwill.” -Alexander Asseily, founder of Jawbone
9. “One of the greatest skills of leadership is being unflappable. Anytime you do anything in the world; there’s going to be criticism.” -Arianna Huffington, Co-found and editor-in-chief of Huffington Post Media Group
10. “Selling is not a pushy, winner-takes-all, macho act. It is an empathy-led, process-driven, and knowledge-intensive discipline. Because, in the end, people buy from people.”
-Subroto Bagchi, Co-founder of Mindtree
11. “Ignore the hype of the startups that you see in the press. Mostly, it’s a pack of lies. Half of these startups will be dead in a year. So, focus on building your business so you can be the one left standing.” -Jules Pieri, Co-founder and CEO of The Grommet
12. “[Don’t] let anyone convince you that your dream, your vision to be an entrepreneur, is something that you shouldn’t do. What often happens is that people who are well meaning, who really care for us, are afraid for us and talk us out of it.” -Cathy Hughes, entrepreneur, radio and television personality, and business executive
13. “It’s important to realize that brand is much more than a logo and slogan. A brand is who your company is: how you function and make decisions.” -Joanna McFarland, Co-founder of HopSkipDrive
14. “Don’t try to do everything by yourself, but try to connect with people and resources. Having that discipline and perseverance is really important.” -Chieu Cao, Co-founder of Perkbox
15. “Your ability to attract, evaluate, and forge strong working relationships with co-founders, early employees, and investors often mean the difference between failure and success.” -Clara Shih, Co-founder of Hearsay Systems
16. “If you can offer a free tier that provides a lot of value, it will naturally help your product to spread much more rapidly.” -Melanie Perkins, Co-founder of Canva
17. “If you’re starting something on your own, you better have a passion for it, because this is hard work.” -Sallie Krawcheck, Co-founder of Ellevest
18. “In the age of transparency, honesty, and generosity, even in the form of an apology, generate goodwill.” -Alexander Asseily, founder of Jawbone
19. “There is no royal flower-strewn path to success. And if there is, I have not found it, for whatever success I have attained has been the result of much hard work and many sleepless nights.” -Madam C.J. Walker, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and political and social activist
20. “Some days you’re smiling and thinking you’re going to make this thing rock. Then the next day a pipe breaks and your costs look too high. You have to learn to keep your eyes on an ultimate goal. If you lose sight of that goal, you have to get out.” -Hamdi Ulukaya, founder and CEO of Chobani
21. “There is something artificial when everyone is agreeing with each other. It’s useful to indulge people who don’t agree, and see their viewpoint or force yourself to explain things better.” -David Sack, founder of Yammer
22. “If you are not getting traction on your idea, you try few things. You try pushing harder, cleaning up something, building up to something aggressively – but if it doesn’t get traction, then don’t bother.” -Vijay Sharma, Founder of Paytm
23. “Five days a week, I read my goals before I go to sleep and when I wake up. There are 10 goals around health, family and business with expiration dates, and I update them every six months.” -Daymond John, founder, president, and CEO of FUBU
24. “If we are going to be part of the solution, we have to engage the problems.” -Majora Carter, urban revitalization strategist and broadcast producer
25. “I can name dozens of failures that we had over the years. Yet, with all these failures, we still managed to build Appster into one of the largest, and best companies in our industry. So, remember every time you fail, remind yourself these words: ‘Life won’t always go my way, but I will always find a way’.” -Josiah Humphrey, Co-founder of Appster
