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Vishu Bheda
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Medial • 2h
Coinbase founder shares the most important lesson from his startup failure before Coinbase Brian started a tutoring website in college, helping students find tutors. He charged a 10% fee on all payments. It worked well at first, but soon, people started paying tutors directly to avoid the fee. This was a big problem. He realized that students and tutors wanted the matchmaking service, but they didn’t want the platform handling payments. The business was getting in the way instead of helping. After struggling with this for years, Brian took a job at Airbnb. He planned to shut the site down but noticed 5,000-10,000 people were still using it every month. Instead of giving up, he made a simple change: He removed the payment system. He made the platform free. He allowed tutors to pay $10/month to promote their profiles. Then, he stopped working on the site. But something amazing happened—it started growing on its own! The site doubled every year until Brian finally sold it for $2 million. His biggest lesson? Stop focusing on making money first. Focus on creating real value. When you help people, they will happily pay for extra benefits. Help first, monetize later. That’s how you build a great business! Follow me for more valuable startup insights from the world's best founders!
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