Tech Talk: Drew Houston - Finding Your Way as an Entrepreneur

Work on the company that you want to work on. You should be excited about it.
Your company needs to have a working business model.
Drew started Dropbox to solve a problem that he was having. Carried a thumb drive everywhere. Annoying. Left it once in Boston while traveling to DC and that was the last straw.
Choosing your co-founder is one of the most important decisions you make. Get to know them first!
You don’t need to know everything to start a startup. You’ll learn.
Read one book on all the various business disciplines (eg. sales, marketing, etc) so you know the basics.
Much of the threat to your startup comes from self-inflicted wounds. Stay focused, keep your users happy, hire the best people, don’t make bad decisions.
Seek out and understand your early adopters. They did so via a video on Digg explaining their product. No one is searching for what you’re making; you need to find them.
Maximize the probability that someone shows up at your store / website and leaves with a solved problem. You need a good product that’s easy to use and solves a problem.
Give people tools to spread the word. They offered extra space for referrals.
What you need for success: make a good product, find ways to get good distribution, hire the best engineers, founders have a morbid fascination with the product.
If you go to VCs with the problem “I have all these users and we just need money for more computers”, you’ll do well. Ie. if you’ve already proved your business, you’re set.