Founder/CEO @ LEANSTACK | Bestselling author and founder

I have bootstrapped several products to millions of users and worked with thousands of early-stage entrepreneurs worldwide - helping them systematically find repeatable and scalable business models using my battle-tested playbooks. 

Instead of:
-Spending several months building a product you hope people will buy.

Imagine a world where you:
- Spend several weeks defining a product you know people will buy.

For aspiring or early-stage founders:

If you’re looking to bootstart your idea, consider joining my 30-day Business Model Design Challenge below: 

You'll learn how to:
- Find or test a big idea worth pursuing,
- Design a business model blueprint,
- Stress-test your idea before investing time, money, and effort. 

Join the next Business Model Design Challenge:
https://runlean.ly/challenge

Ash Maurya

There are three core jobs of a business model. 

1. CREATE VALUE
You create value with your Unique Value Proposition (UVP). To craft a compelling UVP, you need to deeply understand your Customer Segments and their Problem(s).

2. DELIVER VALUE
You deliver value through your Solution and Channels.

3. CAPTURE VALUE
Value capture (getting paid) lies at the intersection of your Cost Structure and Revenue Streams.

The Lean Canvas also helps you describe two more essential jobs:

4. MEASURE VALUE
You measure the output of these three jobs using your Key Metrics.

5. DEFEND VALUE
You deter copycats and competitors using your Unfair Advantage.

Lean Canvas = Business Model Story

I build systematic frameworks for early-stage founders. Author and creator of Lean Canvas.

Your product is NOT "the product" of your startup.
Your business model is THE PRODUCT.

Too many founders obsess over features while ignoring:
→ Customer segments
→ Problems
→ Revenue streams  
→ Distribution channels
→ Cost structure
→ Key metrics

Building the best solution means nothing if the other pieces in the puzzle don't fit.

No alternative text description for this image

In 2006, I had 6 months of runway left. Everyone told me to raise money immediately.

Instead, I did the opposite.

My mentor asked one question: 'Would you rather spend 6 months pitching to investors or pitching to customers?'

I picked customers. Six months later, we were profitable. Never raised that round.

The counterintuitive truth: When you're running out of money, don't chase investors. Chase customers.

Every founder thinks they need funding to get customers. It's backwards. Customers fund your business. Investors fund your story.

Which would you rather have?

Most founders pitch their solution the same way to everyone.

Big mistake.

Investors care about market size and traction.
Customers care about their problems and outcomes.
Advisors care about learning from their experience.

Your solution stays the same. Your story must change.

Good entrepreneurship isn't about changing worldviews—it's about framing your business model in terms of your audience's existing worldview.

Are you telling the right story to the right audience?

Simple models help us understand the complex. 

Before investing in any company, Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger use a latticework of mental models to evaluate the company. 

If it passes their tests, they move all in. Otherwise, they do nothing and wait.

Evaluating early-stage ideas is no different.

I have settled on 3 universal (product-agnostic) mental models that I use to
- baseline progress,
- prioritize risks, and
- formulate a “right action, right time” next step.

Here they are: 

1. Lean Canvas: Deconstruct an idea using 12 basic building blocks.

2. Customer Factory: Chart key milestones using 5 customer-centric metrics.  

3. Customer Forces: Understand customer behavior using 4 causal forces. 

BELIEFS + METRICS + INSIGHTS = BUSINESS MODEL STORY

Most founders think a great offer is about discounts and bonuses.

But the most powerful offers tell a story that makes saying no feel irrational.

I call this a "Mafia Offer" 

Here's a 4-Act structure:

Act 1: Identify an undeniable market shift (external to your product)
Act 2: Show why their current solution can't bridge the gap
Act 3: Demonstrate your different approach (transformation, not features)
Act 4: Present pricing as natural extension of the story

After rebuilding my pitch this way, I no longer get butterflies in my stomach when I reach the pricing conversation. 

Customers don't buy products. They buy a promise of something different AND better.

Are you pitching features or selling a customer story?

The hill climbing problem in startups:

Rushing to pick your first customer segment is like getting trapped on a local peak - you find success, but miss the mountain next door.

Start by brainstorming ALL possible customers. Test multiple segments in parallel.

Your odds of finding the best market increase dramatically.

I gave AI complete control of my product launch.
Not just "helping with copy" or "writing some emails."

Full control. Landing pages. Customer segmentation. Multi-variant email campaigns. Sales tracking automation.

The result? 209 paid customers in 40 days. Before the product was finished.

But here's the plot twist that surprised me:

The AI didn't win because it was smarter than me.
It won because it helped me focus on what I do best, while it took care of the rest. 

Full video here: https://lnkd.in/gruip9bq

Open video: AI Ran My Product Launch (Crazy Results) on youtu.be

Most startups defer pricing because their MVP feels "too minimal" to charge for.

This is backwards thinking.

Price is part of your product. It shapes customer perception and defines your market position.

If you intend to charge eventually, charge from day one. Getting paid is your first real validation - not downloads or signups.

The biggest mistake in customer interviews? Leading with your pitch.

When you pitch first:
• Customers pretend to agree
• You do most of the talking
• You hear what you want to hear

Instead, frame it as learning:
• Set context, then let them talk
• Ask how they solve the problem today
• Seek their advice, not their approval

People love helping. They hate being sold to.

Get the frame right and customer interviews become easy.

Most founders think they need to quit their day job to validate a startup idea.

This is backwards.

With the right approach, you can achieve problem-solution fit in 90 days working just 10-15 hours per week. Only then does going full-time make sense.

The myth of "take a leap of faith" has burned more founders than market crashes ever will.

What if the biggest risk isn't your idea failing, but you never properly testing it?

If you can't convert a warm prospect in a 20-minute face-to-face interview, it will be much harder to convert a visitor in under 8 seconds on your landing page.

Yet most founders skip this step entirely.

They build their MVP, launch a website, deploy AI agents, and then wonder why their conversion rates are terrible.

Worse, they don't know why.

Test your messaging, pricing, and user flow with 10 early adopters first. 

If you can't sell them, you won't fare any better with strangers.

The harsh feedback you get face-to-face will save you months of poor online performance.

Don't rush outside the building without first stress-testing your idea.
Stress testing is NOT customer testing, BUT business model testing.

2025 was the year of vibe coding.
Developers typed vibes into Cursor. AI wrote the code. Products shipped in hours.

But here's what nobody's talking about: AI just made the biggest startup mistake easier than ever.

The (Faster) Build Trap.

And it's creating thousands of zombie startups—built in days, dead in weeks (which I guess is still better than dead in months)

---

A founder I know spent 3 weeks building a B2B scheduling tool with Cursor. Beautiful interface. Clean code. Zero customers.

"AI made building so fast," he told me. "Why waste time on validation?"

Sound familiar?

Before AI, building took months. So we validated first. We had to.

Now building takes days. So we think we can skip validation. 

That's the trap.

---

But here's the plot twist:

The same AI creating this problem is also the solution.

Traditional lean startup? Plan-Do-Check-Act took 6 weeks per cycle. You'd run maybe 8-10 cycles per year if you were disciplined.

Most founders ran 2-3 cycles, got impatient, and just started building.

Why? Validation felt slower than building.

2026 changes the math completely.

---

AI collapses the PDCA cycle from 6 weeks to 6 hours:

• Plan experiments: 2 hours (not 2 weeks)
• Build tests: 2 hours (not 2 weeks)  
• Analyze results: 1 hour (not 1 week)
• Decide next steps: 1 hour (not 1 week)

You can now run 50+ validation cycles in the time it used to take to run 5.

That's not incremental improvement. That's a different game.

I'm calling these Vibe Startups—companies that use AI to not just build fast, but validate as fast as they build (before and after).

---

Speed isn't the competitive advantage anymore. Everyone has speed.

Systematic validation at the speed of your thinking is the new moat.

---

Watch the full breakdown of how Vibe Startups work and why the 75-year old PDCA loop just became a lot more relevant (again):

https://lnkd.in/gXWHQpMn

undefined undefined

youtube.com

The New Way Startups Will Be Built in 2026

Joseph Bunga

Everyone tells you to start with a free plan and worry about revenue later.

That's exactly what's killing most startups.

Even MailChimp spent years as premium-only before introducing its famous free tier.

The problem with freemium-first:
• You give away too much (like an artist wanting appreciation)
• Low conversions drown you in non-actionable data
• Free users give bad advice about hypothetical features

The premium-first approach:
1. Charge from day one - pricing is your riskiest assumption
2. Launch with one plan for one customer segment
3. Target early adopters (they're not price sensitive)
4. Use trials or guarantees instead of free plans
5. Add freemium later as a marketing tactic

When I 10x'd my prices and repositioned from B2C to B2B, conversions went UP and I doubled paying customers.

Premium is a marketing tactic, not a business model.

Are you building for users who might buy or customers who do buy?

Most founders start backward.

They get hit with an idea and try to estimate how big it can get. But if you had three ideas to work on, wouldn't you always start with your most promising one?

Instead of starting with an idea, start with a goal.

Define your minimum success criteria: the smallest outcome you'd need in 3 years to call it a success. Then stress test your business model against that criteria.

If your model can't deliver your minimum bar, fix it before investing time and money.

What's your minimum success criteria?

The biggest startup myth? You need a "perfect idea" to begin.

I've seen countless founders wait years for that breakthrough moment that never comes. Meanwhile, successful entrepreneurs use a completely different approach.

In this video, I reveal the "Innovator's Gift" framework—a systematic way to find viable startup ideas hiding in plain sight.

Watch: https://lnkd.in/gts9nruM

Know if your idea will work -- in 90 days, not 9 months.
100X Founder registration closes tonight.

Stop chasing fictional 5-year forecasts.

Most founders waste time inventing big goals or pulling out Excel wizardry when pitching investors. Even Mark Zuckerberg didn't think Facebook would be a billion-dollar company.

Instead, define your Minimum Success Criteria: the smallest outcome that makes 3 years of your life worth it.

Pick your game:
→ Level 1: $100K/year (solopreneur)
→ Level 2: $1M/year (small team)
→ Level 3: $10M/year (VC-backable)
→ Level 4: $100M/year (unicorn)

There's no right answer. But you must pick a game to play it well.

What game are you actually playing?

Mark Elliott

Startup School For Seniors co-founder | Coach for purposeful, messy business owners | Green Economy, Social Equity, Personal Growth

I help midlife entrepreneurs stop firefighting and build a business that reflects their values—and pays them well for their expertise.

You’ve been running your business for a few years. You’re good at what you do, your clients respect you—but behind the scenes, things feel messier than they should. You’re doing too much yourself. The clarity is gone. Growth feels confusing. You want your business to work better—and fit who you’ve become.

I coach experienced business owners who are brilliant at their craft but stuck in a cycle of overwork, hesitation, or playing small. My clients are often the ones holding everything together—for their clients, their families, their teams—but quietly asking: What about me?

With over 30 years across startups, scale-ups, agencies and manufacturing, I bring commercial strategy, systems thinking, and deep empathy to the table. I’m not here to hype or push—I’m here to challenge what no longer serves you and help you build something better.

My style?
🎯 Serious about helping you make bold, smart decisions
🎭 Playful enough to make the hard parts easier to face
💬 Empathetic to the real-life challenges of running a business in midlife

Together, we’ll:

    Refocus your business around your values, energy, and priorities
    Simplify your offers, pricing, and marketing
    Build systems for growth that don’t burn you out
    Replace the “busy blur” with clarity, confidence, and consistent progress

You don’t need another productivity hack. You need a business that finally works for you.

Coach for Business Founders

- Coached over 100 founders, helping many double or triple their business revenue within the first six weeks; one client increased revenue tenfold within a year.
- Developed and implemented the "From Busy to Blooming in Six Weeks" program, which consistently delivers transformative results for solo founders, freelancers, and the self-employed.
- Provide open-diary coaching, allowing clients to focus on creating significant change without time constraints.
- Specialize in business modeling and re-modeling to delight customers, increase revenue, and redefine roles within companies.

Mark Elliott FRSA

We’re about to start our 21st term of Startup School for Seniors, next Thursday 22nd.
Our 65th programme.

We exist for one reason:
 to help people over 50 create financial independence in later life - on terms that actually fit their lives.

Something we’re seeing very clearly this time:
 over half of applicants have a health condition or disability that affects their day-to-day life.
I
 don’t yet know what this fully means.
 But I do know this: people want to work, earn, and contribute - without pretending their reality doesn’t exist.

We’re grateful to be delivering this cohort with support from
 Ealing Council (London Borough of Ealing),
 Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea,
 Westminster City Council, and
 RingGo Parking and Wates Group and their suppliers.

📌 There’s still time to apply.
 If you’re over 50 and thinking about freelancing, self-employment, or your next working chapter, applications are open for one more week.

📌 And we’re open to conversations.
 Demand is rising faster than funding. If you work in policy, funding, health, or inclusion - and this resonates -I’d genuinely welcome a conversation.

As far as we know, we remain the only national, online freelance and startup programme focused on people over 50 - and uniquely built to support them. Suzanne Noble

(Photo: a calm, misty Thames. It felt right this morning even though this was yesterday. I guess I'm channelling the calm rather than living it.)

Mark  Elliott FRSA

Coach for Midlife Founders | Helping You Build Your Next Stage Business | Strategy - Coaching - Accountability | Startup School For Seniors co-founder

Most experienced founders don’t struggle with what they do.

They struggle with how they explain it.

They tell the same story to:
- A £10k client and a £250k client
- A procurement lead and a delivery team
- A referral partner and an end customer

Same solution. Same words.
That’s rarely effective.

Different audiences listen for different things:
👆 Large clients want risk reduction and outcomes
👇 Smaller clients want clarity and speed
👉 Partners want fit and confidence
🫶 Buyers want their problem named accurately

🫵 Your offer doesn’t need to change.
 Your story does.

This is where good coaching helps.
Not by rewriting your pitch every week (heaven help us) but by:
1) Clarifying who you are actually speaking to
2) Sharpening the story that matters right now
3) Keeping you focused when it’s tempting to say everything

Most businesses don’t fail because the solution is wrong.
They stall because the story is blurred.

Are you telling the right story to the right audience — or the same one to everyone? OR How many stories do you tell?

This was inspired by Ash Maurya, as he has many times before, but from my own experience of non-equity funded businesses.

Let Your Business Support Your Life — Not Take Over It

Your business is meant to support your life — not become the centre of it.

When you look at the projects that have gone well this year, you’ll often notice there’s a pattern: a structure, a framework, or a rhythm that allowed them to succeed.

Those are the ingredients you can carry with you into 2026.

And then there’s the deeper layer:  
What would value-led goals look like for you? 
How would they differ from goals you’ve set before? 
Can you spot where past goals were slightly misaligned with where you really wanted to go?

When your goals match your values, they feel lighter - and more achievable.

✨ If you want to explore this in your business, I’m here.

taplio

The Battle

Ash Maurya

Mark Elliott FRSA

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreAsh Maurya's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreMark Elliott FRSA's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Ash Maurya

Mark Elliott FRSA

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Ash Maurya's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreMark Elliott FRSA's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreAsh Maurya's LinkedIn Performance