Derek Flanzraich, 7 Lessons From My First Year as an Entrepreneur

Derek Flankzraich, Greatist, guest post, everywhere else Cincinnati, YECDerek Flanzraich is a keynote speaker at Everywhere Else Cincinnati, September 29-October 1st (tickets available here). Derek originally published this piece in July of 2012 in conjunction with the Young Entrepreneur Council.

A year ago, I started Greatist with no real clue what I was doing. We’re now the fastest-growing health and fitness site on the Web, so a lot has gone right. But a lot has als0 gone wrong. A year ago, I’d never really hired someone. Never really fired someone. Never incorporated a company in Delaware. Never spent days accounting in Excel, signed an office lease, paid the IRS, saved a crashing website, negotiated with a potential acquirer, or been responsible for six people’s paychecks. But those things could always have been figured out.

The biggest challenges, instead, have been personal, and on that level, it’s never been harder. I’ve never been so busy, so behind, so unsatisfied with how much I can accomplish with the mere 24 hours in each day. At the same time, I’ve never been happier. I’ve never been more optimistic, more excited for what can be achieved, more able to genuinely say I love every second of what I’m doing. Now I can.

Here are 7 lessons I’ve learned this past year of being an entrepreneur:

  1. Starting something for the first time is really, really hard. Imagine the hardest thing you’ve ever worked on. Now imagine that thing is the most important thing you’ve ever done. Then imagine you have no idea what you’re doing. Most startups are different, and most founder motivations and ambitions unique – but no matter what it is, if you think it’s going to be easy, you’re wrong. This experience has been way harder than anything I’ve ever been challenged with. I love that challenge. A startup is a to-do list with infinite scroll. It’s true that it’s never been easier to start a startup, but that doesn’t mean that starting a startup is remotely easy.
  2. Sometimes you just have to make mistakes for yourself. There’s an unbelievable amount of brilliant, experienced entrepreneurs/investors/male models regularly sharing advice on the web (Vin Vacanti, Fred Wilson, Mark Cuban, Chris Dixon, Ben Horowitz, Albert Wenger, Rob Go, Bijan Sabet, Brad Feld, Jason Goldberg, just to name a few of my favorites). Those + Quora can answer nearly any question. But you’re going to mess up anyway. I recognized that it was likely I’d make a lot of mistakes, but I’ve realized I had to make an awful lot of them for myself. Example: knowing that you should fire someone who isn’t working out because they’re hurting the team’s culture quickly is much easier than actually fully realizing that’s what’s happening and then acting on it. I knew, but I didn’t really know until I felt the taste of mistake in my mouth. And it tastes salty.
  3. Asking others for help and meaning it is important. I’m the worst at asking for help, but I’m getting better. Entrepreneurs are, by nature, usually confident, positive and optimistic, but if success in startups is the outcome of a million random factors, inspiring help from others is among the most important. Asking for help is humbling, but the minute you genuinely eat your pride, tell it like it is, and share what you need is the minute things can change. If what you’ve built is truly meaningful and impressive, let your guard down. Share your hardest challenges, biggest worries and scariest fears, and people will help if they can.
  4. Surround yourself with friends who will remind you you’re awesome when you need it, and call you out when it’s time. In my experience, entrepreneurship is sort of like a see-saw: sometimes it seems like everything is falling apart and, at others, that huge thing you’ve been working to achieve may actually be possible. Friends can be an escape, sure (and you need escapes, big time), but they can also be the external support you need most. It’s hard to keep up with friends regularly when you’re starting a company, but each time I do, I’ve been working increasingly hard to allow them to push me in the way I personally need pushing (and, by the way, try to do the same right back!).
  5. Sharing what you’ve learned with others can pay back in a million different ways. With Greatist, I’ve found putting the time into teaching others has paid me back many times over. I started a class with Skillshare mostly because two awesome buddies, Peter Boyce and Scott Britton, asked me to. I taught How to Grow from 0 to 250,000 Organic Uniques in Under 6 Months with no expectations… and have since taught a few more. Each time I’ve been shocked by how much I’ve learned, from the people who take the class and those who follow up afterwards. I’ve made great friends, started major brand partnerships, been introduced to some remarkable people, and brainstormed amazing ideas with others because of them.
  6. Schedule in specific time to think and be creative. Emails, meetings, sleep, repeat… and suddenly a week has gone by without time to think. This might sound a little silly, but put time blocks into your calendar to just think. I’ve literally just started scheduling “thinking time” on my calendar at regular intervals, and beg everyone on my team to do the same. Also, a lot of my most creative ideas come from doing, seeing, experiencing something else entirely. Some of my best ideas have come from seeing a random movie, attending a jazz concert, or taking the time to explore somewhere new.
  7. The only way to build something different is to do things differently. A good friend, Runkeeper’s Jason Jacobs, said in an interview once: “We have no exit strategy, we have longtime horizons. We are digging our heels in and we are going to slog through this over a long period of time.” I’ve noticed it’s increasingly easy for people in the startup community to become swept up in, “That’s just what everyone else is doing.” It obviously makes some sense to do what others have done to fit how everyone else defines success, but I’m learning that success, to me, is different. I’m getting better and better at realizing that to achieve something different, we need to do different things.

Derek Flanzraich is the founder and CEO of Greatist, a health and fitness media startup on a mission to make better choices easier for everyone. Also a fan of theme parks and theme bars.

The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only nonprofit organization comprised of the world’s most promising young entrepreneurs. The YEC recently published #FixYoungAmerica: How to Rebuild Our Economy and Put Young Americans Back to Work (for Good), a book of 30+ proven solutions to help end youth unemployment.

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Greatist Founder Derek Flanzraich Added To Everywhere Else Cincinnati Line Up

Derek Flanzraich, Greatist, New York Startup, Everywhere Else Cincinnati, EE CIncinnnati Speaker

No, we did’t misspell “greatest” in that headline.

Greatist is an web startup about health and wellness. It’s an expert community driven resource that helps you reach fitness, health, and happiness goals. Whether you’re looking for great healthy recipes, workout tips, or even how to get over a hangover, Greatist offers a variety of wellness and health related content.

While the content on Greatist.com is overflowing, the team at Greatist encourages their users to take it slow, one week at a time. The startup’s mission is to inspire and inform the world to make at least one healthier decision per week.  Whether you want to lose weight, eat better, get stronger, get motivated, relieve stress, or just start working out, Greatist offers the content you need, in an easy-to-read format for all of their users.

Derek Flanzraich has been an entrepreneur since his first “lemonade stand” startup dog walking business. All the while friends, family members, and new acquaintances would ask him what drove him, and one of those main ingredients was health and wellness. That’s why he created Greatist.

Flanzraich has been featured by Forbes as an up and comer.  That’s also why Andrew Warner, the founder of Mixergy, (and another Everywhere Else Cincinnati speaker) interviewed Flanzraich on his popular site Mixergy, home of the ambitious startup.

Flanzraich told Warner in the interview that he thought of product first, in his case the content on Greatist, before he thought about revenue and traffic, a healthy recipe that seems to be working out.

Flanzraich can talk about his experience building a school newspaper in middle school, a political forum in high school, or a web TV show and network at Harvard. He can also talk about how he joined Clicker, a startup that sold to CBS for hundreds of millions, right before exit. He even picked the startup route over joining Google. Then he can talk about building Greatist into the greatest. Why people come, why they stay, and what he has learned in his career in new media.

Check out Flanzraich’s site, Greatist, here

Flanzraich joins the growing list of confirmed national speakers for Everywhere Else Cincinnati:

  • Naithan Jones, Founder agLocal
  • Andrew Warner, Founder Mixergy
  • Andy Sparks, Co-Founder Mattermark (backed by NEA and a16z)
  • Wil Schroter, Mr. Ohio, founder of Fundable
  • Jake Stutzman, founder evlevate.co
  • Jonathon Perrelli, Managing Director, Fortify Ventures
  • Justin Gutwein, Filmmaker and Entrepreneur startupland.tv
  • Mark Hasebroock, Founder Dundee Venture Capital
  • Jason Healy, Founder, Blu
  • John Bracken, Founder e-vite and Speek
  • Dave Knox, CMO Rockfish, co-founder, Brandery
  • Patrick Woods, Managing Director a>m ventures
  • Sarah Ware, Founder Markerly
  • John T. Meyer, Founder lemon.ly
  • Raghu Betina, Managing Patner, The Starter League
  • Ryan O’Connell, VP Influence & Company
  • Blake Miller, Managing Director, Think Big Accelerator
  • Michael Bergman, Founder Repp.

Get your ticket or Startup Village Booth for Everywhere Else Cincinnati below.

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New York Startup: Greatist The Go To Place For Health & Wellness Info INTERVIEW

Greatist,NY startup,New York startup,startups,startup,startup interviewI’m one of those people that thinks in order to be the best you need to think like you are the best, it’s a motivational mantra that’s driven me since my childhood. Such is the case with Derek Flanzraich and his health and wellness, socially driven info startup Greatist. This New York based startup is a destination site for original, amazingly good health and wellness content. It must be because they’re currently seeing 1.5 million uniques a month, which according to Flanzraich makes Greatist the fastest growing site in the health space.

Whether you’re looking for great healthy recipes, workout tips or even how to get over a hangover, Greatist offers a great variety of wellness and health related content.

While the content on Greatist.com is overflowing, the team at Greatist encourages their users to take it slow, one week at a time. The startups mission is to inspire and inform the world to make at least one healthier decision per week.  Whether you want to lose weight, eat better, get stronger, get motivated, relieve stress, or just start working out, greatist.com offers the content you need, in an easy to read format for all of their users.

Flanzraich has been an entrepreneur since his first “lemonade stand” startup dog walking business. All the while friends, family members and new acquaintances would ask him what drove him and one of those main ingredients was health and wellness. That’s why he created Greatist.

We got a chance to talk to Flanzraich. Check out the interview below:

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