How many apply to y combinator

YC just helps you refine what it is that you're trying to achieve. Three of the four times Saroya and Gray pitched their fashion application Stylekick, they received invitations to interview, but still didn't get accepted. After they sold Stylekick and pitched their next business venture, the property insurance application Cover, they applied again.

This time, the pair said they not only had experience selling a company, they had a better product fit. We had tried a lot of different things at that point. Gray continued: "YC is an access to a network and resources. If you don't know how to turn your idea into an actual business, investors will know that. When you're an early stage or pre-seed company, you're a couple of people with an idea and you're asking for a million dollars. The only thing an investor has to go on is you as a founder.

Having all of that additional experience really counts. Both Saroya and Gray said they owed at least one part of their success with StyleKick to their repeated applications and interviews with Y Combinator. YC is exceptional at keeping you honest with yourself about all the things that are going right or wrong. For you. World globe An icon of the world globe, indicating different international options. Get the Insider App. Click here to learn more.

A leading-edge research firm focused on digital transformation. Good Subscriber Account active since Shortcuts. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders. If the founders seem promising, I'll now spend more time trying to understand the idea. I care more about the founders than the idea, because most of the startups we fund will change their idea significantly.

If a group of founders seemed impressive enough, I'd fund them with no idea. But a really good idea will also get our attention—-not because of the idea per se, but because it's evidence the founders are smart.

Just as what we look for in founders is not the type of achievement but the magnitude, what we look for in ideas is not the type of idea but the level of insight you have about it. You're going to start an auction site? That could be a good idea or a bad idea. What matters is how you're going to hold your own against eBay. What's going to be distinctive about your solution? It's a common mistake to say the distinctive thing about your solution will be that it's well-designed and easy to use.

That is not an insight. You're just claiming you're going to execute well. Whoever wrote the current software was presumably also trying to. So you have to be more specific. Exactly what are you going to do that will make your software easier to use? And will that be enough?

The reason a lot of big companies' software sucks is that they have some kind of natural monopoly. Unless you have a plan for cracking it, it won't make any difference if yours is better. We don't mind if you're doing something that will face serious obstacles. In fact, we like that. The best startup ideas are generally outliers that seem crazy to most people initially.

But we want to see that you're aware of the obstacles, and have at least a theory about how to overcome them. We'd be delighted to get an application that answered the question "What are you going to make? Wouldn't you be interested at this point? Whereas if we can see obstacles to your idea that you don't seem to have considered, that's a bad sign. This is your idea. You've had days, at least, to think about it, and we've only had a couple minutes. We shouldn't be able to come up with objections you haven't thought of.

Paradoxically, it is for this reason better to disclose all the flaws in your idea than to try to conceal them. If we think of a problem you don't mention, we'll assume it's because you haven't thought of it. And since we care more about you than the idea, it's a mistake to risk sacrificing yourself to make the idea seem better. If the founders seem promising and the idea is interesting, I'll now spend a lot more time on the application.

I'll take a look at the video , if there is one. Statistically we're much more likely to interview people who submit a video. I'll check out the demo. And I'll look at answers to some of the more mundane questions, like the stock allocation. If the founders seem promising but the idea doesn't, I check the question near the end that asks what other ideas the founders had. It's quite common for us to fund groups to work on ideas they listed as alternates.

Please tell us about the time you most successfully hacked some non-computer system to your advantage. If this wasn't already clear, we're not looking for the sort of obedient, middle-of-the-road people that big companies tend to hire.

We're looking for people who like to beat the system. So if the answer to this question is good enough, it will make me go back and take a second look at an application that otherwise seemed unpromising.

In fact, I think there are people we've invited to interviews mainly on the strength of their answer to this question. Generally, the advice I'd give to applicants is: help us out. Investors are optimists. We want to believe you're great. Most people you meet in everyday life don't. If you go around saying you're going to start the next Google, most people's initial reaction will be skepticism. Here are the interviews! So without further ado, here are some of the key takeaways from the Y Combinator interviews!

Why apply to Y Combinator. Do you need traction to get into Y Combinator? Most of the founders I interviewed got in on their second application. How much time and effort did you put into the application? How much time these startups spent collectively on their written applications … Lendsnap: 3 hours over a week, but they did other accelerators first which reduced the amount of time needed Suiteness: hours on the application Peergrade: hours of concentrated time.

What are some tips for writing the written application? We asked several people to read it that had no idea about our industry, but who had gone through YC. If you did this, what are the metrics to tell me how you did it, and how you did it?

Find one person that was really good, get them to read your application for you, and then iterate on their feedback and send it in. If you can condense it down you can make the quality a lot higher. How to pass your Y Combinator interview? Y Combinator is after all a tech incubator Have self-awareness about the weaknesses in your business. Biggest benefits of Y Combinator besides just the money? You are in a special group where people show up for you and help you — and you do the same for them in return.

Bonus tips on how to get into Y Combinator. There are some that have very long lists. I found these to be pretty accurate when talking to other founders. Y Combinator does look for huge market-sizes and potential billion-dollar businesses, but I think positioning how you have an unfair advantage and are uniquely positioned to solve a big problem is often left out of the application.

Just do it. Just keep doing it! So they like to see you come back again and again. Too many people believe that they need to go out and get the funding or find the developers and technical co-founders in order to start and execute an idea.

Sometimes, it could be a simple spreadsheet or a landing page. Nothing stops us from getting where we want to be.