Insight certainty 4/5 debate potential 2/5

Epstein: Founders beat large competitors by offering unmatched personal commitment

Aaron Epstein · Startup Experts Discuss Doing Things That Don't Scale · Y Combinator · May 30, 2024 · at 14:50

Aaron Epstein was not on this episode. A recording of them was played into it, so these are their words but not an appearance on the Y Combinator Startup Podcast. It still counts as said, and it is kept out of every score on their page.

Y Combinator Group Partner Aaron Epstein explains why direct founder-led sales defeats big incumbent competitors when early products are immature.

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“What middle manager is going to give out their personal cell phone number when trying to win a customer's business? Like nobody's going to. And so if you make people feel like you care about them and you're going to stop at nothing and your personal career depends on making them successful, People are going to want to go with you every single time.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

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