I have written previously about how to evaluate accelerators and choosing the right accelerator since there are so many of them these days and also about what the goal of an accelerator is.
I wanted to share somethings that entrepreneurs should expect from an accelerator from a perspective of a startup founder. I think the best thing that has happened is that so many accelerators have opened in the last few years. Similar to eCommerce companies in 2010-11, I expect many to close or shut down within the next 2-3 years.
There are 3 top things an entrepreneur needs according to me:
1. Access to customers: Whether it is beta customers for feedback, early adopters for providing traction (paying customers) or larger customer for growth, startups thrive on customers. Depending on the stage of your company, if an accelerator does not help you get customers, they are not doing their job. That’s the first lens I would adopt to judge accelerators. If you have access to customers, you can practically write your own destiny. If all the accelerator does is provide advice on getting customers but does not provide introductions to customers, or have customers be ready to adopt and review your platform, you are not going to get much traction or be “accelerated”.
2. Access to talent: In India, for startups, good development talent is hard to get , marketing & sales talent is harder and design talent is extremely challenging to get on board. If your accelerator does not help you with talent sourcing or provide talent in house to help you tide these critical areas when you need them most, you should run away. I have heard the notion that the graduates of the accelerator will help you, but entrepreneurs helping other entrepreneurs by providing time is not very sustainable. Most of the very successful startups and their executives are extremely busy. While a sense of pay-it-forward does exist, its just not sustainable is what I have found. There’s no substitute for dedicated people to help you with development issues, help you with User experience and design (mockups, wireframes, HTML/CSS development and information architecture) or marketing talent to roll up their sleeves and run campaigns.
3. Access to capital for growth: While I am personally not a big fan of funding as a metric for accelerators to gauge their success, capital is nonetheless needed to grow and thrive, especially in India, where most founders are not serial, successful entrepreneurs or those that come from a “rich family”. So look for an accelerator that provides you an extensive and wide set of investors from seed to early stage and from venture to growth. If all the accelerator does is “showcase you in front of several investors” but does not actively nudge investors to help take a closer look at your company, I dont think they are doing their job.
There are several other things that matter which include a support system of the existing entrepreneur network from their previous batches, access to meetings internationally that possibly help get some global exposure, and a great space to work from, besides other things. However if you dont have access to customers, talent and capital, there’s no value in joining an accelerator.