Separate the business from the product, because they fail for different reasons. If customers didn't want it, more engineering won't help. If the product never properly launched (it stalled at deployment, broke, ran out of developer, or wasn't safe to open up), then the business was never really tested, and the product may be the fixable part. Decide which it was, honestly. If you do close, close properly: your code, domain and data are assets, and there are steps you're legally required to take.
What's the problem
You've stopped, or you're about to. Money, time or a co-founder ran out. There's a product sitting there that represents months or years of work, and you can't tell whether walking away is wisdom or giving up one step from the finish.
Why it happens
- Some products stall before the market ever decides. Deployment, security, a departed developer or a runaway budget can stop a product before real users have seen it.
- Sunk cost pulls both ways. What you've already spent can push you to keep paying, or make you so tired of paying that you abandon something nearly done.
- It's hard to judge your own project. You're too close to it, and the people quoting you to fix it have an interest in the answer.
How to fix it
- Look after yourself first. It's a hard decision, and it doesn't have to be made in a week.
- Name why it stopped. No customers wanted it? Customers wanted it but it never worked properly? It never launched at all?
- If the market said no, a better product won't fix it. Talk to the users you had, and decide whether there's a different version worth testing.
- If the product is what stopped, find out what it would take to get it live: what's broken, what's missing, what it costs. Then decide with real numbers.
- If you close, follow the official steps: tell customers and suppliers, end contracts, finalise tax and legal obligations, and keep the records you're required to.
- Treat the product as an asset either way. The code, the domain and the data have value. They can be sold, handed to someone who'll run it, or kept for a later attempt. Make sure they're in your name before you walk away.
When to call Preventionlabs
When it's the product that stalled, not the market. We don't deliver users, customers or revenue, and our terms say so plainly. What we do is find out, free, whether the product can be saved, and if it can, get it live: running, protected to MVP level and on scalable infrastructure, for a flat $10,000 AUD. Then the business gets the test it never had. If it can't be saved, we tell you, and you owe nothing.
Submit your project for a free assessmentFree assessment. $10,000 AUD flat to get it live, only if we take it on and you go ahead.
Sources
- business.gov.au: Close your businessAustralian Government
Knowing when and how to close your business can be hard.
- business.gov.au: Close your businessAustralian Government
Identify what assets you need to sell.
- Preventionlabs: Terms of Service, section 9: What Is Not Includedour terms of service
Users, customers, revenue, or any other commercial outcome.