How to Create the Next Facebook: Seeing Your Startup Through, from Idea to IPO

by Tom Taulli

In just under a decade, Facebook has gone from a Harvard prodigy's dorm-room experiment to an essential part of the social life of hundreds of millions of children, teens, and adults across the globe. It's no surprise, then, that the company has been the subject of countless magazine articles, books, and even movies. But despite the extensive coverage that has been given to the company in the years since founder Mark Zuckerberg first took Facebook live on Harvard's server, one question remains From a business standpoint, how, exactly, did Facebook do it? How did a college student with no real-world business experience take a relatively simple idea and then, less than ten years later, turn it into a $100 billion dollar company? What specific steps did Facebook take along its journey to creating perhaps the most innovative startup of the 21st century? What approach did it take when pitching venture capitalists, and how did it go about forging its many strategic partnerships? And, most importantly, how can would-be founders learn and effectively utilize Facebook's unique techniques and strategies in their own startup efforts? In How to Create the Next Facebook,  tech guru Tom Taulli answers all of these questions and more, crystallizing the process by which Facebook was shepherded from idea to IPO to provide a guided blueprint for budding entrepreneurs who are ready to start building their own great business. Regardless of what stage of development your startup is in, How to Create the Next Facebook  provides you with clear, compelling, and ultimately actionable advice extracted from Facebook's startup success story. You'll learn how Facebook handled the very same situations your startup is confronting―from how it arrived at its mission statement to what its priorities were during its talent search process―before gaining access to all the concrete, practical guidance you need to make the right decisions for your company and continue moving forward with confidence. And, of course, because Facebook didn't get everything  right at first, author Tom Taulli painstakingly details the company's most costly mistakes, documenting everything from its protracted legal struggles to its many failed attempts at establishing multiple revenue streams, so that you can arm your company against the various challenges that threaten to sink even the very best startups. By the time you turn the final pages of How to Create the Next Facebook , you'll realize that Facebook is more than just a fun place to catch up with old friends; it is the ideal model to follow for those who, like you, are ready to build the world's next great startup.

Genres: Business, Entrepreneurship

219 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

I'm the author of a variety of books on technology and finance, with the latest being How to Create the Next Facebook and High-Profit IPO Strategies. I also write for Forbes.com and the IPOPlaybook.com.

Reviews

[Younes Bensouane · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a beginner in the world of business, creating a company, how to manage, build your team... until you make the company public. I have found this book very useful. It provides a general overiew of the journey, with some advices from the life of the author who himself created and sold many online companies.
Great book to start with. Looking forward to learn more.

[Peter Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting read discussing the journey of starting up, raising capital, building the team and facilitating growth. Distractors were the lack of realism in solciting capital investments and the ignorance of the high failure rate of start-ups. Overall a good read, but needs to be balanced with a dose of realism.

[Ioannis Batsios · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good book. I learned a ton of information I didn't know about. My only complaint is it was a little too positive. He doesn't really talk about the failure rate and what to do if a start up fails.