Comment by andrewstuart

You really can't tell people anything when they are starting their first business.

You may be able to offer them hard won wisdoms about revenue, cashflow, the nature of what a startup is, why they shouldn't be wasting time on making a logo and why not to hurry to trademark their business name etc etc, but the lights are off.

They'll only come to understand the importance of your advice as they make the mistakes and pay the price - i.e. blowing 3 months of their financial runway getting a logo, website, business cards and trademark, only to go out of business 3 months later because they've run out of cash.