What goes on inside the head of a 25-year-old billionaire entrepreneur?
Keep reading and they might tell you.
We combed through the interviews, speeches, and rants of the world’s most successful young entrepreneurs to find their best quotes. Some quotes will inspire you, others will inform you, and a couple might even just change the way you think about online business forever.
I’ve broken the quotes down into categories like Quotes About Risk and Practical Quotes, which you can view on the table contents to jump to whatever section of quotes you like. The Internet’s brightest young entrepreneurial minds are talking on subjects from Simplicity to Social Media – and we would be fools not to listen.
Everybody on this list below started their company in their teens or early 20’s and they’ve all achieved wild success beyond their years. A few of the young entrepreneurs on the list’s age has crept into the early 30’s, but that’s still pretty young to be a CEO.
The 50 top quotes from the top young entrepreneurs is below. If you’re interested in this post you may like our 50 Great Thoughts on Success and our Top 30 Quotes To Inspire Entrepreneurs.
Getting Started
“I find it best to dive right in and learn the hard way.”
– Pete Cashmore, Mashable
“If you do the things that are easier first, then you can actually make a lot of progress.”
– Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook
“A hard thing is done by figuring out how to start.”
– Rand Fishkin, SEOmoz
“To any entrepreneur: if you want to do it, do it now. If you don’t, you’re going to regret it.”
– Catherine Cook, MyYearbook
“If you’ve got an idea, start today. There’s no better time than now to get going. That doesn’t mean quit your job and jump into your idea 100% from day one, but there’s always small progress that can be made to start the movement.”
– Kevin Systrom, Instagram
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– Ben Weissenstein, Grand Slam Garage Sales
The “Big” Idea
“I don’t have big ideas. I sometimes have small ideas, which seem to work out.”
– Matt Mullenweg, WordPress
“I suffer from the delusion that every product of my imagination is not only possible, but always on the cusp of becoming real.”
– Sean Parker, Napster
“Choose something unique.”
– Angelo Sotiro, DeviantART
“People tend to think that in order to start a new business they have to come up with something new and dazzling, but that’s a myth – and it’s often propagated by venture capitalists.”
– Gurbaksh Chahal, RadiumOne
“If Google teaches you anything, it’s that small ideas can be big.”
– Ben Silbermann, Pinterest
Being a Young Entrepreneur
“I think I was very naïve early on, but that also meant I didn’t know what couldn’t be done.”
– Matt Mickiewicz, 99 Designs
“It’s not about how many years of experience you have. It’s about the quality of your years of experience.”
– Jacob Cass, Logo of the Day
“The earlier you start, the more time you have to mess up.”
– Emil Motycka, Motycka Enterprises
“There’s no committee that says, ‘This is the type of person who can change the world – and you can’t.’ Realizing that anyone can do it is the first step. The next step is figuring out how you’re going to do it.”
– Adora Svitak, Flying Fingers
Quotes About Risk
“If you’re not making mistakes, then you’re not making decisions.”
– Catherine Cook, MyYearbook
“If you start with nothing and end up with nothing, there’s nothing lost.”
– Michael Dunlop, Income Diary
“The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.”
– Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook
“Don’t make decisions based on fear.”
– Jake Nickell, Threadless
Quotes About Failure
“I’ve also learned that the biggest lessons came from my biggest mistakes.”
– Gurbaksh Chahal, RadiumOne
“The hardest part about being an entrepreneur is that you’ll fail ten times for every success.”
– Adam Horwitz, Mobile Monopoly
“Running a start-up is like eating glass. You just start to like the taste of your own blood.”
– Sean Parker, Napster
Quotes About Making Money
“I think not focusing on money makes you sane because in the long run it can probably drive you crazy.”
– Kevin Systrom, Instagram
“The companies that I really admire the most are the ones that have a deep visceral understanding of why people use their service, and they figure out ways of making money that are completely consistent with how people are feeling and what they are doing at the time.”
– Ben Silbermann, Pinterest
“Great products sell themselves.”
Kevin Systrom, Instagram
“To be successful online, you have to be nimble and evolve where the opportunities are. You have to layer revenue streams.”
– Angelo Sotiro, DeviantART
“There are a lot of rich people in the world. There are very few people who have the privilege of getting to invent things that billions of people use.”
– David Karp, Tumblr
Following Your Passion
“Every single person I know who is successful at what they do is successful because they love doing it.”
– Joe Penna, Mystery Guitar Man
“Anything can be done, as long as you truly believe it.”
– Ashley Qualls, WhateverLife
“We led with our conviction rather than rational, because rational said it was impossible.”
– Daniel Ek, Spotify
“Find something you love and do it better than everyone else.”
– Gurbaksh Chahal, RadiumOne
Practical Advice
“My number one piece of advice is: you should learn how to program.”
– Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook
“If you make the Internet, live on the internet.”
– Matthew Mullenweg, WordPress
“A poor logo doesn’t mean a business will fail, and a good logo doesn’t mean it will succeed – it just helps. Ultimately a good logo is something that people recognize instantly and relate to.”
– Matt Mickiewicz, 99 Designs
“SEO is a race, not a sprint.”
– Neil Patel, Quick Sprout
“Don’t take too much advice. It’s just that most people who have a lot of advice to give—there are a few people who are exceptions, and they have a lot of data in front of them—most people generalize whatever they did and say that’s the strategy that made it work.”
– Ben Silbermann, Pinterest
“Over-deliver every time.”
– Alex Maroko, Game Speed Insider
Quotes on Social Media
“Building and hanging on to an audience is the biggest role of social media.”
– Matthew Inman, The Oatmeal
“I believe photos is one of the underlying things in every social network that becomes successful.”
– Kevin Systrom, Instagram
“Social media really grew up.”
– Kevin Rose, Digg
Quotes on Startups
– Blake Ross, Mozilla
“There’s a lot of pressure to look like the last company that was successful.”
– Ben Silbermann, Pinterest
“The pace of change for entrepreneurs is rapidly accelerating, and the cost and risk of launching a new business and getting off the ground is just amazing. The ability to gain user feedback really quickly and adapt to what your consumers want is totally different with the web as it is now. But finding a new market, helping people and taking that original idea and turning it into a business is really exciting right now.”
– Matt Mickiewicz, 99 Designs
“Every startup should address a real and demonstrated need in the world. If you build a solution to a problem lots of people have, it’s so easy to sell your product to the world.”
– Kevin Systrom, Instagram
“The transition strategies are more important than understanding what the outcome state will be.”
– Sean Parker, Napster
“We are really competing against ourselves, we have no control over how other people perform.”
– Pete Cashmore, Mashable
Quotes on Simplicity
“Every feature has some maintenance cost, and having fewer features lets us focus on the ones we care about and make sure they work very well.”
– David Karp, Tumblr
“Focusing on one thing and doing it really, really well can get you very far.”
– Kevin Systrom, Instagram
“The trend of design toward simplicity and accessibility in software happened for a reason—simple sells, simple’s usable and simple scales.”
– Rand Fishkin, SEOmoz
“I’m a firm believer in shades of gray.”
– Blake Ross, Mozilla
“A poorly implemented feature hurts more than not having it at all.”
– Noah Everett, Twitpic
Quotes on Success:
“Success is defined in units of fun. It’s all about being happy.”
– Jake Nickell, Threadless
“Success comes down to hard work plus passion, over time. If you work really, really hard over a long period of time, it will pay off.”
– Stanley Tang, eMillions
“Solving specific problems is what drives me. I am not interested in having a career. I never have been.”
Sean Parker, Napster
“I’m here to build something for the long-term. Anything else is a distraction.”
– Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook
Inside the Mind of a Young Entrepreneur
I love quotes because they’re a window into a person’s mind while they’re thinking their most clearly. And obviously it’s best when the people you’re quoting are as innovative and intelligent as these young entrepreneurs. After compiling a post like this, I feel like I’m swimming in wisdom and insight from the best and brightest.
I would be interested in hearing from you below. Are there were any quotes above that struck you in particular or ones that you disagree with? Are there any young entrepreneur quotes that I didn’t include above that I should have?
If you read this article because you’re starting out on the path to online entrepreneurship, we offer a road map to making money online that links to guides and resources every step of the way. If you’re just looking for more inspiration, I recommend you check out 21 Life Lessons from Steve Jobs.