Small guide to Preparing Y Combinator in person interview

Recommended Todo list:

1) Read how to prepare according to YC

2) Make an exhaustive list of questions you can get

• Usual questions: you'll find a good list here + all the questions from the application form
• Think about questions specific to your business you might get (eg how do you compare to that competitor, how does that specific feature work, etc)
• Good video from Garry Tan

3) Build a table with all the questions and for each question

• Short answer (20 seconds)
• More info to have in mind if the interviewer decides to dig more
• The cofounder who answers
• Below an example of one of our questions:

4) Figure out what is your superpower (could be your product, your traction, your team, a unique expertise, etc) and make sure you pass that message along during the interview

• For us, it was our product. We made sure to show it because we knew that was the most impressive thing about our overall application.

5) Practice, practice, practice

• Use this awesome tool and / or this brand new one built by an W20 company.

• Do 2 or 3 mockup interviews with YC alumni, maybe you know a few, many also offer on twitter to help. I'm also happy to help. Hit me up on Twitter

6) Go to the interview and kill it

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Final word: the best thing you can do before you interview is grow. If you have 0 users, try to get 1, or 2. If you don't have a product, try to get a minimal version by then, etc.