God is dead.

But your startup doesn’t have to be!

One advantage of a universe empty of moral truth is that the only thing holding your business back is your own adherence to the slave morality of a dead deity. With that being said, here are some great ways that you can use your gaping existential vacuum to succeed where others fail:

1: Truth isn’t real and liars are just people who reject the mundanity of agreeing with everyone else’s version of reality.

Most places on Earth consider lying to your consumers about material factors regarding your product or service to be a severe breach of ethics and the law. However, it is impossible to prove that you have lied about your own opinion, because the content of other minds is unavailable to human beings, who are trapped in a flesh prison isolated and alone. If your product is bad, or doesn’t exist, you can still provide opinions about it and stay one step ahead of the law. For example, instead of saying, “Our product is the industry lead in safety and efficacy” try “I think that this is the safest and most effective product of this type”.

I know what you’re thinking, “But wait! Who would believe me? I’m just a scummy grifter who wants to sell out as soon as I can attract a big enough monopolist!”
Fear not, as we learn from our second hot tip:

2: Identity is itself a lie that we tell ourselves to hold together the half-crazed minds of animals too half-assed to accept their condition and too bored to properly reject it. Nobody but you cares who you really are, which means you get to choose what they think you are.

Present yourself as an expert, without saying it. There are a lot of ways to do this; be it a professional website, well-dressed confident-looking spokespeople, a LinkedIn so packed with masturbatory nonsense it could bewilder the most sceptic of consumers, depth is a fiction we imagine because we are unsatisfied with the knowledge that everything has always been superficial. It is shockingly easy to convince consumers to trust you, and the idea that that trust has to be founded on convincing them of your actual positive qualities is entirely baseless. Therefore, in accepting the emptiness of human interaction, an intelligent businessperson can bypass the need for genuine qualification by merely presenting like someone who has qualification; you must become the second-hand car salesman, the television preacher, the upstart populist politician.

Now that you know how to substitute a soul for the sell, the question of strategy remains, a question answered by our third burning hot tip:

3: The human drive for meaning in a meaningless universe is nothing short of desperate, and where there is desperation there is profit!

Imagine a person in a vast and dry desert. Now imagine a caravan arrives loaded with water. The person would sell their limbs for a mouthful. Now imagine it wasn’t water but beer, which will dehydrate them further but feel refreshing while they drink it. They would still sell themself.
Humanity is that same lonely wanderer but it is not water they crave but meaning. True meaning is impossible to create and we are addicts to a substance that does not exist. How does this relate to your business? All you need to do is make people realise how desperate they are, and then suggest yourself as the first solution. In fact, you will never invent meaning, but that doesn’t mean you can not masquerade as the alcohol from the analogy. When providing any product or service, speak to their desperation, not for what they buy from you but for what they could never buy from anyone. The mere act of buying and the promise of relief will provide them with momentary satisfaction, until like the addict they are, they need the next hit, which you will provide.

Bear in mind that consumerism is not the only way to exploit this, but it is the most efficient way to convert their desperation into your profit. For example, churches and politicians do the same, but the pretence of altruism may make it difficult to be simultaneously successful and profitable in those industries. In contrast, the advantage of business is that consumers know they are being exploited and will still buy anyway.

By now, you have learnt how to lie without deceit, reveal your face while wearing a mask, and distribute liquor to the thirsty. All that remains is to let consumers and employees alike in on it without them realising; you must speak without moving your lips. Enter our final tip:

4: Most people live as though reality is whatever we agree it is, which means that it changes whenever you say something different with enough force. Changing your vocabulary will literally change the world around you, including giving you the success you crave.

Compare these two sentences:

It is cheaper to produce in countries with lax labour laws like China or Bangladesh, so we are firing you to outsource your job.

In an increasingly competitive marketplace, success comes from constant strategic redirection of our skills and intelligence. The experience we have given you will equip you to seek out the cutting-edge of this quickly evolving industry, while we redirect our attention to stay relevant.

Language is both manacle and key, and you can use it to free yourself while you enchain those around you. Given that language is usually used to bridge over the stubbornly indecipherable nature of things as they are, it can also be used to obfuscate; just as it can give meaning where there is none, it can strip meaning from what might have been. It is therefore the essential key to success: language will allow you to pull the wool over the eyes of investors, keep your employees content with little, and hoodwink the ignoramus hordes of consumers.

Now you have all you need to find cash in the space left behind by God.

Please bear in mind that material wealth is itself a construct valued only socially, and that we can not be held liable if despite obtaining it, self fulfillment and satisfaction elude you.