K9 Ventures

AUGUST 13, 2010

In the end the revenue simply wasn’t enough to make a sustainable business and so we had to switch gears once more (in today’s parlance that would be a “Pivot”). Over the course of that relationship that lasted several years, we did over $1M in revenue just from HP. Let’s take another scenario — this time in my second company.

Revenue 72

Revenue Developer Java Customer Development 72

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

is an elegant way to model any service-oriented business: Acquisition Activation Retention Referral Revenue We used a very similar scheme at IMVU, although we werent lucky enough to have started with this framework, and so had to derive a lot of it ourselves via trial and error. The Lean Startup Intensive is tomorrow at Web 2.0.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, February 20, 2009 Work in small batches Software should be designed, written, and deployed in small batches. I owe it originally to lean manufacturing books like Lean Thinking and Toyota Production System. Similar results apply in product management, design, testing, and even operations.

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment Development Team Review 161

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, April 14, 2009 Validated learning about customers Would you rather have $30,000 or $1 million in revenues for your startup? All things being equal, of course, you’d rather have more revenue rather than less. And yet revenue alone is not a sufficient goal. More on that in a moment.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

Five Quarters of Profitability During the 1980’s and through the mid 1990’s startups going public had to do something that most companies today never heard of – they had to show a track record of increasing revenue and consistent profitability. There was now a public market for companies with no revenue, no profit and big claims.

Silicon Valley 235

Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 235

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

Of all the tactics I have advocated as part of the lean startup , none has provoked as many extreme reactions as continuous deployment , a process that allows companies to release software in minutes instead of days, weeks, or months. January 29, 2010 11:18 AM Eric said. > January 29, 2010 12:55 PM Gareth Evans said.

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Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

When a startup finds a repeatable sales process and steadily increasing revenue, its investors wants to harvest the rewards and build a culture of “execution.” 4) You don’t see any revenue gain past three years. on July 9, 2010 at 12:50 pm Said: [.] Theme: Digg 3 Column by WP Designer. Blog at WordPress.com.

Customer 216

Customer Silicon Valley RSS California 216

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 23, 2009

They were accustomed to measuring their progress primarily by gross revenue compared to their targets. All very reasonable, well designed, well argued. They were accustomed to measuring their progress primarily by gross revenue compared to their targets. All very reasonable, well designed, well argued. Expo SF (May.

Metrics 167

Metrics San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

And it was going to mention the two words that SuperMac marketing needed to live and breathe: revenue and profit. If marketing can’t deliver the 40,000 leads what else can we do for sales to still achieve our revenue and profitability?”) They understood the mission intent was our corporate revenue and profit goals.

Silicon Valley 269

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 269

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 15, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, January 15, 2010 Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Harvard Business Review) The next part in the series I am writing for Harvard Business Review is online. Usually, they are delivering only a fraction of the revenue they promised.

Hockey Stick 105

Hockey Stick San Francisco Entrepreneur Lean 105

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

This theory has become so influential that I have called it one of the three pillars of the lean startup - every bit as important as the changes in technology or the advent of agile development. This is a self-published book, originally designed as a companion to Steves class at Berkeleys Haas school of business. Heres the catch.

Customer Development 168

Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Steve Blank

MAY 28, 2009

But then, because there might be entrenched competitors and your concept is radically new, you still need to invest in the customer development process to learn how to get design wins from companies who may be happy with their existing vendors. These two numbers have direct impact on revenue and financial health.

Vertical 162

Vertical Silicon Valley Marketing Customer 162

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

aka: An Open Letter to the Next Big Social Network) - 500 Hats , November 1, 2010 I've held off writing this post for a long time, because I couldn't quite get my head around all the issues. When It’s Darkest Men See the Stars - Steve Blank , November 24, 2010 When It’s Darkest Men See the Stars. but: Something is Still Missing.

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Technology Product CTO Hire 175

ConversionXL

MARCH 19, 2020

Greater discipline during boom times offered more flexibility during lean years. And getting it right during the lean years, Bain reports , has a massive impact on companies’ growth rate after things improve: ( Image source ). Survey design. As the recession wrapped up, they had to remind consumers of lean times.

Marketing 121

Marketing Campaign Non-Compete Lean 121

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

I have been working on getting a startup to revenue for a while, and while this is my 4th iteration and I have not yet succeeded, I’ve been learning new things every time. Theme: Digg 3 Column by WP Designer. Your blog post has provided a lot of useful insights for me which I’ve been implementing. Blog at WordPress.com.

Silicon Valley 131

Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital Customer Development 131

Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

We talked about some simple design rules and I remember him thanking me for coming, saying we were the only chip company who cared enough to call on him (little did he know.) Long gone from Zilog I saw the picture of the original Macintosh design team. I thought nothing about the meeting until years later. What happened?

Silicon Valley 143

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 143

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 14, 2013

Guest post by Lisa Regan, writer for The Lean Startup Conference, who has created content for a number of startups. In our ongoing exploration of how people actually implement Lean Startup methods in their workplaces, we’re asking practitioners to share their techniques. Steph: Segmentation and timing.

Lean 167

Lean Conversion Audience Design 167

crowdSPRING Blog

APRIL 7, 2013

In 2010 the co-Founders of Burbn , a check-in app for mobile phones built on HTML5, raised $500,00o in seed funding for a service that was designed for quick mobile sharing between users. This iterative cycle is at the heart of the lean approach to business and the pivot is one aspect of it. And they may buy more from you.

Lean 100

Lean Cofounder Small Business Social Network 100

Steve Blank

APRIL 30, 2009

The design was actually a negative drag on selling anything off a retail shelf. From grumbling skeptics, they all became packaging design converts. And for sure they were never going to win any design awards. So we not only sent everyone through packaging school, we also brought the packaging design in-house.

Sales 120

Sales Silicon Valley RSS Las Vegas 120

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. Over its lifetime a Lean Startup may spend less money than a traditional startup. Lets see why.

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Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 260

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

If youre making revenue, you should be finding ways to grow it predictably month-over-month; if youre focused on customer engagement, your product should be getting more sticky, and so on. The Lean Startup Intensive is tomorrow at Web 2.0. Tell your Startup Visa story Speaking 2010: Webstock, GDC, Web 2.0, Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 88

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 2, 2009

For the rest of us, there is an alternative: to create credibility by building a lean startup. We were even more embarrassed by the pathetically small number of customers we had, and the pathetically low amount of revenue we had earned so far. My 2008 revenues were over $100k on a 35k inventory. Retention cohort analysis.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Tampa Continuous Deployment Lean 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

And so the spreadsheet is built with conservative assumptions, including a final revenue target. No matter how low we make the revenue projections for this new product, it’s extremely unlikely that they are achievable. In a startup context, numbers like gross revenue are actually vanity metrics, not actionable metrics.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 28, 2009

You might have the interaction designer who designed it take a look to see if it really conforms to their design. There are huge classes of bugs that "work as designed" but cause catastrophic changes in customer behavior. No automated test is going to catch that, but it still will drive revenue to zero.

Continuous Deployment 122

Continuous Deployment San Francisco Lean Metrics 122

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

Just like in the world of startups, we can start to use micro-scale pilot programs, executed in lean fashion, to gather real facts for making ROI decisions about new project investment. What is the right revenue model? I ask because as you mentioned there is a gap between people embracing lean principles and those who won't.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Altgate

SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

But did you know that founder Markus Frind has just 3 employees for his $10MM+ revenue business? Unless you’re a designer you’re going to outsource the graphical design work you have, but remember, you get what you pay for. Unfortunately they will be very expensive (30-50% or more of gross revenue). PR/Marketing.

Software Review 65

Software Review Offshore Startup Boston 65

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

Lean Startups/Back to Basics (2000-2010): No IPO’s, limited VC cash, lack of confidence and funding fuels “lean startup” era with limited M&A and even less IPO activity. With Netscape’s IPO , there was suddenly a public market for companies with limited revenue and no profit. 1970 – 1995: The Golden Age.

Internet 335

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 335

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

Or more accurately, startups are a temporary organization designed to search for a scalable and repeatable business model.) There are few courses which teach aspiring entrepreneurs the skills (business models, customer and agile development, design thinking, etc.) Class Lecture/Out of the Building Assignment: What’s a revenue model?

Wiki 316

Wiki Lean Management Business Model 316

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 30, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, October 30, 2008 John Doerrs 10 lean startup tips I just saw video of John Doerrs talk yesterday at VentureBeat’s “How to manage your start-up in the downturn&# roundtable event. Not just about expenses, about increasing revenue. Everyone from the receptionist to engineers is selling.

Lean 121

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 121

ConversionXL

OCTOBER 13, 2015

The class of 2010 is a cohort, because every student in the group graduated in 2010. As the above chart shows, we can compare the average income of the class of 2010 and 2011 over the same relative interval (5 years after graduation) for an apple-to-apples comparison. Average Revenue Per Customer. Total Customers.

Conversion 48

Conversion Retention Acquisition Metrics 48

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

Finally, I’ll write about how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. Once the product begins to ship, startup sales execs use orders and revenue as its marker of progress in understanding customers.

Customer Development 228

Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer 228

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 1, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, May 1, 2009 Lean Startup webcast post-game Wow, what an incredible turnout for webcast this morning, right on the heels of a phenomenal crowd at startup2startup last night. Its been a great twelve hours for the lean startup! wogsland : Still not understanding the "lean" aspect. What a thrill.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 60

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. After twelve months Handspring’s revenue was $170 million. They never understood Market Type. Why does Market Type matter?

Customer Development 220

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 220

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 16, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, August 16, 2010 Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium (Normally, I do not write about companies that are doing a marketing launch. First, SlideShare is a fantastic product (that I use on a regular basis) and an impressive company example of Lean Startup practices in action. How are we doing?

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Analytics Continuous Deployment 167

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2009

This series of posts is a brief explanation of how we’ve evolved from Product Development to Customer Development to the Lean Startup. Yet we used the product development model not only to manage product development, but as a road map for finding customers and to time our marketing launch and sales revenue plan.

Silicon Valley 269

Silicon Valley Product Startup Product Development 269

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

As you stated, the VCs only want to hear about product development and, I would add, revenue models. Reply llathieyre , on June 6, 2010 at 6:57 am Said: same here. e práticas de empreendedorismo em Startups no Brasil, especialmente relacionados aos temas Customer Development e Lean [.] Looked up for a kindle edition.

Silicon Valley 133

Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital California 133

Steve Blank

APRIL 22, 2009

Corner Cases and Consensus are For Large Companies Carefully considering each and every possible outcome before you proceed with a decision is something large companies with large revenues, shareholders and employees need to do. Get a blog at WordPress.com Theme: Digg 3 Column by WP Designer.

Silicon Valley 201

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 201