Steve Blank

JANUARY 14, 2014

A pivot can change any of nine different things in your business model. A pivot may mean you changed your customer segment, your channel, revenue model/pricing, resources, activities, costs, partners, customer acquisition – lots of other things than just the product. Business Model.

Business Model 330

Business Model Lean Customer Development Channel 330

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 31, 2014

There’s nothing wrong with a business that supports you and perhaps an extended family. But if you want to build a scalable startup you need to be asking how you can you get enough customers/users/payers to build a business that can grow revenues past several $100M/year. With 317 million people the U.S. Trip 2 to the U.S.

Global 335

Global Australia Silicon Valley China 335

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 2, 2013

We talk a lot about Customer Development, but there’s nothing like seeing it in action to understand its power. Here’s what happened when an extraordinary Digital Health team gained several critical insights about their business model. They estimated their Average Revenue per User (ARPU) would be about $36 per year.

Customer 323

Customer Churn Rate Customer Development Lean 323

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 18, 2016

Most often the first acquisitions in a hype cycle are for the “shiny objects” – the technology, the team and the tools. The irony is that the acquisitions made later in the hype cycle – when companies have built real products that customers want, are the ones that generate revenue and profit for the acquirer.

Artificial Inteligence 318

Artificial Inteligence Lean Exit Strategy Startup 318

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 10, 2011

I hear similar things for pre-revenue startups that are on schedule, on time, and on budget - even though they are busy building something that nobody wants. (In In fact, this crisis was at the heart of Steve Blank ’s original impetus to develop customer development as an alternative set of milestones to use for startups.)

Silicon Valley 167

Silicon Valley San Francisco Lean Investment Bankers 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, September 22, 2008 The three drivers of growth for your business model. The AARRR model (hence pirates, get it?) He also has a discussion of how your choice of business model determines which of these metric areas you want to focus on. Choose one.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 11, 2019

At NextView we invest across the spectrum of seed stage companies so roughly 1/3rd of the companies we invest in are pre-product, roughly 1/3rd are post-product but pre-revenue, and perhaps 1/3rd have some very early revenue. You’re obviously not showing charts of user growth, number of customers, or revenue.

Seed Stage 149

Seed Stage B2B Seed Capital Revenue 149

Steve Blank

JUNE 23, 2016

These resulting business models made them look incredibly profitable. They knew how to execute the current business model. Intel under their last two CEOs delivered more revenue and profit than any ever before. On the low-end, they undercut cost structures, resulting in customer migration. Lessons Learned.

Architecture 227

Architecture IRR Balance Sheet Liquidity Event 227

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Teams can prove their competence and validate their ideas by showing investors evidence that there’s a repeatable and scalable business model. A Lean Startup methodology offers entrepreneurs a framework to focus on what’s important: Business Model Discovery. We focus on evidence and trajectory across the business model.

Oakland 326

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics 326

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 22, 2010

Startups that are searching for a business model need to keep score differently than large companies that are executing a known business model. Yet most entrepreneurs and their VC’s make startups use financial models and spreadsheets that actually hinder their success. Managing the Business. Here’s why.

Balance Sheet 298

Balance Sheet Startup Burn Rate Metrics 298

Steve Blank

MARCH 4, 2014

These groups are adapting or adopting the practices of startups and accelerators – disruption and innovation rather than direct competition, customer development versus more product features, agility and speed versus lowest cost. Every large company, whether it can articulate it or not, is executing a proven business model (s).

IRR 335

IRR Startup Business Model Agile 335

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 3, 2012

Enter the Business Model Canvas. With the business model canvas in hand, we can now approach rethinking corporate innovation strategy and structure. Existing companies and their operating divisions implement known business models. Operating divisions execute the known business model.

Business Model 333

Business Model Customer Development United States Operations 333

Steve Blank

JUNE 7, 2010

The company had innovated, found a business model, grown successfully but now even as revenues continued to grow, the company was slowly but surely dying. The other founder, the business guy, managed to get its product legislated into consumer electronics devices. It was impressive. More on this in another post.).

Silicon Valley 267

Silicon Valley Cofounder Acquisition Kansas 267

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

Business schools teach aspiring executives a variety of courses around the execution of known business models, (accounting, organizational behavior, managerial skills, marketing, operations, etc.). In contrast, startups search for a business model. (Or Their objective is to get users, orders, customers, etc.

Wiki 311

Wiki Lean Management Business Model 311

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

VC’s worked with entrepreneurs to build profitable and scalable businesses, with increasing revenue and consistent profitability – quarter after quarter. They taught you about customers, markets and profits. With Netscape’s IPO , there was suddenly a public market for companies with limited revenue and no profit.

Internet 334

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 334

Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2013

Lean Start-up Connection: Business Model Canvas. Regarding revenue, we made a big bet on “purchase intent.” We looked at social sites—like Facebook and Twitter—with huge user bases, but comparably small revenue. Lean Start-up Connection: Customer Development. Filed under: Customer Development.

Lean 293

Lean Agile Customer Development SEO 293

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2015

And when we do make bets, they’re small bets on incremental products or acquisitions that simply add to the bottom line.”. I suggested the best place to start the conversation is with the 21 st century definition of a startup: A startup is a temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model.

Widget 120

Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

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.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 14, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, December 14, 2009 Business ecology and the four customer currencies Lately, I’ve been rethinking the concept of “business model&# for startups, in favor of something I call “business ecology.&# The amount of traditional business modeling will vary.

Customer 156

Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 18, 2016

Most often the first acquisitions in a hype cycle are for the “shiny objects” – the technology, the team and the tools. The irony is that the acquisitions made later in the hype cycle – when companies have built real products that customers want, are the ones that generate revenue and profit for the acquirer.

Artificial Inteligence 120

Artificial Inteligence Lean Exit Strategy Startup 120

Steve Blank

JULY 15, 2010

Most of the startups they invested in either died by running out of money before they found a scalable business model or ended up in the “land of the living dead” by never growing (failing to Pivot.). Until 1995 startups going public typically had a track record of revenue and profits. Startup lifecycle in an IPO Market.

Venture Capital 297

Venture Capital IPO Liquidity Event Entrepreneur 297

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

APRIL 16, 2013

Seems like every third startup nowadays is using the “Freemium” business model: The lowest service tier is free, and the business is designed to get those users hooked and then upgrade to a paid plan. Which means it costs 20-100x as much on marketing campaigns to achieve the equivalent revenue.

Marketing 318

Marketing Viral Campaign Business Model 318

Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2010

Fairchild Semiconductor became the progenitor of a flood of Silicon Valley chip companies and at the same time the adoption of the limited partnership as the model for Venture Firms gave VC’s their own profitable business model. Lean VC’s are expert in on-line distribution, Agile and Customer Development.

Lean 258

Lean Internet Silicon Valley Venture Capital 258

Seeing Both Sides

JULY 11, 2013

Before this occurs, the sales process is a craft or an art - custom-made by the founder or evangelist sales VP. You dive deep into a customer development process, working closely with a few customers who feed you requirements and are willing to trial an imperfect product that is evolving quickly. 1) Enterprise Sales.

Sales 50

Sales Technical Review Software Review B2B 50

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 23, 2013

In the Udemy course, Alistair and Ben expand these basics into a description of how to create empathy, stickiness, virality, revenue, and scale. Stickiness, Ben and Alistair say, is where people move on too quickly--they don’t make sure they really have a product that has the right features and functionality to meet their customers’ needs.

Analytics 167

Analytics Lean Widget Metrics 167

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 20, 2012

We now know this results in wasted engineering effort, time and cash, as customers don’t use, want or need most of the features developed without their input. Another path is to put product development on hold until the customer development team can find customers who can provide adequate feedback.

Customer 119

Customer Advisory Board Engineer Cofounder 119

The Startup Toolkit

NOVEMBER 15, 2012

So here’s another way of thinking about the stages of a startup in visual terms using the business model canvas[2]. Important Business Question #1: does anybody care at all and will they pay us? Some businesses have basically zero risk around their revenue model. Growth is acquisition plus retention.

Startup 55

Startup Business Model Retention Acquisition 55

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 11, 2014

They have many, many man-years of development and customer development in them. Edwin: Oh sorry, so the business model. Edwin: The business model is that the organizer has to pay. How do you split revenue? And then the final thing is just getting the revenue up. ” Jason: So?

Technical Cofounder 220

Technical Cofounder Cofounder Software Review Management 220

YoungUpstarts

AUGUST 15, 2017

by Robbie Kellman Baxter, author of “ The Membership Economy: Find Your Super Users, Master the Forever Transaction, and Build Recurring Revenue “ The fastest growing businesses today have a powerful secret weapon: superusers. This special group of customers goes far beyond using your services regularly and paying promptly.

Community 124

Community LLC Customer Developer 124

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

I would focus on one product and set a goal to generate $1M in yearly revenue from it. Near shoring development with your team (ex: your team is based in Canada / India) is cool, but not outsourcing. Outsourcing is something a big company, with a known customer / problem (that has revenue & traction) does to save cost.

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

The 11 Harsh Realities Of Being An Entrepreneur - OnStartups , November 1, 2010 There's always talk about the end game in the form of an acquisition, funding announcement, or eventual flame out. few years ago I also started following Alexander Osterwalder in his blog about his Business Model Generation -mantra.

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Technology Product CTO Hire 175

ConversionXL

JUNE 14, 2021

They developed features with their specific audience in mind. million in monthly recurring revenue (at time of writing). It allows customers to peer in and find out if what you’re offering is for them—and if they should stick around to learn more. It’s a position that’s helped them build a SaaS brand that generates over $2.3

Software Review 158

Software Review Audience Differentiation Framework 158

ConversionXL

APRIL 30, 2014

When used intelligently, this can be used on every level of your marketing strategy from acquisition to retention to referrals. They’re using ecommerce tracking to measure revenue and sales, and they’re using Goals to measure a number of macro and micro conversions. You want to know if you are analyzing 10% of users or 60% of users.

Analytics 97

Analytics eCommerce Software Review Campaign 97

techcrunch.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

You lost credibility with your statement: “The problem is that many programmers have loads of talent with no product sense and business students have great designs with no way to implement them.&# Take the top 10 largest tech innovators (take your pick of largest by revenue or largest by idea) of the last 20 years in Silicon Valley.

Technical Review 84

Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 84