Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

In this time, building a successful business meant building a company that had paying customers quarter after quarter. It did not mean building a startup into a company to flip or hype on the market with no earnings or revenue, but building a company that had paying customers. They taught you about customers, markets and profits.

Silicon Valley 235

Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 235

Steve Blank

MARCH 25, 2009

While we sometimes cut the price of graphics boards, it was only because we offered our customers no compelling reasons to buy one that was priced equivalently to the market share leaders. Was SuperMac attempting to introduce radically new products and create a new market ? And we lost money when we did so.

Silicon Valley 157

Silicon Valley Marketing RSS California 157

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 22, 2010

As a founder you are testing a series of hypotheses about all the pieces of the business model: Who are the customers/users? An early indication that you’ve found the right business model is when you believe the cost of getting customers will be less than the revenues the customers will generate. Startup Metrics.

Balance Sheet 304

Balance Sheet Startup Burn Rate Metrics 304

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 11, 2019

You’re obviously not showing charts of user growth, number of customers, or revenue. Pre-launch customer development data is another way, sometimes in the form of user surveys for consumer companies or interviews with potential beta customers for B2B businesses. B) Post-Product Companies.

Seed Stage 149

Seed Stage B2B Seed Capital Revenue 149

David Teten

APRIL 1, 2021

For example, recruiting writ large is useful at all stages of development. Similarly, customer introductions are invaluable in the early days, but become less valuable once a company has a fully-formed go to market function.”. Customer Development. A well-developed model is Andreessen Horowitz’s Executive Briefing Center.

Private Equity 78

Private Equity Venture Capital Portfolio Equity 78

Steve Blank

JUNE 23, 2016

As a consequence, corporations used metrics like return on net assets (RONA), return on capital deployed, and internal rate of return (IRR) to measure efficiency. These metrics make it difficult for a company that wants to invest in long-term innovation. On the low-end, they undercut cost structures, resulting in customer migration.

Architecture 227

Architecture IRR Balance Sheet Liquidity Event 227

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. They measure their success on metrics that reflect success in execution, and they reward execution.

IRR 335

IRR Startup Business Model Agile 335

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2015

And worse, even if someone does manage to start something new, our management structure has so many financial, legal and HR hurdles that every initiative needs to match our existing business financial metrics, processes and procedures. They’ve found product/market fit (what products customers want to buy). and how to price the product.

Widget 120

Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

There are few courses which teach aspiring entrepreneurs the skills (business models, customer and agile development, design thinking, etc.) If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you know I believe that: 1) a product is just a part of a startup, but understanding customers, channel, pricing, etc. to optimize this search.

Wiki 316

Wiki Lean Management Business Model 316

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 2, 2008

Its the same with acquisitions. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev.

San Francisco 125

San Francisco Software Review Technical Review Continuous Deployment 125

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2010

This includes how the product gets distributed to your customers and how money flows back into your company. We want to teach our students to think about how their “idea” for a business translated into a business model and then to see if that business model will survive first contact with customers. Customer Discovery.

Intellectual Property 257

Intellectual Property Business Model Customer Development Distribution 257

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2016

In other words, how can we adapt the Business Model Canvas when the metrics of success for an organization is not revenue? Unlike an org chart, which describes how a company executes to deliver known products to known customers, the business model canvas illustrates the search for the unknowns that most new ventures face.

Business Model 120

Business Model Revenue Channel Community 120

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

Austin Startup

FEBRUARY 24, 2018

Much of the writing on startups focuses on two elements: finding product-market fit scaling the company once #1 is accomplished For product-market fit, we have a lot of source material to work with from the last decade: Steve Blank’s leadership on Customer Development , and Eric Ries’ on the Lean Startup ?—?along Stanford’s CS183c?—?Blitzscaling

Warrant 48

Warrant Bootstrapping Framework Hiring 48

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

You delight customers just like before. In a subscription business, maybe your attrition starts matching your acquisition, balancing like magic. In an eyeballs business, you just cant seem to acquire or activate that next step-up of customers. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 60

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 23, 2013

It provides a basic introduction to analytics as they apply to Lean Startup, including sections on what metrics to use and how to interpret them. For instance, Ben lists out the worst of the “vanity metrics,” a term that describes appealing but meaningless or misleading numbers. Alistair: There are plenty. Consider a restaurant.

Analytics 167

Analytics Lean Widget Metrics 167

ConversionXL

DECEMBER 2, 2020

It wasn’t until we began creating custom dashboards to visualize our data that everything started to click. . In this article, I’ll share how to bring together data from different sources and visualize it at custom marketing and sales funnels that help you make better decisions. Defining your funnel. The Activation stage.

Churn Rate 78

Churn Rate Analytics Retention SQL 78

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 24, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, March 24, 2009 The metrics and levers of engagement, presentation on Engagement Loops for Facebook Developer Garage SF Ill be presenting a talk at the Facebook Developer Garage SF Wednesday evening. You can learn more about the event here. Its hosted by Kontagent and sponsored by Intel.

Metrics 88

Metrics San Francisco Lean Viral 88

A Crowded Space

AUGUST 20, 2015

They will need to do tons of customer development. Once the product / market fit is established and acquisition channels are better understood, the startup can enter the next phase. Founders should have a clearer idea about which customer verticals work the best and focus exclusively on those.

Vertical 60

Vertical Channel Acquisition Metrics 60

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.&# Let’s begin with the four customer currencies. And this is true outside of games.

Customer 156

Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156

ConversionXL

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

. “Growth hackers have a passion for tracking and moving a metric. Without metrics or data, a growth hacker can feel out of place and uncomfortably exposed. This strong bias towards data drives a growth hacker away from vanity metrics towards metrics that will make or break the business.” ” Creativity.

Retention 48

Retention Metrics Acquisition Conversion 48

andrewchenblog.com

MARCH 10, 2010

Coupled with A/B testing, customer development, and thinking through business problems in a scientific, hypothesis-driven way, you end up with a powerful cocktail of techniques to build a modern startup in the most iterative way possible. Listen to your customers. We’ll call this general category of debt Type I.

Technical Review 47

Technical Review Design Las Vegas Product 47

ConversionXL

JUNE 19, 2014

As a follow up to our data driven traffic acquisition article , we’re going to be looking at the roles emotion & data play in “activating” customers and using Dave McClure’s Conversion Metrics as a guide to the larger conversation. Strongly Recommended Reading: How to Create Customer Feedback Loops at Scale.

Greece 98

Greece Customer eCommerce Design 98

The Startup Toolkit

NOVEMBER 15, 2012

The language we use for startup stages (discovery, validation, customer creation, company building) is abstract. Growth is acquisition plus retention. Acquisition and retention tend to be inseparable from the product. You shift from qualitative feedback (customer development) to quantitative feedback (metrics).

Startup 55

Startup Business Model Retention Acquisition 55

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 7, 2008

The App Store is a channel for customer acquisition. Customers and prospects are overwhelmed by the number of media and companies clamoring for their attention. I think its helpful to think about two kinds of competition for distribution: acquisition competition and retention competition. So what can you do?

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Retention SEM 68

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Investors sitting through Incubator or Accelerator demo days have three metrics to judge fledgling startups – 1) great looking product demos, 2) compelling PowerPoint slides, and 3) a world-class team. And we can offer investors metrics to play Moneyball – with the Investment Readiness Level. We think we can do better. Here’s how.

Oakland 329

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics 329

ConversionXL

JUNE 19, 2014

As a follow up to our data driven traffic acquisition article , we’re going to be looking at the roles emotion & data play in “activating” customers and using Dave McClure’s Conversion Metrics as a guide to the larger conversation. Strongly Recommended Reading: How to Create Customer Feedback Loops at Scale.

Greece 107

Greece Customer eCommerce Design 107

ConversionXL

JUNE 19, 2014

As a follow up to our data driven traffic acquisition article , we’re going to be looking at the roles emotion & data play in “activating” customers and using Dave McClure’s Conversion Metrics as a guide to the larger conversation. Strongly Recommended Reading: How to Create Customer Feedback Loops at Scale.

Greece 82

Greece Customer eCommerce Design 82

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 21, 2010

To see proof of this, simply observe the results of the large majorities of corporate acquisitions of startups. I prefer to take the most expansive possible definition of product, one that encompasses any source of value for a set of people who voluntarily choose to become customers.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco Startup Lean Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 10, 2011

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.) But who do you think makes those acquisition decisions? Far too many of these acquisitions go nowhere. I also frequently see the reverse.

Silicon Valley 167

Silicon Valley San Francisco Lean Investment Bankers 167

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 11, 2014

Listen to this episode if you want to hear about a founder who has a product and users and paying customers … and is trying to figure out how to take his company to the next level and grow faster. Jason: So how many of those 20,000 people are paying customers? Edwin: Okay, I have different types of customers.

Technical Cofounder 220

Technical Cofounder Cofounder Software Review Management 220

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 24, 2020

Dave McClure’s conversion metrics visualize where different conversion optimization opportunities lie—including those for acquisition. Acquisition focuses on how to grab attention in a very crowded content environment. Predictive analytics help you understand what your customers are going to buy before they do. *. *.

Acquisition 111

Acquisition Software Review PPC Analytics 111

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

The term “Growth Hacking”, invented by Sean Ellis , and made popular by Andrew Chen , a Silicon valley marketer and entrepreneur, is a combination of two disciplines – marketing and coding: Growth hackers are a hybrid of marketer and coder, one who looks at the traditional question of “How do I get customers for my product?”

API 167

API Viral Startup Retention 167

www.women2.org

MARCH 8, 2012

After quitting my job and starting Sorced , I spent a few months validating my business concept by creating the product mockups and doing customer development. Acquisition. The Alchemist Series: Customer Development and Metrics. Tweet By Elizabeth Knopf (Co-Founder & CEO, Sorced). Angel Investors.

Cofounder 47

Cofounder Technical Review San Francisco Founder 47

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

Written By Dan Martell on February 2nd, 2012 | Category: Hiring LeanStartup Marketing Metrics Startup Life | 6 Comments. Building Metrics / Usage Reports / KPI 3. Product/Metrics (70%/30% time) * Get your product activation (sign-up + meaningful action) to 60% * then, Get your product retention to 20% weekly. Why do I do it?

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

www.rocketwatcher.com

NOVEMBER 8, 2010

Rocket Watcher Product Marketing for Startups Product Marketing for Startups About Speaking Contact Email Posts Startups Product Marketing Messaging Social Media Commentary Uncategorized Marketing Metrics 101 for B2B Startups 13. Rocket watcher b2b marketing metrics View more presentations from April Dunford.

B2B 42

B2B Metrics Marketing Startup 42

grasshopperherder.com

FEBRUARY 19, 2011

Q: “What will be your best channel for customer acquisition?&# How many customers have you spoken to? If you’re waiting for a marketing guy to talk to customers, you’ll never understand the target market. As an investor, I will expect the same metrics an investor would get. Totally agree.

Cofounder 47

Cofounder NDA Founder Sweat Equity 47