Up and Running

DECEMBER 6, 2012

Today, I want to introduce you to a new concept for starting and growing successful companies: Lean Planning™. Before I dive too deeply into the Lean Planning methodology, it makes sense to talk about its history and where it comes from. It starts with “Plan-As-You-Go” instead of detailed, formal business plans.

Lean 147

Lean Silicon Valley Forecast Technical Review 147

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 14, 2014

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. In the early days (20 years ago), most new e-commerce sites cost a million dollars to set up.

Entrepreneur 283

Entrepreneur Intellectual Property Technical Review Incubator 283

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 1, 2017

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. In the early days (20 years ago), most new e-commerce sites cost a million dollars to set up.

Product Development 177

Product Development Cost Developer Product 177

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 19, 2013

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. In the early days (20 years ago), most new e-commerce sites cost a million dollars to set up.

Intellectual Property 309

Intellectual Property Technical Review Venture Capital Startup 309

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 12, 2018

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. In the early days (25 years ago), most new e-commerce sites cost a million dollars to set up.

Intellectual Property 134

Intellectual Property Technical Review Startup Incubator 134

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 4, 2013

I recommend you read Fred Wilson’s recent blog post about the need for a well articulated business strategy before pushing a particular business model. He then brought her to board meetings so nobody could accuse him of not having a business model. LEAN STARTUP MOVEMENT. Business Model.

Technical Review 401

Technical Review Startup Business Model Non-Compete 401

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 8, 2015

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. In the early days (20 years ago), most new e-commerce sites cost a million dollars to set up.

Entrepreneur 120

Entrepreneur Intellectual Property Technical Review Incubator 120

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

Last May, I shared the news that long-time Lean Startup advocates Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits were working on a new book called The Lean Entrepreneur featuring illustrations by FAKEGRIMLOCK. LitMotors approach to using Lean Startup to create a new vehicle category. That new book is about to hit bookstores everywhere.

Lean 167

Lean Entrepreneur Agile San Francisco 167

The Next Web

DECEMBER 4, 2013

As a startup, you’re working with limited resources and a lean business model. Building your brand presence on specialized outlets holds immense value for your business – especially in early stages. Prioritize social networks. Startup Example: Cloudera. Strategy Adopted: Blogger Outreach.

Social Media 158

Social Media Media Viral Startup 158

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, March 13, 2009 Dont launch Heres a common question I get from startups, especially in the early stages: when should we launch? This is the usual reason given for a marketing launch, but for most early stage startups, its a failure. You have to know your business model.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

In an early-stage startup especially, revenue is not an important goal in and of itself. Let’s start with a simple question: why do early-stage startups want revenue? What matters is proving the viability of the company’s business model, what investors call “traction.&#

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Steve Blank

JUNE 11, 2009

Yet for every founder there are 10-20 other employees who take the near-equivalent risks in joining an early-stage company. If you’re not a founder (by choice, timing or temperament,) you may be an early employee or a later stage startup employee. link] a few seconds ago from web [.]

Cofounder 219

Cofounder Founder Silicon Valley Technical Cofounder 219

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 26, 2020

And thanks to Ann Miura-Ko of Floodgate (my first Lean LaunchPad co-instructor) for her suggestions. Keep in mind that there is no “one way” to raise money Different investors will almost certainly have different models, and different regions may have different math. Team, Product, Traction, Business Model and Market.

Cofounder 429

Cofounder Seed Stage Valuation Metrics 429

Occam's Razor

APRIL 8, 2013

This thought was in my mind as I was reading Lean Analytics a new book by my friend Alistair Croll and his collaborator Benjamin Yoskovitz. In this post, we’ll look at each of the four steps in the Lean Analytics Cycle in more detail. Another way to find the metric you want to change is to look at your business model.

Metrics 156

Metrics Analytics Lean Churn Rate 156

Steve Blank

APRIL 20, 2021

And Jennifer is now my co-instructor in the Stanford Lean LaunchPad class.). Over the last two decades Shawn has seen hundreds of startups use the Lean Methodology. It bears repeating: an early-stage startup must focus on making one customer group excited by a mission-aligned product. The MVP Tree.

Product 436

Product Viral Channel San Francisco 436

YoungUpstarts

MARCH 16, 2014

Knowledge and content used to be locked in physical depositories – and within great minds – not easily accessible by everyone, but the web is changing that paradigm.

Video 221

Video Founder Silicon Valley Lean 221

Steve Blank

JUNE 11, 2013

When you take money from investors their business model becomes yours. Sigh… What I should have been hearing is the search for the business model, specifically the progress on product/market fit, but I hear the fund raising story first at least 90% of the time. When I asked, “What are you working on?” What’s a Startup?

Venture Capital 333

Venture Capital IRR Liquidity Event Business Model 333

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

One way to conceive of our goal in an early-stage venture is to incrementally “fill in the blanks&# for the business model that we think will one day power our startup. For example, say that your business model calls for a 4% conversion rate – as ours did initially at IMVU. Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

Step 1: Start with a lean plan. Instead of sitting down to write a 40-page business plan, start with a one-page pitch. It’s the fastest way to get your idea onto paper, and it’s the very first step in the lean planning process, which is much easier and more iterative than traditional business planning methods.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Steve Blank

JUNE 11, 2013

When you take money from investors their business model becomes yours. Sigh… What I should have been hearing is the search for the business model, specifically the progress on product/market fit, but I hear the fund raising story first at least 90% of the time. When I asked, “What are you working on?” What’s a Startup?

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital IRR Liquidity Event Business Model 225

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 19, 2017

When starting a business today, going online is certainly one of the best ways to keep your company expenditure to a minimum. As excited as you are about your new business venture, it can be very easy to get carried away spending money on things such as gadgets, decorations, or even a premium web design service.

Cost 150

Cost Curation Startup Early Stage 150

Steve Blank

JULY 13, 2009

Hype before shipping any product is an obvious flaw, but what about hyping products that have shipped but have zero business model? I do not want to necessarily start a flame war about particular creations of “Web 2.0 I’m a bit old fashioned and think that’s like flipping houses that are appreciating daily.

Silicon Valley 122

Silicon Valley Product RSS California 122

www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

VC Cafe covers early stage Israeli and European tech & mobile startups. Updated Business tools for Startups. Amazon Web Services. Lean Methodology Sources. Steve Blank on Lean Customer Development. Part 3- Lean Cust. Web Tools: Hereâ??s Mobile Tools: If you are a web developer, you donâ??t

Software Review 53

Software Review Technical Review Startup 53

Steve Blank

MAY 26, 2009

The guidelines I had originally proposed to my students worked for enterprise software or Web 2.0 Just for discussion, the markets I chose were: Web 2.0, “vertical&# works perfectly fine in quickly telling you about a general direction of a company’s business model. Order Here. To Order Outside of the U.S.

Vertical 149

Vertical Silicon Valley Intellectual Property RSS 149

SoCal CTO

OCTOBER 8, 2009

This is a great presentation and one that I'm going to point out to startup / early stage company CEOs. Normally, when I am talking to the founder of any startup trying to figure out what they need to do, one of the things I always try to do is understand their business at its core. Great stuff.

Metrics 225

Metrics Startup Retention Acquisition 225

www.inc.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Arizona Bay, after all, had built the IT infrastructure and Web applications that Jumpstart needed to hit it big. Over the past year or so, work-for-equity arrangements have become an integral part of Arizona Bays business model. But Ive definitely had to lean on Dave. Graham was happy for his client.

Arizona 40

Arizona Equity Iowa Venture Capital 40

genylabs.typepad.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Before you agree to take equity in lieu of cash, you need to understand that any individual early stage start-up company equity is most likely going to be worthless. While Ive made at least my share of mistakes taking equity in lieu of pay, I continue to see this as a key part of my business model. Business Models.

Equity 40

Equity Technical Review San Jose Stock 40

www.quora.com

JANUARY 16, 2011

Find Questions, Topics and People Add Question Add Question Team Configuration 500 Startups Guerilla Marketing Organizations Entrepreneurship Startup Founders & Entrepreneurs Startups Startup Incubators and Seed Programs Seedcamp Y Combinator TechStars Lean Startups What is the perfect startup team?

Technical Review 51

Technical Review Startup CTO Hire Cofounder 51

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MAY 1, 2012

Pivotability Nowadays everyone agrees that it’s both likely and healthy for an early-stage startup to be on the lookout for an intelligent pivot. If the market is small, it’s hard to get more than a few customers, so you need a business model like B that extracts the most amount of money from the limited available pool.

Customer 320

Customer Revenue Acquisition Cofounder 320

Steve Blank

AUGUST 20, 2009

Rule 1: In an existing market Customer Development means not only understanding potential customers, but your competitors in detail – their product features, their sales channels, their demand creation strategy, their business model, etc. That’s why early stage companies aren’t run by accountants with spreadsheets.

Silicon Valley 181

Silicon Valley Startup RSS Customer Development 181

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2009

We were focused on revenue, but we didnt understand that revenue is not important for its own sake in an early stage company. No business model, either. All my products and ideas focus on early cash and a business model that works from the first day. Heck, Id already seen Friendster flame out.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 94

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 17, 2009

This post describes a solution – the Customer Development Model. In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provide the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. Its strength is its rigor and flexibility.

Customer Development 242

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 242

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

How to stay lean and iterate quickly while you’re building a two sided marketplace, especially when “network effect” and “critical mass” are the two main focuses? When it comes to early stage investing – it’s all gut. Warning: Typos, run-on sentences, and crappy formatting.

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

AUGUST 8, 2012

Pin It Listen to this episode if you want to hear a really tough conversation about refining a cool idea into a profit-making business. This is a long episode (1:20), but it’s a conversation that will resonate with a lot of early-stage startup founders. Jared: I would agree. Jason: No, no. What did they say? Jared: Okay.

API 220

API Software Review Hosting Technical Review 220

techcrunch.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

One of the things I do as a founder of a later stage startup is to meet with early stage entrepreneurs to help them get their companies going. It really needs some rounded corners for that web 2.0 i think another recent guest author pointed out the same thing about just starting and building your web idea.

Technical Review 84

Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 84