Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 10, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, February 10, 2009 Continuous deployment and continuous learning At long last, some of the actual implementers of the advanced systems we built at IMVU for rapid deployment and rapid response are starting to write about it. At IMVU it’s a core part of our culture to ship.

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Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

But theres no denying the level of support for entrepreneurs that we enjoy. They take common stock, not preferred, a fact that the entrepreneurs mentioned to me many times. And every year, it looks as if one or two entrepreneurs from the program decide to stay. And do your customer development.

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

I had the opportunity to pioneer this approach to funnel analysis at IMVU, where it became a core part of our customer development process. To promote this metrics discipline, we would present the full funnel to our board (and advisers) at the end of every development cycle. Return the name of the hypothesis chosen or assigned.

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, September 10, 2008 Smarticus — 10 things you could be doing to your code right now Smarticus — 10 things you could be doing to your code right now A great checklist of techniques and tools for making your development more agile, written from a Rail perspective. Bring your questions.

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 12, 2008

It’s easy to overestimate the impact of this kind of traffic because it just feels good to have your name and company featured. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. It strokes your ego.

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Audience San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 30, 2009

A discounted price is available for early stage entrepreneurs and students. I want to thank Techstars for putting this event together and giving me a chance to experience the scene, even if it lacks a name. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Read the rest.

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Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

In 2007, BusinessWeek named Ries one of the Best Young Entrepreneurs of Tech and in 2009 he was honored with a TechFellow award in the category of Engineering Leadership. my startup is Blank Label (www.blank-label.com), which is a provider of custom dress shirts that empowers consumers to become the designer of their own product.

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Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

This may sound crazy, coming as it does from an advocate of c harging customers for your product from day one. I have counseled innumerable entrepreneurs to change their focus to revenue, and many companies who refuse this advice get themselves into trouble by running out of iterations. And yet revenue alone is not a sufficient goal.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 19, 2009

Much of what I have found effective is counter-intuitive, because it requires investing more effort in each hire - all in the name of efficiency. Thanks for taking the time to pass all this wisdom on to entrepreneurs. Particularly the Continuous Deployment and Split testing posts. The blog is fantastic as well.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

If we already knew who the customer was, how they would behave, how much they would pay, and how to reach them, this wouldn’t be a disruptive innovation. Just because entrepreneurs tend to forget about these models doesn’t mean their investors do. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 26, 2009

The key to successful integration of customer feedback is to make each kind of collection part of the regular company discipline of building and releasing products. The key to successful integration of customer feedback is to make each kind of collection part of the regular company discipline of building and releasing products.

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Advisory Board Customer San Francisco Lean 151

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

To do that, we add specific speed regulators, like integrating source control with our continuous integration server or the more elaborate dance required for continuous deployment. So far, this is all an academic exercise in naming - but I think it has an important real-world effect. One last thought. Eric, great post.

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Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

But we were cutting corners in the development methodology as well as in the code, in the name of increased speed. a is name, b is address, and c is tax percentage. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 7, 2010

Whether youre a US citizen or an immigrant, entrepreneur or investor, founder or employee, theres something you can do. If youre a startup investor, and you support the goals of the Startup Visa proposal, wed like you lend your name to our efforts. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Soon, I promise.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 22, 2009

Each has its own iterative process: customer development and agile development respectively. In a customer problem pivot, we try to solve a different problem for the same customer segment. When doing intense customer development, the problem team can attain a high level of empathy with potential customers.

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Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 3, 2009

First, a definition: the minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort. MVP, despite the name, is not about creating minimal products. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

The same is true of brand-name products in almost every category (and it can be measured ). The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha.

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 102

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 16, 2009

As Im pontificating about agile, I see the name Kent Beck in my peripheral vision. Eric Names matter. By pulling in a web of associations, names help people quickly assess ideas. There is a dark side to naming. The naming question has been raised about the "lean" in Lean Startups. Eric Names matter.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, July 9, 2009 10 years of entrepreneurship I recently passed my ten-year anniversary of becoming an entrepreneur. All the good domain names were taken, all the good ideas were being implemented. BusinessWeek named me one of the top young entrepreneurs in tech , based on my work at IMVU.

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Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 7, 2008

If necessary, consider doing this under a different brand name than the one you are wedded to using. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 13, 2009

It moves at a rapid clip, each argument backed up with the relevant math and equations: marginal profit , Littles law , Markov processes , probability theory , you name it. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 31, 2009

lets you post a description of a job without having to reveal the name of the company who is offering it, or the contact information of the hiring manager. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

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San Francisco Lean Startup Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

One common worry is that this might lead companies to “release crap,&# shipping too soon with a product of such low quality that it alienates potential customers and, thus, causes entrepreneurs to abandon their vision. Entrepreneurs, faced with an early defeat, might lose their commitment to seeing their vision through.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Software Review 167

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 18, 2013

So we’ve added an extra day and expanded into two larger venues--giving us the chance to offer hands-on breakout sessions, increase your chances of meeting fellow entrepreneurs with events that let you share ideas and learn together, and create active mentoring opportunities with real experts. Instead , tell us what you’ve learned.

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Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2010

As entrepreneurs, more than any other industry, we’re in the meritocracy business. If women face structural barriers to becoming entrepreneurs, then those few who are able to overcome those barriers are probably exceptional to begin with. Or, maybe it is true that women make better entrepreneurs than men.

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Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 2, 2009

Pay attention to whether people are comfortable “naming names&# in the meeting. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha.

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San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Do some Customer Development instead. Figuring this out takes time, and few entrepreneurs have the patience to wait it out, because the business plan does such a good job of explaining what customers are going to think. The problem is that customers dont read your business plan. Help you raise money.

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 18, 2008

Even with only a few months of development, third parties have crammed every single category in the store full of apps. All I see is a name, an icon, a price, the developers name, and a review star-rating. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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Distribution San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 74

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

We would pretty much bid on any phrase that was "[name of competitive product] chat" and variations like that. And then we would use that simple analytics system I mentioned to monitor the conversion rates of customers from each campaign. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 1, 2009

In talking with Mary Poppendieck about it, she said that the Chief Engineer role at 3M was called a "Product Champion" The name is less important than understanding the depth of competence that this person has, and what it takes to build it. There are some good anecdotes about Chief Engineers in the Toyota Product Development Book.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 166

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 14, 2009

Each of these four currencies represents a way for a customer to “pay&# for services from a company. A great product enables customers, developers, partners, and even competitors to exchange their unique currencies in combinations that lead to financial success for the company that organizes them.

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Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 24, 2009

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha. Lean Startup Circle - a mailing list of dedicated and helpful entrepreneurs. Bring your questions.

Metrics 88

Metrics San Francisco Lean Viral 88

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

Simply put, we upload all the tasks and assign a name to each task. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha. 1 comments: Josh Moore said.

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San Francisco SCRUM Lean Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 11, 2009

Ironically, meetings like this had given data and experimentation a bad name inside this company. Ironically, meetings like this had given data and experimentation a bad name inside this company. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? What a waste. What a waste.

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San Francisco Lean Metrics Continuous Deployment 133

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 7, 2010

Customers can only tell you want they think they want, and tend to have a very near-term perspective. Our job as entrepreneurs is to invent the future, and any optimization technique – including split-testing, many design techniques, or even usability testing – can lead us astray. and for which customer?

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Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 4, 2009

Imagine you want to store data about customers, each of whom has "last name" field in your database. The problem should be familiar to anyone who plays Scrabble: not all letter are equally likely to be used as the first letter of someones name. Give each entity a name. For example, lets say you have data about customers.

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Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2010

Since I first started writing about vanity metrics , I’ve met more and more entrepreneurs who are struggling with a simple question: how can I tell a vanity metric when I see it? Even worse, entrepreneurs are faced with a constant barrage of vanity metrics from competitors and other companies engaged in PR. Is that really news?

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