Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 7, 2022

Others do far too little, assuming the viral effect and word-of-mouth will soon kick in, and sales will suddenly grow exponentially. There is no magic lever for growth, so several initiatives are required, with metrics to assess value returned. Ask every employee to focus on sales. Shorten the close cycle to grow faster.

Startup 335

Startup Social Media Metrics Viral 335

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 5, 2014

Cashflow is a basic survival metric for every startup. Things will cost more than you expect. Waiting until you have something to sell before bringing on a sales and operations staff. Getting a sales contract before manufacturing inventory. Desperate entrepreneurs lose their leverage and die young. You will make mistakes.

Burn Rate 262

Burn Rate Hockey Stick Entrepreneur Salary 262

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 21, 2013

Creators of new products in environments of extreme uncertainty, startups face enormous risks. Insufficient capital, over investment, and low sales are just some of the reasons leading to this sobering statistic. Changes are more easily made to any step of the process and the costs of rework are far lower.

Lean 193

Lean Technical Review North America Startup 193

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 14, 2016

Cash flow is a basic survival metric for every startup. Things will cost more than you expect. Waiting until you have something to sell before bringing on a sales and operations staff. Getting a sales contract before manufacturing inventory. Desperate entrepreneurs lose their leverage and die young.

Burn Rate 120

Burn Rate Hockey Stick Startup Salary 120

Gust

APRIL 27, 2014

This will include the first version of many critical processes that can be split out later, including market opportunity, requirements, product definition, business model, sales process, and organization. Product development process. If you are contracting or outsourcing, this is even more important.

Startup 187

Startup Institutional Investors Angel Investor Bootstrapping 187

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 9, 2020

Others do far too little, assuming the viral effect and word-of-mouth will soon kick in, and sales will suddenly grow exponentially. There is no magic lever for growth, so several initiatives are required, with metrics to assess value returned. Ask every employee to focus on sales. Shorten the close cycle to grow faster.

Social Media 329

Social Media Metrics Viral Channel 329

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 11, 2015

Once upon a time, your company may have been able to shake it off if you threw a marketing idea against the wall and found it didn’t stick, or developed a line of products customers didn’t seem to like. Develop products customers want. That’s not true anymore. The bottom line?

Analytics 100

Analytics Customer Acquisition Metrics 100

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 4, 2020

Define success metrics, and measure progress regularly. Initially, you may be able to do everything in your startup, including product development, marketing, and shipping orders. As you move from development to rollout, a team effort is required, including marketing, sales, funding, and customers.

Advisory Board 308

Advisory Board Agile Social Media Metrics 308

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

The software was sold based on installation cost running on local servers for enterprises—which was very, very expensive. In the tactics section, list your sales channels and describe how you will be selling your products. Another great way to test your idea is to create a minimum viable product, or MVP.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 29, 2013

Although every organization faces some uncertainty in developing new stuff, the conditions are not always extreme. For example, when your company adds ano ther blade to its disposal razors , the product’s technical development, marketing and sales will follow relatively predictable paths. in ten years?

Lean 165

Lean Technical Review Startup Software Review 165

Up and Running

SEPTEMBER 6, 2016

To create this first year in business checklist, I turned to our in-house experts here at Palo Alto Software: Sabrina Parsons, CEO; Noah Parsons, COO; Josh Cochrane, Vice President of Product Development; and Josh Fegles, Academic and Government Channel Sales Director, and founder of gluten-free cookie company Jude’s Foods.

Forecast 60

Forecast Software Review Lean Finance 60

Occam's Razor

APRIL 23, 2012

While there is a great deal of appreciation for the power of metrics/data, I've come to realize that Sr. Leaders don't quite appreciate the deep, and often corrosive, consequences of choosing metric x over metric y as a key performance indicator (KPI). It is a standard metric. Don't believe me?

Metrics 152

Metrics Analytics Search Channel 152

Up and Running

SEPTEMBER 24, 2020

Let’s see what else you can do using an MVP: Identify risks at an early stage at a relatively low cost. Optimize product development and marketing process. Understand how to monetize a product based on actual user needs. The practice of building a minimum viable product is a long-standing one on the tech market.

San Francisco 106

San Francisco Audience SMS Demand 106

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Every board meeting, the metrics of success change. Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. For a startup, having great sales DNA is a wonderful asset. The problem stems from selling each customer a custom one-time product.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

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

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 28, 2009

I used to think that investments in metrics were a form of waste. Customers dont care if you have good metrics, only if you have a good product. The only reason we learned the art of metrics-based decision making at IMVU was out of necessity. We set sales targets from day one, $300 the first month. Thank you Eric.

San Francisco 98

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 98

Up and Running

JULY 26, 2016

1x hacker in charge of product/development. 1x hipster working with both product and growth. Aug-15: Head of Sales (growth team). Nov-15: Graphic Designer (growth/product). Nov-15: Graphic Designer (growth/product). Dec-15: Developer (product team). This is when metrics come into play.

Revenue 60

Revenue Acquisition Channel Campaign 60

YoungUpstarts

JULY 7, 2017

To put a finer point on it, we have found that when you adhere to the following three demand-based priorities companies can drive growth while saving 20% or more of total costs – costs that are often completely overlooked through traditional cost-savings mechanisms. Complexity in the system explodes, as do costs.

Green 133

Green Demand Dividend Metrics 133

Up and Running

SEPTEMBER 7, 2016

Sales and marketing spend, no matter how targeted, is always going to be more expensive than hanging on to the customers you’ve got. An “At the Beach” option now provides that pause button at a negligible cost, which has not only stopped churn, but put it into reverse gear, all while reducing customer hassle!

Customer 60

Customer Retention Startup Metrics 60

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 29, 2016

Others do far too little, assuming the viral effect and word-of-mouth will soon kick in, and sales will suddenly grow exponentially. There is no magic lever for growth, so several initiatives are required, with metrics to assess value returned. Ask every employee to focus on sales. Shorten the close cycle to grow faster.

Social Media 120

Social Media Metrics Viral Channel 120

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 4, 2014

This will include the first version of many critical processes that can be split out later, including market opportunity, requirements, product definition, business model, sales process, and organization. Product development process. If you are contracting or outsourcing, this is even more important. Marty Zwilling.

Startup 268

Startup Institutional Investors Angel Investor Bootstrapping 268

Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

As the (very junior) product marketing manager I got a call from our local salesman that someone at Apple wanted more technical information than just the spec sheets about our new (not yet shipping) chip. I vividly remember the sales guy saying, “It’s only some kid in field service. What happened?

Silicon Valley 131

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 131

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

Convertible debt financings have become an increasingly attractive approach for seed rounds because it delays the valuation discussion, costs less from a legal standpoint, and is an easier financial instrument to “keep raising more small amounts of money” on. No updates, screen comps, or metrics have been publicly shared yet.

Burn Rate 152

Burn Rate Equity Software Review Early Stage 152

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 20, 2008 The engineering managers lament I was inspired to write The product managers lament while meeting with a startup struggling to figure out what had gone wrong with their product development process. Thats why we need continuous integration and test-driven development.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

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 figured out the revenue model (subscription, license, direct sale, etc.) That’s now changed.

Widget 120

Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 11, 2019

In the course of all this productive planning, and as you look to build stronger relationships that drive ROI in 2019, consider how you’re responding to customer information. billion dollars and growing, leaders are investing in this software to improve customer interactions that lead to sales. With CRM revenues at 39.5

Artificial Inteligence 127

Artificial Inteligence Sales Cycle Colorado Retention 127

Lightspeed Venture Partners

JANUARY 6, 2011

Our engineers often come up with great ideas, and they are the most productive when they work on these ideas. Shawn Gupta of OhLife , a personal journaling tool over email, has similar sentiments in using metrics to drive product innovation: Make metrics a core part of our product development.

Stealth 60

Stealth Startup Lean Cofounder 60

ConversionXL

MAY 27, 2022

Sales intelligence platform Cognism cut their lead generation efforts by 90% in 2021. In this article, you’ll learn how to build a demand generation funnel that fuels the pipeline, shortens the sale cycle, and generates revenue. Stage 1: Target the right metrics for an effective long game. email, ads, retargeting, etc.)

Demand 124

Demand B2B Distribution Channel 124

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 9, 2009

Creating a company-wide feedback loop that incorporates both customer development and agile development is a challenge. So instead of having sales, marketing, and business development, we have a problem team implementing customer development. dalelarson : "Metrics are people, too."

San Francisco 132

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean Agile 132

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 22, 2010

The cost of creating new companies is falling rapidly, and access to markets, distribution, and information is within the reach of anyone with an Internet connection. The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production. [.] We will not lose on their products -- after all, most of them are global.

San Francisco 121

San Francisco Indiana Lean Startup 121

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 31, 2013

This will include the first version of many critical processes that can be split out later, including market opportunity, requirements, product definition, business model, sales process, and organization. Product development process. If you are contracting or outsourcing, this is even more important. Marty Zwilling.

Institutional Investors 230

Institutional Investors Angel Investor Bootstrapping Database 230

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Like a financial debt, the technical debt incurs interest payments, which come in the form of the extra effort that we have to do in future development because of the quick and dirty design choice. Although it costs to pay down the principal, we gain by reduced interest payments in the future.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2019

Often board members themselves don’t do the work to say “what metrics would we like to see.” Any great board member should tell you, “please don’t create any performance metrics or materials that analyze the business that you’re not already creating for your own management’s use.” Sometimes they don’t even know.

Stock Options 226

Stock Options Metrics Stock Valuation 226

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 7, 2011

This will include the first version of many critical processes that can be split out later, including market opportunity, requirements, product definition, business model, sales process, and organization. Product development process. Hobbies can be a lot of fun, but they usually cost money rather than make money.

Startup 255

Startup Institutional Investors Angel Investor Bootstrapping 255

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

Customer development is a parallel process to product development, which means that you dont have to give up on your dream. Our goal in product development is to find the minimum feature set required to get early customers. If I get sales I will expand on the site. This is a common mistake.

Customer Development 168

Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 12, 2010

It’s human nature to prioritize the metrics that get measured, so the simple act of keeping track is often enough to have a significant positive impact. You can also use this space to keep track of innovators (R&D personnel) and rainmakers (sales & marketing personnel). Detail isn’t important; tracking your progress is.

Intellectual Property 223

Intellectual Property .Net Valuation Distribution 223

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 28, 2009

Because, unless you are working in an extremely static environment, your product development team is learning and getting better all the time. Most importantly, I encouraged the leaders of the company to bring awareness of the business challenges to the product development team. Great post, Eric.

San Francisco 79

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 79