Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2010

So if you’re the founder of a startup, you may want to consider who you take money from. Is Your VC Founder Friendly? What startup stage do they typically invest in? Do they “get&# Customer Development ? How many of their founders are still with their company? What Startup Stage Do they Invest In?

Founder 231

Founder Vesting Later Stage Early Stage 231

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

Following is his advice to early stage entrepreneurs for creating structure in their company. So, I’ll explain my reasoning through the story of ASC, a fictitious company that has a combination of characteristics I’ve seen across a number of early stage companies. It’s too early for that s**t.

Burn Rate 152

Burn Rate Equity Software Review Early Stage 152

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Unfortunately in early stage startups the drive for financing hijacks the corporate DNA and becomes the raison d’etre of the company. Unfortunately in early stage startups the drive for financing hijacks the corporate DNA and becomes the raison d’etre of the company. What are Early Stage VC’s Really Asking?

Customer Development 264

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 264

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

An investor had few hard metrics other than the actual financials, and little technology to make the process scaleable. Over the past few decades, better metrics became available, and investors could take a more analytical, data-driven approach. ” Historically, investing was a manual, artisan process. Pitchbot.vc

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Technical Review 60

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

In an early-stage startup especially, revenue is not an important goal in and of itself. This may sound crazy, coming as it does from an advocate of c harging customers for your product from day one. Let’s start with a simple question: why do early-stage startups want revenue? But all things are never equal.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Steve Blank

JULY 1, 2014

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. Is Prescriptive – offers founders a “what-you-need-to-do-next” framework to reach a higher level of readiness.

Sacramento 308

Sacramento Framework Customer Development Lean 308

Occam's Razor

APRIL 8, 2013

To win in business you need to follow this process: Metrics > Hypothesis > Experiment > Act. We are far too enamored with data collection and reporting the standard metrics we love because others love them because someone else said they were nice so many years ago. That metric is tied to a KPI.

Metrics 156

Metrics Analytics Lean Churn Rate 156

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 11, 2019

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. One of our portfolio investments, a B2B SaaS company, was a pre-product startup at the time of the seed round. B) Post-Product Companies.

Seed Stage 149

Seed Stage B2B Seed Capital Revenue 149

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

The companies I spoke to all agreed that the community there was extremely supportive, especially in the critical ulta-early-stage. Then, create an encouraging environment for early-stage companies. Provide early seed capital, and be the ones to make those introductions. And do your customer development.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Lean 113

Steve Blank

JUNE 1, 2011

A veteran board can bring 50-100x more experience into a board meeting than a first time founder. From a founder’s point of view there are three reasons for board meetings. 2) Founders who have a great board do recognize the uncanny pattern recognition skills that good VC’s bring. The Wrong Metrics. Wastes Founders Time.

Silicon Valley 292

Silicon Valley Business Model Venture Capital Balance Sheet 292

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, November 17, 2008 The four kinds of work, and how to get them done: part one Ive written before about some of the advantages startups have when they are very small, like the benefits of having a pathetically small number of customers. What is customer development?

San Francisco 88

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Steve Blank

JUNE 1, 2011

A veteran board can bring 50-100x more experience into a board meeting than a first time founder. From a founder’s point of view there are three reasons for board meetings. 2) Founders who have a great board do recognize the uncanny pattern recognition skills that good VC’s bring. The Wrong Metrics. Wastes Founders Time.

Silicon Valley 263

Silicon Valley Business Model Venture Capital Balance Sheet 263

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 21, 2012

I often get asked about finding cofounders and I usually give the standard list of characteristics of what I look for in a founder. But Jessica Alter , Cofounder & CEO of FounderDating , pointed out that co founders did not mean two founders in the same room. Filed under: Customer Development , Family/Career/Culture.

Cofounder 330

Cofounder IPO Early Stage Green 330

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. We often tell founders that a business plan is nonsense.

Analytics 167

Analytics Lean Widget Metrics 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 14, 2008

Most of the people building our product werent themselves target customers. So there was simply no substitute for seeing actual customers with the product, live. Today, when I talk to startup founders, the most common answer I get to the question "do you talk to your customers?" Dont confuse passion with volume.

San Francisco 131

San Francisco Customer Lean Continuous Deployment 131

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 30, 2009

A discounted price is available for early stage entrepreneurs and students. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? The event will include a talk from Eric on The Lean Startup over dinner, followed by moderated table discussion and then final Q&A with Eric.

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 9, 2009

benjaminjoffe : early adopters of buggy product are visionary customers, sometimes smarter than founders! goap #ericries InvisibleGaijin : #goap #leanstartup Eric Ries talks about importance of "visionary customers" in startup success. Startups need to spend time with these customers. Brilliant insight.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Japan Continuous Deployment 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 2, 2009

The core of the article is my first attempt to articulate the key metrics (in graph form) that I believe demonstrate customer value. When startups ask me what to measure, I always come back to these three as a starting point: Revenue per customer. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Tampa Continuous Deployment Lean 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

In a startup context, numbers like gross revenue are actually vanity metrics, not actionable metrics. In other words, we want to use the spreadsheet to quantify our progress using the most important unit: validated learning about customers. Even that early, it became clear that 4% was not an achievable goal.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 13, 2011

Steve Blank is a retired serial entrepreneur, educator, thought leader and creator of the rigorous "Customer Development" methodology that helps startups optimize their chances for success while reducing risk. A veteran board can bring 50-100 times more experience into a board meeting than a first-time founder. Here's how.

Silicon Valley 117

Silicon Valley Balance Sheet Metrics Early Stage 117

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 8, 2009

When it becomes possible to build products "live" with customers, the cycle time changes and design becomes a much more dynamic process. We still struggle to create Firm software that is defect-free, and it still requires customer insight (and maybe some customer development) to discover what will Delight.

Software Review 87

Software Review Design Software San Francisco 87

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 4, 2009

Thanks to those of you who were willing to fill out the survey, I learned my net promoter score (about 25) as well as some clear other segmentation insights: about 80% of you are founders of or work at a startup, you read many of the same other blogs, and many of you would like to engage with Lessons Learned in formats and venues beyond this blog.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

www.women2.org

MARCH 8, 2012

female founders. founder friday. Lessons learned from female founders and women entrepreneurs. Startup Quote: Wendy Tan White on Building a Successful Startup » FounderDating: How I Found My Co-Founder. Tweet By Elizabeth Knopf (Co-Founder & CEO, Sorced). Scoring Founder “Dates” On My Own.

Cofounder 47

Cofounder Technical Review San Francisco Founder 47

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

“If you can fix a problem for someone and do it better, quicker, and/or cheaper than your competitor, you’re off to a good start.” – Gabriel Kuperman, founder and CEO of CuePin. We created UpKeep to fill this void—a cloud-based solution that was affordable for any size business.” – Ryan Chan, founder of UpKeep.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 17, 2010

Three premier early-stage venture investors have joined forces to sponsor the event: Baseline , Floodgate , and First Round Capital. Three premier early-stage venture investors have joined forces to sponsor the event: Baseline , Floodgate , and First Round Capital. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23.

San Francisco 107

San Francisco Romania Cleveland South Africa 107

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 24, 2009

I liked the flattering Venture Hacks commentary so much Ill just quote it: Many founders believe that early stage startups are endeavors of execution. The customer is known, the product is known, and all we have to do is act. He believes that many early stage startups are labors of learning.

Lean 74

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 74

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 327

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics 327

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. Do some Customer Development instead.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 12, 2009

I believe this is part of what made the first workshop such a success - the people in the room were visionary customers who therefore came ready to work, not just to be entertained (by contrast with what I see at some of my speaking engagements). The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Lean 60

Lean Programming San Francisco Continuous Deployment 60

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 20, 2009

It is neither a capitulation to “what customers think they want&# nor a willful ignorance of conditions on the ground. As a consequence, this new startup is relentlessly metrics-driven. It tries out new ideas with a fraction of customers in order to prioritize using facts, not opinions. It is a company built to learn.

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 19, 2008

What all these teachers had in common were two things: they were technology early adopters that were willing to take a chance on a new software product, and they all had similar problems organizing their classes and students. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 60

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

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 24, 2011

Because then you’d miss out on: Whether it’s better experience to build a complete, tiny startup or to do more in-depth customer development for a meatier problem. So that means stuff like thinking about what a business model might be, it does mean customer development. So I have a question for you, Jason.

Cofounder 208

Cofounder Technical Review Software Review Differentiation 208

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. In fact, I remember sending him and his obscure-to-me co-founder (aka Reid Hoffman ) a bug report early-on, instead of taking them up on their offer of an in-person meeting.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 94

Hunter Walker

DECEMBER 19, 2013

However, measuring the outcome of a fund has a long time horizon so there are several other metrics we keep on our dashboard. This opportunity looked juicy: two founders we knew previously, mission-driven, attacking a big market. At the time we were not ready to offer a termsheet because the founders were working in a new area.

Cofounder 105

Cofounder Term Sheet Seed Stage Portfolio 105

SoCal CTO

AUGUST 3, 2010

Startup Culture Lessons From Mad Men - OnStartups , July 26, 2010 The following is a guest post by Brian Halligan who is my co-founder and CEO at HubSpot (which means he gets to do most of the really hard work). Metrics availability. Customer Validation needs to have the CEO actively involved. Not so bad. Performance.

Software Review 217

Software Review Startup Venture Capital Technical Review 217

www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

VC Cafe covers early stage Israeli and European tech & mobile startups. ” Hackernews list of “Tools of the Trade” for startups - includes over 150 SaaS tools used by startups, and over 150 comments with interesting insights from founders. Steve Blank on Lean Customer Development. Codeacademy.

Software Review 53

Software Review Technical Review Startup 53