article thumbnail

Times Square Strategy Session – Web Startups and Customer Development

Steve Blank

I was in New York last week with my class at Columbia University and several events made me realize that the Customer Development model needs to better describe its fit with web-based businesses. And without revenue how do we know if we achieved product/market fit to exit Customer Validation?” It’s an impressive portfolio.

article thumbnail

Document Your MVP for a Developer

SoCal CTO

I was talking with an early-stage founder who has a product vision and wants to get it built. He wanted to get input from me on what he's doing, and he wants to begin to ask developers what it would take to build his product. Founder : Ummm. Founder : Umm. what format would you and the developer want that in?

Developer 354
Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

Customer Validation - 33 Great Articles

SoCal CTO

The other was a consumer play with possible viral growth. Would the consumer one get traction and be viral? In both cases, the founder and I brainstormed on ways to shift the product in order to get closer to what I perceived as something that would be great. Customer Validation 101. Neither felt like a slam dunk.

Customer 227
article thumbnail

Why Too Many Startups (er) Suck

Steve Blank

Either way, the “hurdle” for successful, scalable startups is high, and it gets higher every day as customer acquisition challenges continue to increase. Filed under: Customer Development. The “it” is a physical or web product they’ve often been locked-down, pounding away at, for many weeks. What’s the honest trajectory?

Startup 332
article thumbnail

A Path to the Minimum Viable Product

Steve Blank

Shawn immediately said the name I had given the four steps was confusing – I had called it market development – he suggested that I call it Customer Development – and the name stuck. Founders should understand what the customer hopes to accomplish , or what their job to be done is. Final Thoughts.

Product 436
article thumbnail

Why tech founders can’t hire in early salespeople

The Startup Toolkit

It’s as big of a deal as getting your viral loop working — it’s how you’re going to acquire customers at scale. As a tech founder doing sales, you’ll find yourself constantly fantasising about hiring in a sales guy to take all your pain away. The founders have to do the early sales.

Hiring 51
article thumbnail

[Review] The Lean Startup

YoungUpstarts

Enter “ The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses “, a New York Times bestseller by founder of IMVU (creator of 3D avatars) Eric Ries. Not doing so would end up in wasteful innovations and features that customers do not want.

Lean 193