Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 7, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Sunday, September 7, 2008 Customer Development Engineering Yesterday, I had the opportunity to guest lecture again in Steve Blank s entrepreneurship class at the Berkeley-Columbia executive MBA program. Its a nice complement on the product engineering side to his customer development methodology.

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Customer Development Engineer San Francisco Developer 131

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013

While our teams have mentors, socialize a lot and give great demos, the goal of our class final presentations is “ Lessons Learned ” – about product/market fit, pricing, acquisition/activation costs, pricing, partners, etc. And what the market needed would, of course, be exactly what we had envisioned. Wireframes.

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Lean Customer Development Sales Cycle Business Model 316

Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

And I got to experience a type of customer buying behavior I had never seen before – the Novelty Effect. But the team believed adding video as an integral part of an operating system and user experience (where there had only been text and still images) would be transformative. The software was idiot proof.

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Video Silicon Valley RSS California 168

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 16, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, March 16, 2009 Combining agile development with customer development Today I read an excellent blog post that I just had to share. In most agile development systems, there is a notion of the "product backlog" a prioritized list of what software is most valuable to be developed next.

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Agile Customer Development Developer San Francisco 111

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 13, 2024

But the product/market fit of this first iteration is a swing and a miss. Marketing and capital expenses (new factory, high R&D expense) were predicated on consumer-scale sales. I got a preview of PhotoCD when I was the head of marketing at SuperMac , a supplier of hardware and software for graphics professionals.

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Search Marketing Forecast Burn Rate 265

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

Reading the NY Times article “ Jeffrey Katzenberg Raises $1 Billion for Short-Form Video Venture, ” I realized it was time for a new startup heuristic: the amount of customer discovery and product-market fit you need to find is inversely proportional to the amount and availability of risk capital. ” Fire, Ready, Aim.

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Lean Burn Rate Startup IPO 335

ConversionXL

MARCH 28, 2014

You’ve likely already heard that explainer videos can boost conversions anywhere between ten and ten bazillion percent. With over 100 years of movie & video history embedded in our collective subconscious, your customer’s expectations are really high. What Is An Explainer Video? A Tutorial. image source.

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Video Software Review Cofounder Metrics 122

Steve Blank

MARCH 12, 2014

Therefore we needed them to think and learn about two parts of a startup; 1) ideation - how to create new ideas and 2) customer development – how do they test the validity of their idea (is it the right product, customer, channel, pricing, etc.). Hawken students practicing Customer Discovery in a mall.

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Lean Customer Development Startup Silicon Valley 334

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 19, 2009

While the last post was titled “ You Know You’re Getting Close to Your Customers When They Offer You a Job “, this post should probably be titled, “You Know You’re Getting Close to Your Customers When You Offer Them a Job.&# Context here.)

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Engineer Silicon Valley Part-Time VPE Advisory Board 205

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 23, 2009

The Times Square Strategy discussion I had with Eric Ries , was still top of mind, so instead of my standard Customer Development lecture , I offered my thoughts on: the origin of Customer Development, where we are today, and where does Customer Development go, and how you can help get it there.

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Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer 217

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

As part of our Lean LaunchPad classes at Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia and for the National Science Foundation, students build a startup in 8 weeks using Business Model Design + Customer Development. Set up the Lean LaunchLab or a WordPress blog to document your Customer Development progress. Size the market opportunity.

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Lean Web Coder Business Model 333

Steve Blank

MAY 28, 2009

Customer/Market Risk Versus Invention Risk One day I was having lunch with a VC sharing what I learned from my students. Steve,&# he said, “you’re missing the most interesting part of vertical markets. Markets with Customer/Market Risk are those where the unknown is whether customers will adopt the product.

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Vertical Silicon Valley Marketing Customer 147

Steve Blank

JANUARY 6, 2021

I realized that pre-pandemic I had put together a series of two-minute videos called “See Why.” How to Get, Keep and Grow Customers ? What is Customer Development. What is Customer Discovery and Why Do it? A short article on how to do Customer Discovery via Zoom. Customer Validation. Jobs to be done.

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Lean Customer Development Business Model Video 358

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. They never understood Market Type. Why does Market Type matter?

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 203

crowdSPRING Blog

JUNE 6, 2014

Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about logo design , web design , startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! 1oNJIZp. – crowdspring.co/1uncW1c.

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Social Media Small Business Design Software Review 94

crowdSPRING Blog

APRIL 25, 2014

Every day on the crowdSPRING Twitter account and on my own Twitter account , I post links to posts or videos I enjoyed reading or viewing. These posts and videos are about logo design , web design , startups, entrepreneurship, small business, leadership, social media, marketing, and more! A 3-Day Weekend…Every Weekend?

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Social Media Small Business Design Media 92

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 6, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, July 6, 2009 Lean Startup fbFund slides and video As a follow-up to my previous post on my talk for fbFund at Facebook , there was enough interest in watching video of the talk that I have finally uploaded it using Apples MobileMe. If you want to see the original video, use the link above.

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Lean Video San Francisco Continuous Deployment 115

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.

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 246

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. Freemium models have their own scorekeeping.)

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 220

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 12, 2012

Problem is, users don’t want them to have that data and are highly sensitive when it’s used to market to them. The problem is that marketing departments are trying to apply traditional marketing approaches to an entirely new environment — and it’s not working. Restore community marketing. Why fight nature?

Social Media 164

Social Media Media Marketing Software Review 164

Steve Blank

MARCH 25, 2009

Was SuperMac attempting to introduce radically new products and create a new market ? Was the company attempting to be a low cost provider by introducing cheaper products to an existing market? Was the company attempting to be a low cost provider by introducing cheaper products to an existing market? No, not really.

Silicon Valley 144

Silicon Valley Marketing RSS California 144

Steve Blank

MAY 1, 2009

The Customer Development talk can be seen here. It starts at ~40:30 in the video. That said I will be giving a Customer Development talk at TIECON , Saturday May 16th, 1:30 thanks for asking. steve Customer Development is Hard. Thanks to Dave McClure and Leonard Speiser for the opportunity to speak.

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Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer 142

Steve Blank

JUNE 28, 2014

If you can’t see the video click here Filed under: 2 Minute Lessons , Business Model versus Business Plan , Customer Development , Lean LaunchPad , Teaching. 2 Minute Lessons Business Model versus Business Plan Customer Development Lean LaunchPad Teaching'

Customer 315

Customer Search Lean Business Model 315

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Chasing funding versus chasing customers and a repeatable and scalable business model, is one reason startups fail. Product Development – Getting Funded as The Goal In a traditional product development model, entrepreneurs come up with an idea or concept, write a business plan and try to get funding to bring that idea to fruition.

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 264

The Startup Magazine

DECEMBER 17, 2021

Finding your voice as a software developer in the middle of all this can be tough, and so can making sure that others hear it. Still, it is possible to build your reputation as a trustworthy software developer, despite the busy nature of the markets. Curate Developer Profiles. Don’t Overpromise.

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Software Developers Software Development Reputation Software Review 144

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2010

We’re here for Greycroft’s CEO Summit – a gathering of the CEO’s of their portfolio companies with guest speakers covering topics including how to build your team, PR, customer development, etc. It is the key to “customer development” that Steve Blank talks about. And market your brand, not your personality.

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PR Technical Review Portfolio Customer Development 279

Steve Blank

APRIL 7, 2020

finding product/market fit). The key principles of customer development are: There are no facts inside the building so get the heck outside. So the next best thing is a Video Teleconference. Video Teleconferencing is Your Virtual Friend. Video (via Zoom , Skype , Google Hangouts , Microsoft Teams , etc.)

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Customer Business Model Restful Video 415

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

It’s often said that you shouldn’t talk about price during customer development interviews. Price is as important as any other feature to determine product/market “fit.” In a huge market this is probably still OK because there’s enough customers for everyone to thrive in different ways. .”

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Bootstrapping Technical Review B2C Sales Cycle 294

Up and Running

MARCH 21, 2018

He has been an entrepreneur since he was young, founding top conversion and marketing companies like Crazy Egg, Kissmetrics, Quick Sprout, and more. These don’t require coding skills—they’re usually visual templates that are easy to use but don’t allow for great customization (that would require technical skills). Custom development.

Entrepreneur 107

Entrepreneur Technical Review Hosting SEO 107

Steve Blank

MARCH 8, 2011

It was designed to bring together many of the new approaches to building a successful startup – customer development, agile development, business model generation and pivots. The first class was an introduction to the concepts of business model design and customer development. The Adventure Begins.

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Lean Business Model Customer Development Guinea 300

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2009

Customer Development We were starting Epiphany, my last company. I was out and about in Silicon Valley doing what I would now call Customer Discovery trying to understand how marketing departments in large corporations worked. His enthusiastic response was, “This will revolutionize marketing departments!”

Silicon Valley 232

Silicon Valley Non-disclosure Agreement NDA Startup 232

Steve Blank

JULY 13, 2021

By the early 1920s a new dean changed the curriculum – shifting it from an industry orientation (steel, railroads, etc.) – to a functional one (marketing, factory and employment management (HR), etc.). Lean-driven (hypothesis testing/business model/customer development/agile engineering). experiential.

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Lean Agile Business Model Business Plan 435

ConversionXL

JANUARY 31, 2014

Step Zero – Really Understand Your Target Market. Do This: Really get to know your market. Conduct surveys & interviews to understand your customer’s pain points. These questions help you uncover trends within your market and tell you things analytics alone can not. The Conversion Funnel Survival Guide.

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Analytics Video Matching Conversion 134

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2009

Customer Development ) to help you quickly recognize and reverse any incorrect decisions. Customer Development) to help you quickly recognize and reverse any incorrect decisions.&# My advice was to start a policy of making reversible decisions before anyone left his office or before a meeting ended. Blog at WordPress.com.

Silicon Valley 302

Silicon Valley RSS Startup Agile 302

Steve Blank

MARCH 19, 2009

Why they were looking to me to run marketing wasn’t clear. They sold to a set of customers I knew nothing about. The company was the laughing stock of the Mac market. The two other players in the add-on graphics business, Radius and RasterOps, had a combined 90% market share. Why I was interested was equally obscure.

Silicon Valley 150

Silicon Valley Software Review Technical Review RSS 150

Steve Blank

JUNE 25, 2009

Twenty eight years ago I was the bright, young, eager product marketing manager called out to the field to support sales by explaining the technical details of Convergent Technologies products to potential customers. The answer depends on your answer to two questions: which step in the Customer Development process are you on?

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Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 139

Steve Blank

MARCH 3, 2015

It taught lean theory ( business model design , customer development and agile engineering) and practice. We use Customer Development and the Lean LaunchPad to train and accelerate teams U.C. VentureWell Lean LaunchPad Master Video Library. Customer Development works outside Silicon Valley.

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Business Plan Silicon Valley Saudi Arabia Lean 120