SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 19, 2012

It's the same as when I've created financial models and then have it reviewed by a hard-core CFO, sophisticated investor or similar kind of expert. And in the case of defining mobile/web/software, there is even more variability in terms of form and format. I'm never trying to embarrass someone. I know how it feels.

Developer 354

Developer Technical Review Fractional CTO Software Review 354

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

Since the term “cloud computing” was coined in 1996—at least as we have come to understand its meaning—the software as a service industry has exploded. If you use software like LivePlan, you can create this initial “lean plan” in under an hour and then spend your time where it really matters—on validating your idea.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

I am convinced one of Joel Spolskys lasting contributions to the field of managing software teams will turn out to be the Joel Test , a checklist of 12 essential practices that you could use to rate the effectiveness of a software product development team. Do you fix bugs before writing code? Please leave feedback!)

Software Review 144

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, February 11, 2009 The free software hiring advantage This is one of those startup tips Im a little reluctant to share, because its been such a powerful source of competitive advantage in the companies Ive worked with. Especially for a startup, not taking maximum advantage of free software is crazy.

Software Review 68

Software Review Software Hiring San Francisco 68

conversionxl.com

SEPTEMBER 10, 2013

It’s Not a Conversion Problem, It’s a Customer Development Problem. The product or website (be it software, e-commerce, or a service) might be awesome , but if it puts itself in front of the wrong market, or packages itself so the right market can’t figure out why it’s awesome, the startup will fail.

Customer Development 60

Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 60

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

A new bit of code contained an infinite loop! why did that code get written? Hes a new employee, and he was not properly trained in TDD So far, this isnt much different from the kind of analysis any competent operations team would conduct for a site outage. Most engineers would ship code to production on their first day.

Software Review 167

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

Steve Blank

AUGUST 29, 2011

More than 90% of startups fail, due primarily to self-destruction rather than competition. They believe that they can crack the code of innovation and turn entrepreneurship into a science if they had hard data rather than speculation of why startups succeed or fail. 74% of high growth Internet startups fail due to premature scaling.

Software Review 296

Software Review Early Stage Technical Review Startup 296

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 8, 2008

Integration risk is the term I use to describe the costs of having code sitting on some, but not all, developers machines. It happens whenever youre writing code on your own machine, or you have a team working on a branch. It also happens whenever you have code that is checked-in, but not yet deployed anywhere.

Software Review 136

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 136

The Equity Kicker

SEPTEMBER 24, 2014

Both of these schemes use the tax code to make it more attractive for high-net-worth individuals to invest in startups. These two developments combine to make startup investing much more exciting than it ever used to be and we have seen a massive increase in the number of individuals who want to be angel investors.

Early Stage 119

Early Stage Development Team Review Technical Review Software Review 119

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.

Software Review 68

Software Review San Francisco Technical Review Continuous Deployment 68

David Teten

OCTOBER 1, 2015

Should you co-found your company with a software development shop? I’ve talked with a number of software development shops who are eager to get into the business of cofounding companies, i.e., getting product revenue and equity instead of just consulting revenue. mentor VCs, e.g., most VCs. Our model at Casual Corp.

Software Developers 60

Software Developers Software Development Software Review Technical Cofounder 60

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

FEBRUARY 14, 2012

Freshman Salesman writes: I’ve read somewhere in your blog about how you had a very large organisation as the first customer for your software. I’m putting myself in the same boat now with the solution I’m developing so could you tell me: 1. How did you reach out to your first customer?

Customer 231

Customer Software Review IP Technical Review 231

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 30, 2012

The class teaches founders how to dramatically reduce their failure rate through the combination of business model design, customer development and agile development using the Startup Owners Manual. More importantly, it makes no demands of you to stand and deliver your weekly customer development progress in front of your peers.

Startup 335

Startup Lean Incubator Business Model 335

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

If engineers want more time to spend making their old code more pretty, they are invited to do so on the weekends. The idea is that once we move to the new system (or coding standard, or API, or.) The current code is spaghetti, but the new code will be elegant. Its become "legacy code" and part of the problem.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2010

for Harvard Business Review) Over at Harvard Business Review, Ive been building up a series designed to introduce the Lean Startup methodology to a business-focused audience. This is the first post that moves into making specific process recommendations for product development. Labels: product development Speed up or slow down?

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Steve Blank

AUGUST 3, 2012

Long before there was the Lean Startup, Business Model Canvas or Customer Development there was a guy in Santa Barbara California who had already figured it out. I want to tell you a story about how a team pivoted and succeeded by synchronizing product and customer development. Filed under: Customer Development.

San Jose 259

San Jose Technical Review Customer Development Software Review 259

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 4, 2010

Kent is a significant figure in the field of software development. To his credit are Extreme Programming , jUnit, patterns, TDD , the list goes on. Kent is a significant figure in the field of software development. To his credit are Extreme Programming , jUnit, patterns, TDD , the list goes on.

Agile 99

Agile Software Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 99

ConversionXL

JUNE 14, 2021

The USP that communicates this is: “ConvertKit helps you find your audience, turn them into true fans, and earn a living as a creator with our audience building and email marketing software.”. Advocates are more likely to agree to an interview due to positive sentiment. However, it’s necessary due to the nature of the interaction.

Software Review 158

Software Review Audience Differentiation Framework 158

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 17, 2013

We were modernizing datacenters, buying vulnerability-scanning software, and adding intrusion detection appliances – all things typical of anyone running an enterprise-scale network. There are a series of formal reviews throughout the two semesters, in line with the Air Force acquisitions process. Francis Hospital. Up the hill!

Lean 267

Lean Technical Review Acquisition Software Review 267

Steve Blank

JANUARY 22, 2014

They failed due to: the dearth of deals in the region that have IPO potential and. Today it’s dominated by capital efficient software, web and mobile startups whereas 10 years ago it was dominated by semiconductor and hardware startups that consumed huge amounts of capital before their first dollar in revenue. Build $10-30M funds.

Early Stage 290

Early Stage Silicon Valley Oregon Technical Review 290

Steve Blank

APRIL 11, 2013

The Torch program created Innovation Clusters by creating national Science and Technology Industrial Parks (STIPs), Software Parks, and Productivity Promotion Centers. In addition to the 54 Science and Technology Industrial Parks, the Torch program also set up an additional 32 Torch Program Software Parks. Venture Guiding Fund.

Programming 283

Programming Technical Review SBIR China 283

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 24, 2010

The United States is now a debtor nation to China and that the bill is about to come due. Wave after wave of hardware, software, biotech and cleantech products have emerged from what has become “ground zero” of entrepreneurial and startup culture. Filed under: Customer Development , Customer Development Manifesto , Venture Capital.

Silicon Valley 335

Silicon Valley United States Venture Capital Software Review 335

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 4, 2014

Reach out to your loyal customers and offer incentives for them to write reviews and rank services. If you run a business than offers higher priceditems, such as equipment vending, instead of requiring a 100% cash payment, leasing allows the customer to obtain the equipment they need for a manageable monthly payment.

Customer 168

Customer PPC Software Review Finance 168

crowdSPRING Blog

JUNE 6, 2014

Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers presented the data at the recent Code Conference. To Negotiate Effectively, First Shake Hands | Francesca Gino |Harvard Business Review – crowdspring.co/1jQOCwN. Customer] Retention is King (good insights on measurement) – crowdspring.co/1haiyJt. 1ovDU38.

Social Media 94

Social Media Small Business Design Software Review 94

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

It became harder and harder to separate how the software is built from how the software is structured. If youre trying to design an architecture to maximize agility, how can that work if some people are working in TDD and others not? If not, whos going to insist we switch to free and open source software? I dont think so.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 24, 2020

If you don’t have customers, our articles on customer development and how to write compelling copy without customers can help you get started. Considering that the “ad” was hidden in the source code of the page, it spoke exclusively to the target market—nobody else could see it! website reviews; 5.

Acquisition 111

Acquisition Software Review PPC Analytics 111

Steve Blank

APRIL 5, 2017

I was having coffee with the CEO of a new startup, listening to her puzzle through how to communicate to potential customers. She was an academic on leave from Stanford now selling SAAS software to large companies, but was being inundated with marketing communications advice. “My Filed under: Customer Development , Marketing.

Marketing 315

Marketing Audience Technical Review PR 315

Steve Blank

MARCH 19, 2009

When I went through their financials as part of my due diligence I realized that if they ditched their low margin disk drive products, it wouldn’t take much to make them a profitable company. They had an existing distribution channel and their dealers and customers thought they knew who the company was and what it stood for.

Silicon Valley 161

Silicon Valley Software Review Technical Review RSS 161

crowdSPRING Blog

MARCH 15, 2013

Bad Customer Development Questions and How to Avoid My Mistakes – [link]. How You Can Benefit from All Your Stress | Heidi Grant Halvorson – Harvard Business Review – [link]. Bad Customer Development Questions and How to Avoid My Mistakes – [link]. Paid Search: Are You Wasting Your Money?

Social Media 105

Social Media Small Business Design Media 105

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 19, 2017

Among many other strategies employed by e-retailers, improving the customer experience seems to carry a significant weight in increasing revenues. Here are some of the practical and creative ways to improve your customer’s online experience: 1. Engage your customers.

Software Review 133

Software Review Technical Review Retention Channel 133

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 1, 2009

I know that this all seems obvious now with the movements started by Steven Blank ( Four Steps of Epiphany ) with the whole Customer Development processes / Lean Startup movements also popularized by people like Eric Ries. I know that their are independent software companies now focused on this like UserVoice and Get Satisfaction.

Customer 280

Customer Technical Review Software Review Mexico 280

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

This required convincing software vendors to move their applications to our unique machine architecture. Oh, and we had no installed customer base. I had hired the VP of marketing from a potential software partner who was responsible to get all this 3 rd party software on our computer. – was his job.

Silicon Valley 331

Silicon Valley Software Review RSS Technical Review 331

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 15, 2019

This article previously appeared in the Harvard Business Review. And by product, I mean the creation of new hardware, services, software, tools, operations, tradecraft, etc. The type of disruption most companies and government agencies are facing is a once-in-every-few-centuries event.

Government 319

Government Technical Review Acquisition Metrics 319

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 7, 2008

When I want to know about some concurrency issues between services in his cluster, he doesnt blink an eye when I suggest we get the source code and take a look. Hes just as comfortable writing code as racking servers, debugging windows drivers, or devising new interview questions. He throws off volumes of code, and it works.

Software Review 94

Software Review Technical Review Part-Time VPE San Francisco 94

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 8, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, August 8, 2009 Revisiting the Software Design Manifesto (and whats changed since then) My recent article on technical debt and its positive uses generated a fair bit of controversy. The same might be said of good software. Here we have the beginnings of a theory of design for software.

Software Review 87

Software Review Design Software San Francisco 87

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 12, 2009

Nuclear Weapons Laboratories which used supercompurters to run their hydrodynamics codes to simulate what went on in the first microseconds in a nuclear weapon and the National Security Agency (with Cray putting in a special population count hardware instruction) used to facilitate decryption of codes.

Silicon Valley 163

Silicon Valley RSS Software Review Technical Review 163

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

For both origination and due diligence, a host of companies aspire to be the “Bloomberg of private companies”, including CB Insights , Crunchbase , DataFox , FuelUp , fundsUP , Mattermark , Qodeo , Quid , Tracxn , Unomy.com , and Zirra. 5) Due diligence. 4) Manage deal flow. Talent Relationship Management tools (e.g.,

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Technical Review 60