Steve Blank

APRIL 16, 2024

One of the most exciting things a startup CEO in a business-to-business market can hear from a potential customer is, “We’re excited. This can be the beginning of a profitable customer relationship or a disappointing sinkhole of wasted time, money, resources, and a demoralized engineering team. And it went great. What did I do wrong?

Founder 325

Founder Engineer Sales Conversion 325

Steve Blank

JULY 22, 2010

Startup CEO’s can’t delegate sales and expect it to happen. Customer Validation needs to have the CEO actively involved. Here’s an example in a direct sales channel. Customer Development Diagnostics over Lunch. He went through his product feature by feature and matched them to the customer problems. Sales Process.

Forecast 270

Forecast Sales Customer Customer Development 270

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2014

I was driving home from the BIO conference in San Diego last month and had lots of time for a phone call with Dave, an ex student and now a founder who wanted to update me on his Customer Discovery progress. Customer Discovery. He worked hard to deeply understand the customer problems of these two customer segments.

Cofounder 336

Cofounder Founder Technical Cofounder Coder 336

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

Pattern Recognition One of the great things about being an entrepreneur is that you are constantly running a pattern recognition algorithm against a continual collection of customer and market data. Let’s Fire Our Customers Part of the DNA of great entrepreneurs is a bias towards decisive and immediate action. Get it done, now.

Customer 195

Customer Silicon Valley RSS California 195

Steve Blank

MARCH 15, 2017

His company had marched through customer discovery, learning about the customer problem, validated solutions and was now scaling sales and marketing. After a few months of talking to customers and working with sales, we defined the marketing Mission (our job) as: Help Sales deliver $25 million in sales with a 45% gross margin.

Startup 310

Startup PR Public Relations Channel 310

Steve Blank

APRIL 30, 2009

SuperMac sold our graphic boards for the Macintosh through multiple distribution channels: direct sales to major accounts, national chains, independent rep firms, etc. But the computer retail channel was a large part of our sales. He had teamed up with a former product manager at P&G to deliver seminars on just this subject.

Sales 120

Sales Silicon Valley RSS Las Vegas 120

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 2, 2013

We talk a lot about Customer Development, but there’s nothing like seeing it in action to understand its power. But the big payoff came when their discussions with medical device customers revealed an entirely new way to think about pricing —potentially tripling their revenue. The class has talked to ~2,200 customers to date.

Customer 323

Customer Churn Rate Customer Development Lean 323

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. Our firm has a portfolio of companies across a broad range of markets and the way we look at it is pretty simple – the deals fall into two types: those with customer/market risk and those with invention risk.”

Vertical 144

Vertical Silicon Valley Marketing Customer 144

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 11, 2021

Relationships with sales versus my marketing department was a typical food fight and problem). I’d get trapped in this loop with my wife telling me to “go to sleep,” until I finally passed out anxious and exhausted. At times this went on for days.

Customer 395

Customer Lean Entrepreneur Internet 395

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 13, 2024

Marketing and capital expenses (new factory, high R&D expense) were predicated on consumer-scale sales. The moment I saw the product I knew every one of my professional graphics customers (ad agencies, freelancers, photo studios, etc.) would want to use it. In fact, they would have paid a premium for it.

Search 256

Search Marketing Forecast Burn Rate 256

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 11, 2010

The Customer Development process is the way startups quickly iterate and test each element of their business model , reducing customer and market risk. The first step of Customer Development is called Customer Discovery. outside the building and test them in front of customers. VP of Sales – “Sure.”

Burn Rate 248

Burn Rate Silicon Valley Marketing Boston 248

Steve Blank

JUNE 19, 2014

110 researchers and clinicians, and Principal Investigators got out of the lab and hospital, and talked to 2,355 customers, tested 947 hypotheses and invalidated 423 of them. clinical utility, customer, quality of data, reimbursement, what parts of the product are valuable, roles of CRO’s , and partners, etc.,)

Lean 269

Lean SBIR Intellectual Property Customer Development 269

Steve Blank

JUNE 4, 2021

citizen he was now the head of sales and marketing for a company in London selling medical devices to hospitals in the UK National Health Service. health system was very different from the system in the UK, not just the regulatory regime through the FDA, but the reimbursement process and the entire sales process. salesforce.

Lean 435

Lean Agile Conversion Business Model 435

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 23, 2012

Wrote technical manuals and taught microprocessor design (to customers who knew more than I did.) Worked weeks non-stop responding to customer Requests For Proposals (RFP’s.) In the sprint to first customer ship, slept under the desk in my office the same nights my engineering team was doing the same.

Thailand 331

Thailand Engineer Customer Development SEO 331

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2023

Here’s how I learned why they were critical to successful customer development. I was an aggressive, young and a very tactical VP of marketing at Ardent , a supercomputer company – who really hadn’t a clue about the relationship between profound beliefs, customer discovery and strategy. What do you think?” Who are the payers?

Business Model 305

Business Model Product Development Early Stage Customer Development 305

Steve Blank

JULY 24, 2012

The VC’s suggested I should spend a day at Onyx Software, an early pioneer in Sales Automation in Seattle. Their VP of Sales was about 6’ 3” and seemed to be almost as wide. But in that one day I had learned a lot about sales automation that would shape my thinking when we founded Epiphany. I Know A Great Customer.

Seattle 259

Seattle Cofounder Engineer Sales 259

Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2010

Each sale requires us to handhold the customer and takes way too long to close. A few investors suggested he add new product features, others suggested firing the VP of Sales. The Customer Development model that I write and teach about is the entrepreneur’s version of Boyds’ OODA loop.). We can’t scale the company.

Business Model 332

Business Model Agile Customer Development Startup 332

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013

We think teaching teams a formal methodology around the Lean Framework (Business Model design, Customer Development and Agile Engineering) is a natural evolution of how successful incubators/accelerators will build startups. Given something tangible, customers were able to start gauging their willingness to use and pay. Wireframes.

Lean 315

Lean Customer Development Sales Cycle Business Model 315

Steve Blank

JANUARY 6, 2014

Agile is a tremendous advance in reducing time, money and wasted product development effort – and in having products better match customer needs. And these changes may have unintended consequences leading to customer dissatisfaction and confusion. Waterfall – The Customer View. Continuous Delivery/Deployment – The Customer View.

Continuous Deployment 329

Continuous Deployment Customer Agile Cloud 329

Steve Blank

APRIL 23, 2018

When Sloan arrived at GM in 1920 he realized that the traditional centralized management structures organized by function (sales, manufacturing, distribution, and marketing) were a poor fit for managing GM’s diverse product lines. billion in sales in today’s dollars). Yet, you never hear who built GM to that size.

Michigan 268

Michigan Cofounder Stock Forecast 268

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. These companies would take our computers and put their name on them and resell them to their customers.

Technology 138

Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 138

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 25, 2010

It’s the combination of Business Model Design and Customer Development. Business Model Design Gets Dynamic, Customer Development Gets Strategic. One of the key tenets of Customer Development is that your business model is nothing more than a set of untested hypotheses. Business Model Design meets Customer Development.

Customer Development 329

Customer Development Business Model Developer Customer 329

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2014

We’re changing the order in which we teach the business model canvas and customer development to better-fit therapeutics, diagnostics and medical devices. “Customer Development” to test the hypotheses outside the building and. Teams talk to 10-15 customers a week and make a minimum of 100 customer visits.

Intellectual Property 281

Intellectual Property Lean IP Open Source 281

Steve Blank

JUNE 27, 2017

If they select a business model that targets industry incumbents, they don’t have to worry about upsetting existing customers, partners or distribution channels. To protect auto dealerships in the 1920s, direct sales by an automobile manufacturer were made illegal in most states in the U.S.

Startup 275

Startup New York City Valuation Distribution 275

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 13, 2018

I had joined MIPS Computers, my second semiconductor company , as the VP of marketing and also took on the role of the acting VP of Sales. and get the chip designed into companies building engineering workstations – powerful personal computers, all while trying to refine how to find the right markets, customers, and sales process.

Part-Time VPE 333

Part-Time VPE Employee Cofounder Hiring 333

Steve Blank

MARCH 2, 2011

Working with him, I’ve been impressed to watch his small team embrace Customer Development (and Business Model Generation ) and search the world for the right product/market fit. They’ve tested their hypotheses with literally hundreds of customer interviews on every continent in the world. They will build the sales team that follows.

Silicon Valley 222

Silicon Valley Agile Customer Development Early Stage 222

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2009

This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. In the next few posts that follow, I’ll describe how thinking of a solution to this model’s failures led to the Customer Development Model – that offers a new way to approach startup sales and marketing activities.

Customer Development 215

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 215

Steve Blank

APRIL 8, 2010

When were done we followed your advice and got out of the building and started talking to potential users and customers.” He replied, “Well the customers are not acting like we predicted in our plan! No Plan Survives First Contact With Customers. We even entered it in the business plan competition.

Business Model 328

Business Model Business Plan Customer Cap Table 328

Steve Blank

APRIL 21, 2011

Last week the teams tested their hypotheses about Customer Relationships (how do they get, keep and grow customers.) This week they were testing their hypotheses about the sales “Channel” – how a company delivers its value proposition (i.e. its product or service) to its customers. Week 6 of the class.

Channel 215

Channel Artificial Inteligence San Francisco Business Model 215

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. A few successful ones do all these things.

Customer Development 242

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 242

Steve Blank

APRIL 15, 2011

Last week the teams were testing their hypotheses about their Customers (who are the users, payers, buyers, etc.) This week they were testing one of the most confusing sections of a company’s business model – Customer Relationships - the activities used to “Get, Keep and Grow” customers in a physical or virtual (web or mobile) channel.

Customer 247

Customer Cloud EC2 Channel 247

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. Not All Startups Are Alike There’s an urban legend that Eskimos-Aleuts have more words to describe snow than other cultures.

Customer Development 196

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 196

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 17, 2009

Gathering real-world feedback from customers is a core concept of Customer Development as well as the Lean Startup. When I asked him if he actually had personally left the building and talked to these potential customers, or even had gotten them on the phone, he sounded confused. Customer needs are non-deterministic.

Metrics 239

Metrics Customer Customer Development Lean 239

Steve Blank

MARCH 17, 2020

If you’re running a startup or small business, your first priority (after your family) is keeping your employees and customers safe. All your assumptions about customers, sales cycle and most importantly, revenue, burn rate and runway are no longer true. Are your customers closing for the next few weeks?

Burn Rate 436

Burn Rate Startup Valuation Sales Cycle 436

Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

Five Easy Pieces – The Marketing Mission After a few months of talking to customers , talking to our channel and working with sales we defined the marketing Mission (our job) was to: Help Sales deliver $25 million in sales with a 45% gross margin. I couldn’t care less about those.

Silicon Valley 259

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 259

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

Do they have better sales, marketing, or product development groups? The key was the realization that start-ups are not simply smaller versions of large companies, which execute/ exploit known business models, and whose customers, problems, and necessary product features are all “knowns.” Is it that some CEOs are better than others?

Incubator 402

Incubator Lean Agile Business Model 402

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 12, 2019

As there was no venture capital, these early startups were funded by early sales to weapon systems prime contractors and subcontractors. Within a decade, the rise of venture capital in Silicon Valley enabled startups to find commercial customers rather than military ones.

Government 308

Government Artificial Inteligence Silicon Valley North Korea 308