ConversionXL

NOVEMBER 29, 2018

This post details the freemium and free-trial models and considers the key questions—about your business, your market, and your product—that guide you toward the best option. If your onboarding experience is terrible or your product uninspiring, you’re wasting time with the “freemium vs. free trial” debate.

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Customer Conversion Acquisition B2B 119

Austin Startup

NOVEMBER 16, 2010

Calxeda is on track with its business and ARM-based product development plans, moving toward providing first samples of its industry-changing technologies in 2011. Today, Calxeda announces three significant executive team additions: Karl Freund, formerly of IBM and Hewlett-Packard, as Vice President of Marketing.

Naming 59

Naming Hiring Technical Review Virginia 59

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. Their product development team is hard at work on a next-generation product platform, which is designed to offer a new suite of products – but this effort is months behind schedule.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

YoungUpstarts

MAY 16, 2018

There, he would be showered in venture capital, build a team of similarly brilliant twenty-somethings, acquire millions of customers seemingly overnight, and steer his startup to an IPO and himself to the cover of Inc magazine well before his 30th birthday. People in big companies see innovation through the lens of new product development.

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Silicon Valley Forecast Venture Capital Business Plan 157

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2009

This series of posts is a brief explanation of how we’ve evolved from Product Development to Customer Development to the Lean Startup. The Product Development Diagram Emerging early in the twentieth century, this product-centric model described a process that evolved in manufacturing industries.

Silicon Valley 260

Silicon Valley Product Startup Product Development 260

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

But too often when its time to think about customers, marketing, positioning, or PR, we delegate it to "marketroids" or "suits." Many of us are not accustomed to thinking about markets or customers in a disciplined way. We know some products succeed and others fail, but the reasons are complex and the unpredictable.

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Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 12, 2008

vs. sustainable: Compare this to the renewable strategies, like viral marketing, SEO, widgets, and ads, which can scale into 10s of millions of users but are primarily centered around tough, non-user centric work. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Audience 119

Audience San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 28, 2009

And while its true that metrics sometimes can lead to a better product, in my experience just as often they had led to no insight whatsoever, like fancy reports that nobody reads or after-the-fact rationalizations (with graphs!) We set sales targets from day one, $300 the first month. Labels: product development 4comments: Doug said.

San Francisco 98

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 98

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2009

In the last three posts, we drew the relationship of market risk and invention risk with vertical markets and pointed out verticals where customer development would be useful. Ultimately you want to see if you can find customers and a market for the product as specified – as early as possible. M&A, IPO?

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Vertical Silicon Valley RSS Marketing 122

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 20, 2008 The engineering managers lament I was inspired to write The product managers lament while meeting with a startup struggling to figure out what had gone wrong with their product development process. We were using it to get features to market faster, and that was working well.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

The Startup Magazine

SEPTEMBER 10, 2019

So you’ve started a business: you’ve made a great product, achieved product-market fit and have an extraordinary road map laid out. But to build a scalable business you need more than just product-market fit. There’s more to your business’s success than how great your product is. Asset valuation.

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Founder Valuation Dividend Startup 117

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 8, 2009

Because of the extreme unknowns inherent in startup situations, we are all blind – to the realities of what customers what, market dynamics, and competitive threats. I suddenly lose my ability to judge if our marketing programs are being effective. I had it all set up to a jury-rigged SurveyMonkey - PayPal minimum viable product.

San Francisco 84

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 84

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 17, 2014

For a few months, a team of mentors with expertise in sales, financing, business planning, marketing, product development, website design and many other fields will coach an entrepreneur to help create a successful launch and structured plan for future growth. Keep that in mind and you may just be the next $1billion IPO.

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Cofounder Incubator Programming IPO 171

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 28, 2010

In the early fall of 2009, as kaChing prepared for its marketplace launch, the management team showed the app—which included real time market data, SEC-grade accounting, analytics, compliance and customer management tools—to a number of investment pros to get feedback and endorsements. says Rachleff. says Rachleff.

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment SEC 158

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

This gets me into trouble, because it conjures up for some the idea that product development is simply a rote mechanical exercise of linear optimization. You just constantly test little micro-changes and follow a hill-climbing algorithm to build your product. In traditional marketing there are three main objectives.

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 22, 2010

The cost of creating new companies is falling rapidly, and access to markets, distribution, and information is within the reach of anyone with an Internet connection. The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production. [.] The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production. [.]

San Francisco 121

San Francisco Indiana Lean Startup 121

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Startups especially can benefit by using technical debt to experiment, invest in process, and increase their product development leverage. The biggest source of waste in new product development is building something that nobody wants. Leverage product development with open source and third parties.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

Strategy - startups first encounter this when they have the beginnings of a product, and theyve achieved some amount of product/market fit. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? The visionary’s lament The Superbowl ad test Lo, my 57692 subscribers, who are you?

San Francisco 88

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 1, 2010

Scott left the company, which eventually IPO’d and became Internet Brands. Money to be used for hiring and additional product development. Company plans to use the capital to build out sales and marketing and r&d. -a Spread through word-of-mouth as the company has no sales team, all engineers.

San Francisco 248

San Francisco Venture Capital Analytics Government 248

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 9, 2009

blader : @ericries my #1 takeaway from #leanstartup : "No marketing team. Creating a company-wide feedback loop that incorporates both customer development and agile development is a challenge. So instead of having sales, marketing, and business development, we have a problem team implementing customer development.

San Francisco 132

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean Agile 132

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 28, 2009

Because, unless you are working in an extremely static environment, your product development team is learning and getting better all the time. Most importantly, I encouraged the leaders of the company to bring awareness of the business challenges to the product development team. Great post, Eric. Balance is important.

San Francisco 79

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 79

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

Now, helping potential customers discover new things they might like is the job of the discipline of marketing. But that job is changing dramatically, and this brings us to the next major problem facing traditional media organizations: Media companies are failing at marketing. There are too many products clamoring for attention.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 7, 2008

Even if, in a previous life, you were a world expert in some functional specialty, like in-depth market research or scalable systems design, the compressed timeline of a startup makes it irrelevant. At the end of the day, the product development team of a startup (large or small) is a service organization.

Software Review 94

Software Review Technical Review Part-Time VPE San Francisco 94

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Announce a new product, start its PR campaign, and engage in buzz marketing activities. Marketing launch) Make a new product available to customers in the general public. Product launch) In todays world, there is no reason you have to do these two things at the same time. Do your customers really read TechCrunch?

San Francisco 168

San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Up and Running

JULY 24, 2015

From securing funding to marketing your business, there’s a lot to consider. Product development. If you need a little help with your product development and getting it on store shelves, you can check out Edison Nation. They can help with development and licensing, too. Advertising and marketing.

Entrepreneur 60

Entrepreneur Small Business Administration SBA Pennsylvania 60

infochachkie.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

If a consultant claims they can enhance your marketing efforts, pay them based on their direct impact on your incremental sales. Such positions include: PR, Sales, Product Development, Lead Generation, Strategic Planning, Fund Raising, etc. Their story, market positioning, products, etc.

Equity 40

Equity Silicon Valley Cofounder Technical Review 40

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 12, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, February 12, 2009 What is a market? (a To wit: achieving product/market fit , getting customer validation , making something people want , things that matter , and of course the many excellent books on the topic, of which Ill mention just two of the best, Crossing the Chasm and The Innovators Dilemma.

San Francisco 89

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Ruby Lean 89

Seeing Both Sides

NOVEMBER 26, 2012

Whether you are raising a $250K seed round or navigating a $100M IPO, the capital markets - in all of its various forms - are a fundamental constituent in the business-building journey. Developing expertise in raising capital is more than a necessary evil, it's a competitive weapon. But that's not entirely true.

Balance Sheet 42

Balance Sheet Entrepreneur Dilution Portfolio 42

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

I'll add two ideas: The modern structure of university patent licensing and technology transfer works really well in the life sciences and other fields with expensive product development processes. Similarly, government purchasing is a frustrating series of hoops, even compared to enterprise sales.

DC 90

DC Washington San Francisco SBIR 90

www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

Whether you’re wondering what site search you should use or what is the best email marketing tool, knowledge is power. Steve Blank on Lean Customer Development. Inbound Marketing vs Interruption marketing. Email marketing. Market Research. Promotions/Marketing. Social Media Tracking/Marketing.

Software Review 53

Software Review Technical Review Startup 53

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 16, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, August 16, 2010 Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium (Normally, I do not write about companies that are doing a marketing launch. First, SlideShare is a fantastic product (that I use on a regular basis) and an impressive company example of Lean Startup practices in action.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Analytics Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 11, 2008

Sales depend on being right (whereas in UGC we can pretty much try anything, and promote the winners). Your platform may require you to staff up a large production department to crank out enough content to satisfy your customers. In other words, a marketing department. Habbo is first-party, a la carte, merchandising.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 3, 2012

But once the company has honed in on a strong value proposition and found initial product-market fit, what is the best approach to scaling it? With over $1 billion in revenue, 2000 employees and a market capitalization of over $6 billion, Akamai has become a role model for scalable start-ups. After all, scaling is hard.

Distribution 49

Distribution Lean Massachusetts Cofounder 49

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 4, 2009

But if that piece-parts solution is great, then its unlikely they are going to need to buy any additional products. Because this language may lead you to believe this concept is for enterprise sales only, I thought Id walk you through an example from the world of consumer electronics.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Unfortunately, after months or even years of development, many companies discover that customers arent willing to buy their new wares. Thats why some entrepreneurs are trying another approach to product launches: marketing a product online before spending much on research and development or inventory.

San Francisco 137

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 137

Seeing Both Sides

JANUARY 13, 2015

My boss and mentor from Open Market, Gary Eichhorn , made the entire management team read it in the 1990s to hammer home its important lessons as we stumbled through the chasm on our way to scaling from zero to nearly $100 million in revenue in a few years. The first version of the go to market team is hired (i.e., It is a classic.

Mezzanine 20

Mezzanine IPO Finance Business Model 20

Scalable Startup

FEBRUARY 1, 2013

And then five years later computers became — they dropped half in price and then the big insurance companies could buy them, and that’s when Thomas Watson, who ran IBM at the time, was quoted as saying, “There’s only a market need in the world for five computers.”. So GoodData is at the intersection of kind of marketing and business.

Software Review 22

Software Review Startup Venture Capital Stock 22