Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

I was consulting for the two venture capital firms who between them put $12 million into my last failed startup. (My I began to gain an appreciation of how world-class venture capitalists develop pattern recognition for these common types of problems. My mother kept asking if they were going to make me pay the money back.

Silicon Valley 125

Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital Customer Development 125

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. would look in each of the verticals. For example, How does sales differ from one market to another? Sales – What Channel to reach the customer?

Vertical 122

Vertical Silicon Valley RSS Marketing 122

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 8, 2023

For example, he sees great potential ‘for co-pilots are “branded” sales people, like wealth managers, insurance brokers, and mortgage brokers’ and re-defining the product surface area, for example: how would AI change customer service or productivity?

Generative AI 78

Generative AI ChatGPT Artificial Inteligence Cofounder 78

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 7, 2009

This post describes how following the traditional product development can lead to a “startup death spiral.&# In the next posts that follow, I’ll describe how this model’s failures led to the Customer Development Model – offering a new way to approach startup sales and marketing activities. The board raises a collective eyebrow.

Customer Development 224

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 224

Version One Ventures

APRIL 8, 2014

Thus, it should come as no surprise that we are now seeing Venture Capital being disrupted by these forces as well. In his post The Disruption of Venture Capital , Albert Wenger described VC as “the club you had to be invited into.”. Enter Mattermark: where “Big Data Meets Venture Capital”.

Venture Capital 160

Venture Capital Vertical Curation SEC 160

VC Cafe

APRIL 27, 2011

Despite the VC’s obvious disadvantage in the early stages, marketing and differentiation of venture capital funds is limited today. Create events around guests arriving from abroad or experts in a vertical area. So what makes one VC fund be better perceived than others? Can they teach each other something?

Venture Capital 90

Venture Capital Differentiation Incubator Angel Investor 90

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. They looked at their watches, gave our sales guy a quizzical look and left.

Technology 138

Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 138

ReadWriteStart

JANUARY 6, 2011

This curriculum is based on the various questions entrepreneurs have asked me over these 64 sessions, spanning financing, positioning, customer acquisition, marketing, sales, channel, and various other early stage, startup-related issues. As usual, then, I worked with three entrepreneurs working on specific businesses. Mava Consulting.

Vertical 115

Vertical Web San Francisco Entrepreneur 115

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 7, 2011

While there’s no need to reinvent the wheel, there is certainly room for improvement and intra-vertical competition as companies master not only supply chain logistics and shipping and handling, but also SEO, social media, and equally as important, staying creative. Tomer Tzach is a VC turned entrepreneur.

eCommerce 94

eCommerce Open Source SEM Technical Review 94

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 5, 2009

I had last been in Chapel Hill on a winter’s day in 1986, traveling with the VP of Sales of our new supercomputer startup, Ardent. My ex-boss was going to be the VP of Engineering and I would report to the CEO whose marketing acumen and sales instincts seemed at the time to be telepathic and sense of theater was legend.

North Carolina 125

North Carolina Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 125

Ben's Blog

MARCH 1, 2011

In my career, I have never seen a position in any industry with more varying criteria than General Partner at a venture capital firm. Some firms hire pure investors, some firms hire operators, some Wall Street analysts, some firms hire sales people, some firms hire lawyers, and others hire reporters.

Partner 78

Partner Technical Review Venture Capital Cofounder 78

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

After 20 years of working in startups, I decided to take a step back and look at the product development model I had been following and see why it usually failed to provide useful guidance in activities outside the building – sales, marketing and business development. So what’s wrong the product development model?

Customer Development 238

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 238

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

Brendan McManus said: “Lessons Learned” – A New Type of Venture Capital Pitch [link] #startup #advice [.] Lessons Learned” – A New Type of Venture Capital Pitch « Steve Blank (tags: presentations presuation vc startup) [.] Lessons Learned” – A New Type of Venture Capital Pitch [.]

Venture Capital 209

Venture Capital Silicon Valley RSS Hockey Stick 209

Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

I vividly remember the sales guy saying, “It’s only some kid in field service. Some sales guy who was too busy to take the meeting was probably retired in Maui on the commissions. Your Customers are Not Who You Think For years I thought this “million unit chip sale by accident&# was a “one-off&# funny story.

Silicon Valley 131

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 131

Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

———— T o: Marketing Department From: Steve Subject: Going to Trade Shows Like it Matters Generating Leads Ownership If your company is going to a show to generate leads, then sales owns the show. This is worthy of an open and honest discussion with sales up front. And inviting to the booth/dinner/private demo.

Silicon Valley 128

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 128

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. Two paragraphs, Five bullets. It didn’t take more.

Silicon Valley 259

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 259

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

Market Type affects your spending and sales ramp after you reach product/market fit. You say, “Market Type affects your spending and sales ramp after you reach product/market fit.&# Use the Lean Startup - When There's Market Risk The second question is : “What’s the “ Market Type ” of your startup? Does this help?

Customer Development 219

Customer Development Web Developer Customer 219

Austin Startup

JUNE 22, 2020

They have a $600k sales backlog that they’ll complete this month, and about 50% or more of that will be recurring revenue. The product is a complex AI service in an industry vertical that is large and growing fast. Didn’t make sense to him that the industry vertical had revenue anywhere near their forecast.

Vertical 64

Vertical Early Stage Forecast Revenue 64

Steve Blank

MARCH 25, 2009

We knew from back-of-the-envelope calculations that I would need 3 times the combined marketing and sales budgets of the incumbents for a head-on assault. (I The 3:1 Lanchester Laws said I would need $60M in marketing and sales spending to win. You need to hire the right type of sales people for the type of [.]

Silicon Valley 141

Silicon Valley Marketing RSS California 141

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

This tendency is a two edged sword: by iterating strategy a startup can dramatically improve the size and trajectory of the company, but at times this process can be the bane of venture investors (and why they have prematurely grey hair.)

Customer 195

Customer Silicon Valley RSS California 195

Steve Blank

JULY 27, 2009

Our small training department had been without a manager for months and finding a replacement didn’t seem to be high on the VP of Sales list. I walked into the VP of Sales’ office and with my knees trembling, I politely asked for the job. For entrepreneurs good things come to those who ask. What’s Marketing?

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley RSS Technical Review California 120

Mucker Lab

DECEMBER 2, 2015

Most brilliant “Internet of Things” ideas are quicksand for capital unless you have the branding, vertical integration and customer lock-in that Apple achieved. 20 years ago, a majority of “Sand Hill” venture capital went into enterprise-focused startups. The iPod model will separate IoT platforms from fads.

Vertical 60

Vertical Widget Distribution China 60

Steve Blank

APRIL 2, 2009

press and use it to generate end user demand and then drive that demand into our sales channel. Reply SuperMac War Story 9: Sales, Not Awards « Steve Blank , on April 30, 2009 at 5:02 am Said: [.] The Potrero benchmark strategy was one component of this creating end user demand through PR.)

Silicon Valley 124

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS Software Review 124

Cracking the Code

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

This drop in public valuations basically means that private companies lost half of their value in a comparable way and therefore the cost of capital doubled in the past month, pushing much higher the hurdle for any additional investment, be it in sales, marketing or R&D. Rethink vertical segmentation: Healthcare? internet.

Software Review 48

Software Review Technical Review Valuation Portfolio 48

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2009

The initial hypothesis for Epiphany (from my much smarter partner Ben ) was that as departments in the enterprise (manufacturing, finance, customer support sales) became automated, the marketing department would eventually get its turn.

Silicon Valley 225

Silicon Valley Non-disclosure Agreement NDA Startup 225

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

Cracking the Code

DECEMBER 2, 2006

and so I think its a very, very big bet“ - Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft Indeed, the opportunity is large: with 11m+ SMBs in the US only spending more than $300B in IT.but so far nobody managed to "crack the code" and current sales model are facing diminishing returns: (1) HT companies have little insights in their SMB customers (e.g.,

Software Review 48

Software Review Technical Review Europe Software 48

Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

We had seen the reactions of people playing with the prototypes in our lab and when we demo’d it to our sales force. Since we had gotten out of the software business when we came out of Chapter 11 , and our sales channel didn’t know what to do with software, we licensed ReelTime to Adobe. We knew something our CEO didn’t.

Video 164

Video Silicon Valley RSS California 164

David Teten

JANUARY 21, 2021

V: Should you raise venture capital from a traditional equity VC or a Revenue-Based Investing VC? GCVF is pioneering the future of venture capital and high growth startups for all small communities. II: Who are the major Revenue-Based Investing VCs? IV: Should your new VC fund use Revenue-Based Investing?

Equity 78

Equity Revenue Cofounder Colorado 78

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

Private equity and venture capital investors are copying our sisters in the hedge fund world: we’re trying to automate more of our job. . I previously posted a detailed presentation with sales technology tools useful for B2B sales. ff Venture Capital hired two full-time engineers to build out Totem.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Austin Startup

SEPTEMBER 19, 2017

This is useful for a number of reasons, the most obvious of which is to help you navigate the right channels in your vertical and open doors to potential customers. A strong advisor can walk you in the door to the same number of companies as 2–3 new sales hires. I think of this as an early test of the founding team’s sales ability.

Advisory Board 48

Advisory Board Sweat Equity Marketing Vertical 48

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 25, 2010

But if you bring over your ad sales people. Someone is going to hand this guy some cash one day and I have no doubt he’ll build the HuffPo for this vertical, which is huge. Tags: Venture Capital & Technology. The only issue would be getting ad dollars thrown at a new brand. you bring over their media buyers.”

Curation 100

Curation Venture Capital Vertical Social Media 100

Haystack

JULY 8, 2018

After reflecting on it for a day, I began to understand why — even though this topic has been written about many times, “technology” as a sector and industry now has gone from vertical to horizontal, entirely pervasive across industries, across sectors, across geographies and cultures.

Early Stage 95

Early Stage Dilution Private Equity Common Stock 95

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

In times when venture capital is hard to get, investors extract high costs for failure (down-rounds, cram downs , new management teams, shut down the company.) In times when venture capital is hard to get, investors extract high costs for failure (down-rounds, cram downs , new management teams, shut down the company.)

Lean 244

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 244

cdixon.org

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

You’ll refine your sales and investor pitch. But it’s probably wise to be more secretive in some vertical markets: [link]. and an investor, has a great blog on entrepreneurship and venture capital. link] 10 Tips for Making your Startup More Attractive for Investors [Presentation] : Venture Capital Cafe. [.]

Stealth 68

Stealth Startup NDA Cofounder 68

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

However, in catching up with the VP of Sales of Ardent last night, I was reminded one of the few times I did return for closure. In my career I’ve been involved with lots of sales deals, and for some reason losing this was the one deal I never forgot. It was for sale on Ebay. I liked to fail fast, move on, and not look back.

Silicon Valley 185

Silicon Valley San Diego RSS California 185

The Equity Kicker

AUGUST 28, 2012

In the case of social software all the evidence suggests that the investment theme is strong and there will be more winners in this space, but the next generation will work hard to differentiate themselves from their forbears by specialising in different process areas or distinct verticals.

Vertical 94

Vertical Acquisition eCommerce Flash 94