Steve Blank

MARCH 26, 2019

The class was unique in that it was 1) team-based, 2) experiential, 3) lean-driven (hypothesis testing/business model/customer development/agile engineering). When we started this class, the concept of Lean (business models, customer development, agile, pivots, mvp’s) was new to everyone.

Lean 248

Lean Business Model Balance Sheet Video 248

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. The Customer Development process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that. Lets see why.

Lean 244

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 244

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. Even if they did, what if the assumption – that we had developed a better approach to teaching entrepreneurship – was simply mistaken?

Lean 298

Lean Business Model Customer Development Guinea 298

Steve Blank

MAY 9, 2017

When the product and channel are bits, adoption by 10’s and 100’s of millions and even billions of users can happen in years versus decades. Continuous innovation requires the imagination and courage to challenge the initial hypotheses of your current business model (channel, cost, customers, products, supply chain, etc.)

Restful 222

Restful Silicon Valley Puerto Rico San Jose 222

Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

But what I wanted was an agile marketing team capable of operating independently without day-to-day direction. And it was going to mention the two words that SuperMac marketing needed to live and breathe: revenue and profit. The first reaction from my CEO was, “that’s why you’re running the department.” Two paragraphs, Five bullets.

Silicon Valley 259

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 259

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. After twelve months Handspring’s revenue was $170 million. They never understood Market Type.

Customer Development 196

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 196

Steve Blank

APRIL 7, 2020

The classes are built on the Lean Startup methodology: Customer Discovery, Agile Engineering and the Business/Mission Model Canvas. So how do our students get out of the building to talk to customers to do Customer Discovery when they can’t get out of the building? All you have are a series of untested hypotheses.

Customer 413

Customer Business Model Restful Video 413

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, April 14, 2009 Validated learning about customers Would you rather have $30,000 or $1 million in revenues for your startup? All things being equal, of course, you’d rather have more revenue rather than less. And yet revenue alone is not a sufficient goal.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Steve Blank

MARCH 4, 2014

These groups are adapting or adopting the practices of startups and accelerators – disruption and innovation rather than direct competition, customer development versus more product features, agility and speed versus lowest cost. existing enterprises are establishing corporate innovation groups. This is a big idea.

IRR 335

IRR Startup Business Model Agile 335

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

There are few courses which teach aspiring entrepreneurs the skills (business models, customer and agile development, design thinking, etc.) If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you know I believe that: 1) a product is just a part of a startup, but understanding customers, channel, pricing, etc.

Wiki 311

Wiki Lean Management Business Model 311

Steve Blank

JANUARY 25, 2010

As a founder you start out with: 1) a vision of a product with a set of features, 2) a series of hypotheses about all the pieces of the business model: Who are the customers/users? What’s the distribution channel. Most of the time the darn customers don’t behave as you predicted. When revenue, users, traffic, etc.,

Agile 335

Agile Startup Silicon Valley Business Model 335

Steve Blank

JANUARY 4, 2012

from box-office revenue. But the total movie industry revenue was $87 billion. From sources that the studios at one time claimed would put them out of business: Pay-per view TV, cable and satellite channels, video rentals, DVD sales, online subscriptions and digital downloads. Where did the other $57 billion come from?

Silicon Valley 336

Silicon Valley Distribution Washington Channel 336

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. Or blame my MarCom department who approved it.

Sales 120

Sales Silicon Valley RSS Las Vegas 120

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

For decades startups were managed by pretending the company would follow a predictable path (revenue plan, scale, etc.) The Revenue Plan – The Third Fatal Assumption. Notice that the traditional product introduction model leads to a product launch and the execution of a revenue plan. Albert Einstein. Ritualized Crises.

Burn Rate 247

Burn Rate Management Business Model Customer Development 247

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

is an elegant way to model any service-oriented business: Acquisition Activation Retention Referral Revenue We used a very similar scheme at IMVU, although we werent lucky enough to have started with this framework, and so had to derive a lot of it ourselves via trial and error. The AARRR model (hence pirates, get it?) Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 16, 2012

This makes sense in a company where your customers, channel and competition are known. And your revenue plan is something more than a hallucination. Yet year after year, decade after decade, VC’s would watch as no startup business plan survived first contact with customers. The International Business Model Competition.

Business Model 263

Business Model Customer Development Utah Business Plan 263

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 20, 2013

Part 4: This Will Save us Years – Customer Discovery in Medical Devices. Part 5: Value proposition and customer segments in Life Sciences. Part 6: Distribution channels in Life Sciences. Part 7: Revenue Streams in Life Sciences. Part 8: When Customers Make You Smarter –Customer Discovery in Digital Health.

Lean 241

Lean Customer Development IP Agile 241

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Teams use the Lean Startup toolkit: the Business Model Canvas + Customer Development process + Agile Engineering. These three tools allow startups to focus on the parts of an early stage venture that matter the most: the product, product/market fit, customer acquisition, revenue and cost model, channels and partners.

Oakland 326

Oakland Incubator Lean Metrics 326

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2016

In other words, how can we adapt the Business Model Canvas when the metrics of success for an organization is not revenue? Unlike an org chart, which describes how a company executes to deliver known products to known customers, the business model canvas illustrates the search for the unknowns that most new ventures face.

Business Model 120

Business Model Revenue Channel Community 120

Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2010

I think you can blame Customer and Agile Development for a small part of it. Most of the social and mobile channels (YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, iPhone, Android) have emerged in just the past 3-5 years. Quickly iterate the product in front of customers. Filed under: Customer Development , Venture Capital.

Lean 258

Lean Internet Silicon Valley Venture Capital 258

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2012

It was great to watch him embrace the spirit and practice of customer development. He was constantly in front of customers, listening, selling, installing and learning. It seemed like once a week Yuri would come back from a customer meeting brimming with new insights. Filed under: Customer Development.

Founder 316

Founder Cofounder Advisory Board Burn Rate 316

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

In fact, SaaS industry revenue is projected to grow from $49 billion in 2015 to $67 billion in 2018, a compound annual growth rate of approximately eight percent. In the tactics section, list your sales channels and describe how you will be selling your products. Usually, this is via storefronts, online, or via distributors.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2015

More agile competitors are starting to eat into our business. They’ve found product/market fit (what products customers want to buy). They’ve learned the best distribution channel to get the product from their company to the customer. They’ve figured out the revenue model (subscription, license, direct sale, etc.)

Widget 120

Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 3, 2015

In fact, by the start of class they had ~$750K in revenue for 2011 – not quite Facebook but a nice small business. Their sales had given them some real data on three potential distribution channels: direct to consumer, brick and mortar retail, retailers. What Do You Mean You Only Spoke to 1 Customer?

North America 120

North America Lean Customer Development Distribution 120

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

When it was spun out as a a separate company, Iridium’s 1990 business plan had assumptions about potential customers, their problems and the product needed to solve that problem. They made other assumptions about the type of sales channel, partnerships and revenue model they would need. Lessons Learned.

Business Plan 335

Business Plan Customer Business Model Customer Development 335

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

Mass blasts of information are ineffective, because the broadcast channels are suffering from information overload (even in social media). Test-marketing is now easier than ever before, thanks to leveraged distribution channels like AdWords and Facebook. What is the right revenue model? If not, there are plenty of alternatives.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 17, 2009

Gathering real-world feedback from customers is a core concept of Customer Development as well as the Lean Startup. The survey said in part: The survey has 57 questions, the last three of which are open ended, and should take about 20 minutes to complete. “We’re a web startup, all our customers are on the web.

Metrics 239

Metrics Customer Customer Development Lean 239

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 14, 2009

Each of these four currencies represents a way for a customer to “pay&# for services from a company. A great product enables customers, developers, partners, and even competitors to exchange their unique currencies in combinations that lead to financial success for the company that organizes them.

Customer 156

Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

She has a separate team, with its own culture and office, and a mandate straight from top management to innovate without regard to the company’s historic products, channels, or supply chain. And so the spreadsheet is built with conservative assumptions, including a final revenue target. So far, so good. Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

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. In contrast to simply executing your business plan, the Customer Development process is built on low-cost and continuous learning and iterating.

Vertical 122

Vertical Silicon Valley RSS Marketing 122

Steve Blank

MAY 4, 2009

But without sales there is no revenue, and without revenue there is no company. All the strategic thinking in the world won’t make up for a missed revenue plan. If sales revenue and profits are high enough, we could take the company public or sell it, and the stock would be worth more than the paper it was printed on.

Silicon Valley 126

Silicon Valley RSS Non-Compete California 126

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 20, 2012

In both physical and Web/mobile channels, earlyvangelists display these common characteristics: They have a problem or need. Another path is to put product development on hold until the customer development team can find customers who can provide adequate feedback. They understand they have a problem.

Customer 119

Customer Advisory Board Engineer Cofounder 119

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 16, 2010

It requires separating the product launch from the marketing launch (see Dont Launch ) as well as other staple Lean Startup tactics: minimum viable product, split-testing, customer development and the pivot. Those tools, combined with focused customer interviews, have turbo-charged the company’s ability to learn.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Analytics Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 22, 2008

Because the book is chock-full of examples of how to do this in older industries, I will focus on my experience integrating NPS into an online service, although it should be noted that it works equally well if your primary contact with customers is through a different channel, such as the telephone. Even just 10 might be enough.

.Net 158

.Net Operations San Francisco Lean 158

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

This single decision wound up costing the company significant revenue and over the course of several months sent its customer growth into decline. Most normal customers – even among early adopters - do not pay attention to the trolls. I don't run my business with that lack of respect for my customers that IMVU does.

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Community Management Lean Software Review 158