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. It was pretty ugly, the marketing and design sucked, and I was embarrassed by it.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 84

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 9, 2009

blader : @ericries my #1 takeaway from #leanstartup : "No marketing team. So instead of having sales, marketing, and business development, we have a problem team implementing customer development. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. No engineering team. You need a problem team and a solution team."

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San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean Agile 132

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. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

In traditional marketing there are three main objectives. If you are trying to find a product that sells, than each test would require a different product to be created (or at least a different sales page).in This adds to the complexity of decision making since you dont know its the ad, sales page, product, keywords and so on.

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San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 26, 2009

Although customers didnt flock to this offering at first, we had enough of a developer program active to start recruiting early adopters to start creating 3D objects for sale in our catalog. Many complex apps can now be prototyped as a simple mashup in order to prove market viability - and this is true beyond just software apps.

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Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 88

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. This is the usual reason given for a marketing launch, but for most early stage startups, its a failure. In the right situation, its a very useful tactic, too.

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San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

We were using it to get features to market faster, and that was working well. I now believe that the "pick two" concept is fundamentally flawed, and that lean startups can achieve all three simultaneously: quickly bring high-quality software to market at low cost. Of course, the sales folks had new features as their #1 priority.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Just as a business incurs some debt to take advantage of a market opportunity developers may incur technical debt to hit an important deadline. This was a huge win (and we were delighted to give credit where it was due), because it allowed our initial products to get to market much faster. One last thought.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

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. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Especially in the early days, youre fighting for survival every day.

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Software Review Technical Review Part-Time VPE San Francisco 94

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 28, 2009

Eric - There is definitely a business/marketing analog to exactly this situation that happens a lot too. The long refactor of business model and market research (as opposed to more organic iteration) is just as bad. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Balance is important.

San Francisco 79

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 79

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

Similarly, government purchasing is a frustrating series of hoops, even compared to enterprise sales. The US was once known as a free market democracy that could make the trains run on time. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. We are barely even trying to measure this.

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DC Washington San Francisco SBIR 90

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

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 4, 2009

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. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. One of my favorite gadgets at home is the Harmony Universal Remote.

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San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 11, 2008

Sales depend on being right (whereas in UGC we can pretty much try anything, and promote the winners). In other words, a marketing department. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

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. I was an early adopter of this feature, and participated in the last marketing launch, as you can see here. The idea seemed to SlideShare to be a natural direction.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Analytics Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 30, 2008

This can take the form of a traditional sales pipeline or a registration-activation-revenue chart. Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

Lean 121

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 121

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Thats why some entrepreneurs are trying another approach to product launches: marketing a product online before spending much on research and development or inventory. Then, the company spends no more than a few hundred dollars marketing the product through search engines and to the contacts in its sales database and LinkedIn.

San Francisco 137

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 137

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 16, 2008

What can you do to your product and marketing message to increase engagement? From a strictly "promotional marketing" point of view, they probably run those campaigns more than is optimal (theres always fatigue that diminishes the ROI on promotions the more you use them). Levers of engagement Lets start with the levers of engagement.

Viral 140

Viral San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 140

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 23, 2009

We decided from the get-go that, while we clearly saw the benefits and necessity of our concept, we would remain fiercely skeptical of our own ideas and implement the customer development process to vet the idea, market, customers etc, before writing a single line of code. The market will tell you.

San Francisco 144

San Francisco Customer Wiki Lean 144

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

For months, we made constant product and policy changes, trying to end the controversy without simply undoing our original decision and abandoning the mainstream market. Since LL took over xstreet, they have seen a 34% DROP in users and sales, why? IMVU charges a fee for submission of products to be advertised for sale in its catalog.

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Community Management Lean Software Review 158