Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

Jeff Katzenberg has a great track record – head of the studio at Paramount, chairman of Disney Studios, co-founder of DreamWorks and now chairman of NewTV. Tech IPO prices exploded and subsequent trading prices rose to dizzying heights as the stock prices became disconnected from the traditional metrics of revenue and profits.

Lean 335

Lean Burn Rate Startup IPO 335

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 15, 2019

Nail the business model. Leverage your customer conversations to predict and validate your business model. For example, when you think about distribution channels, revenue streams, or the relationship with the customer, ask customers what they expect. Process myth: Why building a product leads to failure.

Startup 245

Startup Angel Investor Technical Review Incubator 245

Steve Blank

APRIL 23, 2014

Most large companies manage three types of innovation: process innovation (making existing products incrementally better), continuous innovation (building on the strength of the company’s current business model but creating new elements) and disruptive innovation (creating products or services that did not exist before.).

Acquisition 332

Acquisition Intellectual Property Silicon Valley Startup 332

The Startup Magazine

FEBRUARY 21, 2024

Arif Bhalwani is the co-founder and CEO of Third Eye Capital (TEC) in Toronto, Canada. The goal is to transform dormant or underutilized assets into active capital that supports your business. It is also the time to take a hard look at your business model. Are there new revenue streams you can tap into?

Technical Review 135

Technical Review Due Diligence Bankruptcy Intellectual Property 135

ConversionXL

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

GrowthHackers founder and former Head of Growth at Dropbox, Sean Ellis , coined the term: “A growth hacker is a person whose true north is growth. In his course on Growth Mindset (part of CXL’s Growth Marketing Minidegree ), WeTheFuture.org founder John McBride describes three key components of a successful growth marketer: 1.

Retention 113

Retention Marketing Acquisition Channel 113

Steve Blank

MARCH 12, 2014

We realized that past K-12 Entrepreneurial classes taught students “the lemonade stand” version of how to start a company: 1) come up with an idea, 2) execute the idea, 3) do the accounting (revenue, costs, etc.). We wanted to teach our students how to think like entrepreneurs not accountants.

Lean 334

Lean Customer Development Startup Silicon Valley 334

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 18, 2014

Nail the business model. Leverage your customer conversations to predict and validate your business model. For example, when you think about distribution channels, revenue streams, or the relationship with the customer, ask customers what they expect. Process myth: Why building a product leads to failure.

Entrepreneur 283

Entrepreneur Startup Angel Investor Technical Review 283

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 12, 2017

Nail the business model. Leverage your customer conversations to predict and validate your business model. For example, when you think about distribution channels, revenue streams, or the relationship with the customer, ask customers what they expect. Process myth: Why building a product leads to failure.

Startup 161

Startup Angel Investor Technical Review Incubator 161

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 20, 2012

Nail the business model. Leverage your customer conversations to predict and validate your business model. For example, when you think about distribution channels, revenue streams, or the relationship with the customer, ask customers what they expect. Process myth: Why building a product leads to failure.

Startup 296

Startup Angel Investor Technical Review Incubator 296

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2016

If the Microsoft board was managing for quarter to quarter or even year to year revenue growth, Ballmer was as good as it gets as a CEO. Services (Cloud, ads, music) have a very different business model. Microsoft executed its 20 th -century business model extremely well, but it missed the new and more important ones.

Azure 120

Azure Business Model Cloud Artificial Inteligence 120

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2016

If the Microsoft board was managing for quarter to quarter or even year to year revenue growth, Ballmer was as good as it gets as a CEO. Services (Cloud, ads, music) have a very different business model. Microsoft executed its 20 th -century business model extremely well, but it missed the new and more important ones.

Azure 120

Azure Business Model Cloud Artificial Inteligence 120

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 19, 2011

Nail the business model. Leverage your customer conversations to predict and validate your business model. For example, when you think about distribution channels, revenue streams, or the relationship with the customer, ask customers what they expect. Process myth: Why building a product leads to failure.

Startup 286

Startup Angel Investor Technical Review Incubator 286

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 13, 2014

This rather crude expression weighs heavily on the mind of all good startup founders, no matter how confident they appear. The real milestone, proving the business model, is that first product sold for full price to a total stranger, leaving him happy. Your revenue model has to make sense. Marty Zwilling.

Business Model 248

Business Model Sales Customer Distribution 248

Steve Blank

JANUARY 22, 2014

Few entrepreneurs find this scalable and repeatable business model because it’s not easy. as a distribution channel have vastly reduced the amount of capital a startup needs at the early stage when the risk is greatest. This is true whether the company is concept stage or ramping revenue. The Bend Experience.

Early Stage 287

Early Stage Silicon Valley Oregon Technical Review 287

Steve Blank

MAY 6, 2015

While it sounds simple , the Build Measure Learn approach to product development is a radical improvement over the traditional Waterfall model used throughout the 20 th century to build and ship products. Learning could be about product features, customer needs, the right pricing and distribution channel, etc.) Testing Hypotheses.

Lean 120

Lean Agile Business Model Customer Development 120

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. In Discovery startups take all their hypotheses about the business model: product, market, customers, channel, etc. Six is a Proxy for Burn Rate.

Burn Rate 249

Burn Rate Silicon Valley Marketing Boston 249

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 11, 2022

That approach may work for an entrepreneur who just sold a successful business for a huge profit, but it doesn’t work for the rest of us who are not proven successes yet, or don’t even have a business yet. Undefined business model or very low gross margins. Naïve expectations on funding terms and process.

Due Diligence 271

Due Diligence Intellectual Property Entrepreneur Preferred Stock 271

Gust

JANUARY 5, 2014

This rather crude expression weighs heavily on the mind of all good startup founders, no matter how confident they appear. The real milestone, proving the business model, is that first product sold for full price to a total stranger, leaving him happy. Your revenue model has to make sense.

Business Model 171

Business Model Sales Customer Distribution 171

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 1, 2020

Funding might be a need in some cases — but it’s not an absolute necessity. ? The business should be self-sustainable. The primary source of your funds should be your paying customers, i.e., your business should generate enough revenues and profits to fund the growth and expansion. Incubators and Accelerators.

Startup 150

Startup Entrepreneur Elevator Pitch Seed Stage 150

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2012

What I saw reminded me of some of the best and worst things I did as a founder. Tossing their agile development process and at times their entire business model in the air, the company would go into fire-drill mode and engineering would start working on whatever his latest insight was. A Pivot a Week. he’d declare. “We

Founder 317

Founder Cofounder Advisory Board Burn Rate 317

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 4, 2011

This rather crude expression weighs heavily on the mind of all good startup founders, no matter how confident they appear. The real milestone, proving the business model, is that first product sold for full price to a total stranger, leaving him happy. Your revenue model has to make sense.

Business Model 244

Business Model Sales Customer Distribution 244

ReadWriteStart

OCTOBER 2, 2023

It’s disheartening, but sadly, this is one experience that many startup founders face. I understand the struggles that come with being a startup founder. Use this voice consistently across all marketing materials and communication channels. MRR is a crucial metric for measuring the growth of a SaaS business.

Design 105

Design Product Churn Rate Architecture 105

Steve Blank

MARCH 31, 2014

Just look at the disruptive challenges that businesses face today– globalization, China as a manufacturer, China as a consumer, the Internet, and a steady stream of new startups. Companies horde cash and squeeze the most revenue and margin from the money they use. Their lifetime as a market leader will be measured in years.

Private Equity 326

Private Equity Metrics China Intellectual Property 326

The Startup Magazine

JULY 7, 2022

Starting the expense management process early will give the founders more time to focus on other pressing issues. There should also be clear policies or guidelines regarding business expenses. It will also let them know the proper channel to submit their spending proposal for approval. Use Software to Track Expenses.

Management 154

Management Startup Finance Business Model 154

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 16, 2011

Freshdesk First, Girish Mathrubootham from Chennai, India, pitched Freshdesk , a SaaS company that provides small and medium businesses with on-demand customer support software that offers multi-channel social support. The company already has paying customers and a validated business model.

India 123

India Bootstrapping Non-Compete Entrepreneur 123

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 7, 2023

Funding for founder salaries at this stage is a red flag. A valid milestone might be closing a specific big-name customer or channel, such as Walmart, or it might mean getting your first 100,000 social-media followers, by a given target date. Have backup charts for investors wanting more detail.

Elevator Pitch 228

Elevator Pitch Salary Angel Investor Viral 228

Steve Blank

APRIL 7, 2020

Talking to customers seems like a simple idea, but most founders find it’s one of the hardest things they have to do. Founders innately believe they understand a customers problem and just need to spend their time building a solution. Your Business Model and the World Have Changed. finding product/market fit).

Customer 415

Customer Business Model Restful Video 415

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 14, 2020

That approach may work for an entrepreneur who just sold a successful business for a huge profit, but it doesn’t work for the rest of us who are not proven successes yet, or don’t even have a business yet. Undefined business model or very low gross margins. Naïve expectations on funding terms and process.

Due Diligence 308

Due Diligence Intellectual Property Preferred Stock Seed Stage 308

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 10, 2018

by Marc Pitart, founder and CEO of onlineresume.us. Acceleration and incubation programs are on the rise and have helped start and scale many successful businesses over the past 10 years. Our business model back then was very complex, and it included a B2C as well as a B2B business model, that wasn’t being implemented yet.

Programming 124

Programming Chile B2B B2C 124

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 12, 2020

Funding for founder salaries at this stage is a red flag. A valid milestone might be closing a specific big-name customer or channel, such as Walmart, or it might mean getting your first 100,000 social-media followers, by a given target date. Have backup charts for investors wanting more detail.

Elevator Pitch 336

Elevator Pitch Salary Angel Investor Viral 336

Steve Blank

AUGUST 15, 2016

But to do it, you need to actually have a sustainable business model. Starting a business is too risky. The show follows the journeys of founders who share what it takes to build a startup – from restaurants to rocket scientists, to online gifts to online groceries and more. Our revenue model was wrong.

Cofounder 143

Cofounder Entrepreneur Africa Sales Cycle 143

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 31, 2014

There’s nothing wrong with a business that supports you and perhaps an extended family. But if you want to build a scalable startup you need to be asking how you can you get enough customers/users/payers to build a business that can grow revenues past several $100M/year. With 317 million people the U.S.

Global 335

Global Australia Silicon Valley China 335

ReadWriteStart

MAY 19, 2011

During today's roundtable, we opened the session with a discussion of the existential crisis in media and how talented bloggers and journalists are facing a tough time sustaining themselves due to lack of business models. We also did some segmentation work and related exploration of relevant channels. MyDataOrganizer.

India 115

India Silicon Valley Entrepreneur Affiliate 115

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2017

Why do these founders get to stay around? Because the balance of power has dramatically shifted from investors to founders. — Unremarked and unheralded, the balance of power between startup CEOs and their investors has radically changed: IPOs/M&A without a profit (or at times revenue) have become the norm.

Founder 252

Founder Technical Review CTO Hire IPO 252

Steve Blank

AUGUST 15, 2016

But to do it, you need to actually have a sustainable business model. Starting a business is too risky. The show follows the journeys of founders who share what it takes to build a startup – from restaurants to rocket scientists, to online gifts to online groceries and more. Our revenue model was wrong.

Cofounder 120

Cofounder Entrepreneur Africa Sales Cycle 120

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 9, 2012

From Lean Startup Machine , Lean LA and San Diego Tech Founders , to countless speeches and workshops, I have seen the impact that their leadership has had first hand. Market segments drive your business model. The market segment you pursue is inextricably linked to the other aspects of your business model.

Entrepreneur 167

Entrepreneur Lean Southern California San Diego 167

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 19, 2015

This is a guest post from Rob May , a co-founder and CEO of Backupify , which raised $19.5M Rob,” he said, “no offense, but you aren’t going to get a world class, been-there-done-that CEO into a company with less than $1 million in revenue. Think more about business models. Hang out with other founders and CEOs.

Founder 120

Founder Startup Cofounder Business Model 120