Steve Blank

JANUARY 27, 2011

The most visible step was the first International Business Model Competition , hosted by the BYU Rollins Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology. What’s A Startup? Therefore the very foundations of teaching entrepreneurship should start with how to search for a business model.

Business Model 275

Business Model Utah Intellectual Property Agile 275

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.

Customer Development 238

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 238

Steve Blank

AUGUST 23, 2010

At times I’ll do what I consider an extension of teaching; a two-day Customer Discovery/Validation intensive session with a large corporation serious about Customer Development at my ranch on the California Coast. It reminded me of the differences in Customer Discovery between a scalable startup and a big company.

Customer Development 235

Customer Development Developer Customer South America 235

Steve Blank

MARCH 12, 2014

Therefore we needed them to think and learn about two parts of a startup; 1) ideation - how to create new ideas and 2) customer development – how do they test the validity of their idea (is it the right product, customer, channel, pricing, etc.). Customer Discovery in the Real World.

Lean 334

Lean Customer Development Startup Silicon Valley 334

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 30, 2009

Customer Development is all about gathering a list of what features customers want by talking to them, surveying them, or running “focus groups.” As the engineers were busy rearchitecting the original Stanford MIPS chip into a commercial product, one of my jobs was to find out what features customers wanted.

Customer Development 278

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 278

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

As part of our Lean LaunchPad classes at Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia and for the National Science Foundation, students build a startup in 8 weeks using Business Model Design + Customer Development. How To Build a Web Startup – The Lean LaunchPad Edition. What are the steps in building a web site?”

Lean 333

Lean Web Coder Business Model 333

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 6, 2013

Most startups fail. Not because they have a conversion problem but because they never really nail the product or how to market it. The most common mistake startups make is assuming they can operate the same way big companies do, and expect success with little to no feedback from potential customers.

Customer Development 126

Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 126

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 3, 2014

A startup is not just about the idea, it’s about testing and then implementing the idea. I was driving home from the BIO conference in San Diego last month and had lots of time for a phone call with Dave, an ex student and now a founder who wanted to update me on his Customer Discovery progress. Customer Discovery. The Problem.

Cofounder 336

Cofounder Founder Technical Cofounder Coder 336

Steve Blank

APRIL 16, 2013

In my 21 years as an entrepreneur, I would come up for air once a month to religiously read the Harvard Business Review. It was not only my secret weapon in thinking about new startup strategies, it also gave me a view of the management issues my customers were dealing with.

Technical Review 327

Technical Review Lean Venture Capital Customer Development 327

Steve Blank

AUGUST 21, 2013

What if we could increase productivity and stave the capital flight by helping Life Sciences startups build their companies more efficiently? —— When I wrote Four Steps to the Epiphany and the Startup Owners Manual , I believed that Life Sciences startups didn’t need Customer Discovery.

SBIR 314

SBIR Technical Review Lean Startup 314

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014

How do you figure out what’s the right mix of skills for the co-founders of your startup? Surprisingly if you’ve filled out the business model canvas you already know who you need. She started by sketching her business model canvas on a napkin, but somehow the conversation quickly shifted to what was really on her mind.

Cofounder 335

Cofounder Founder Intellectual Property Business Model 335

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013

Over the last three years our Lean LaunchPad / NSF Innovation Corps classes have been teaching hundreds of entrepreneurial teams a year how to build their startups by getting out of the building and testing their hypotheses behind their business model. We thought this would be perfect for our product. Wireframes.

Lean 315

Lean Customer Development Sales Cycle Business Model 315

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 21, 2012

This is a guest post by my Startup Owner’s Manual co-author Bob Dorf. While statistics are weak on startup success rates, the worst one I’ve seen suggests that 2 in 1000 venture backed startups will ever achieve $100-million or more in valuation. Can every startup skyrocket like Facebook or Square or Google?

Startup 332

Startup Cofounder Customer Development Viral 332

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2014

Product/Market fit now has its own book. —— The Lean Startup process builds new ventures more efficiently. It has three parts: a business model canvas to frame hypotheses, customer development to get out of the building to test those hypotheses and agile engineering to build minimum viable products.

Business Model 335

Business Model Design Customer Development Lean 335

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

APRIL 16, 2013

In my 21 years as an entrepreneur, I would come up for air once a month to religiously read the Harvard Business Review. It was not only my secret weapon in thinking about new startup strategies, it also gave me a view of the management issues my customers were dealing with.

Technical Review 219

Technical Review Lean Venture Capital Customer Development 219

Steve Blank

APRIL 20, 2021

Having just retired from a career as an entrepreneur I had started thinking about why startups were different from large companies. Shawn immediately said the name I had given the four steps was confusing – I had called it market development – he suggested that I call it Customer Development – and the name stuck.

Product 436

Product Viral Channel San Francisco 436

Steve Blank

JANUARY 22, 2014

Success depends on finding startups that have identified acute customer pains in large markets where conditions are ripe for a new entrant. Few entrepreneurs find this scalable and repeatable business model because it’s not easy. The cloud , open-source development tools and web 2.0 Here’s Part 2 of Dino’s story….

Early Stage 286

Early Stage Silicon Valley Oregon Technical Review 286

SoCal CTO

OCTOBER 6, 2011

" Today I had two conversations with early stage startups (see Free CTO Consulting ). " One was an enterprise software product. Would it take more work to sell the enterprise product than they could make on it? Neither had done enough customer validation to be able to say the second line that Tristan suggested.

Customer 227

Customer Fractional CTO Viral Lean 227

Steve Blank

MAY 6, 2015

I am always surprised when critics complain that the Lean Startup’s Build, Measure, Learn approach is nothing more than “throwing incomplete products out of the building to see if they work.”. It’s time to update Build, Measure, Learn to what we now know is the best way to build Lean startups. Waterfall Development.

Lean 120

Lean Agile Business Model Customer Development 120

Steve Blank

JULY 9, 2015

He’s now run several Lean LaunchPad classes and has seen a ton of healthcare startups. Here’s his advice for startups in this space. Over the past couple of years as Director of Innovation for Intermountain Healthcare I’ve mentored and worked with many Healthcare-focused startups. For a proof of concept or pilot this may be OK.

Startup 120

Startup Early Stage Azure Lean 120

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 24, 2010

Wave after wave of hardware, software, biotech and cleantech products have emerged from what has become “ground zero” of entrepreneurial and startup culture. While startups continued to innovate in each new wave of technology, the rate of innovation was constrained by limitations we only now can understand. Starting now.

Silicon Valley 335

Silicon Valley United States Venture Capital Software Review 335

conversionxl.com

SEPTEMBER 10, 2013

It’s Not a Conversion Problem, It’s a Customer Development Problem. Most startups fail. Not because they have a conversion problem but because they never really nail the product or how to market it. Same goes for e-commerce, SaaS or any startup really. This is a customer development problem.

Customer Development 60

Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 60

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. We were positing that 20 years of teaching “how to write a business plan” might be obsolete. This post is part one.

Lean 298

Lean Business Model Customer Development Guinea 298

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2014

We’re changing the order in which we teach the business model canvas and customer development to better-fit therapeutics, diagnostics and medical devices. The Lean LaunchPad class uses the three “ Lean Startup ” principles: Alexander Osterwalders “ business model canvas ” to frame hypotheses.

Intellectual Property 281

Intellectual Property Lean IP Open Source 281

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2023

In the early stages of a startup your hypotheses about all the parts of your business model are your profound beliefs. You can’t be an effective founder or in the C-suite of a startup if you don’t hold any. Here’s how I learned why they were critical to successful customer development.

Business Model 305

Business Model Product Development Early Stage Customer Development 305

Steve Blank

MAY 17, 2010

I suggested that they first might want to read my post on why business plans are a poor planning and execution tool for startups. At best I think business plan competitions are a waste of time. Business Plan Versus Business Models. Where did the idea that startups write business plans come from?

Business Plan 312

Business Plan Business Model Customer Development Deal Flow 312

Steve Blank

JANUARY 30, 2013

Entrenched Innovation Model Issues : Qualcomm’s existing innovation model – wireless products were created in the R&D lab and then handed over to existing business units for commercialization – was wildly successful in the existing wireless and mobile space. Part 1 outlining the program is here. Read it first.

Programming 265

Programming Technical Review Incubator Intellectual Property 265

Steve Blank

APRIL 14, 2013

I just spent a few weeks in Japan and China on a book tour for the Japanese and Chinese versions of the Startup Owners Manual. This left an open playing field for Chinese software startups as they “copy to China” existing U.S. business models. Small startups act the same way, simply cloning each other’s products.

China 323

China Silicon Valley Non-Compete Intellectual Property 323

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 20, 2011

63 scientists and engineers in 21 teams made 2,000 customer calls in 8 weeks , turning laboratory ideas into formidable startups. The Innovation Corps Startup Team. We taught them the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. This week we saw the results.

Incubator 301

Incubator Government Silicon Valley Lean 301

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2009

And he recognized it was making his startup feel and act like a big ponderous company. Most decisions in a startup must be made in the face of uncertainty. Since every situation is unique, there is no perfect solution to any engineering, customer or competitor problem, and you shouldn’t agonize over trying to find one.

Silicon Valley 300

Silicon Valley RSS Startup Agile 300

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

You think startups are hard? Try innovating inside a large company where 99% of the company is executing the current business model, while you’re trying to figure out and build what comes next. Do they have better sales, marketing, or product development groups? The short answer is no.

Incubator 402

Incubator Lean Agile Business Model 402

Steve Blank

JANUARY 6, 2021

No Business Plan Survives First Contact With Customers. How did we build startups in the past? The Business Model. An introduction to The Business Model Canvas. The Minimal Viable Product. How to Get, Keep and Grow Customers ? How to Get Out of the Building and Test the Business Model.

Lean 356

Lean Customer Development Business Model Video 356

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 4, 2013

The teams present what they learned talking to 10-15 customer/week, and get comments, suggestions and critiques from their teaching team. We’ve recorded these panels for each part of the business model canvas. It turns out that for commercialization, the business model (Customers, Channel, Revenue Model, etc.)

Lean 258

Lean Customer Business Model Customer Development 258

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2015

In the last five years “ Lean Startup ” methodologies have enabled entrepreneurs to efficiently build a startup by searching for product/market fit rather than blindly trying to execute. Gore , I’ve found two corporate strategy tools developed by other smart people helpful in bridging Lean Startups with Corporate Innovation.

Lean 120

Lean Management Business Model Incubator 120

Steve Blank

MARCH 4, 2010

I was having coffee with a former student who was complained that my idea of building a first product release with a minimum feature set was a bad idea. One of the principles of Customer Development is to get out of the building and understand the smallest feature-set customers will pay for in the first release.).

Customer Development 304

Customer Development Business Model Developer Search 304

Steve Blank

JUNE 23, 2020

The pandemic has upended the business models of most startups and existing companies. As the economy reopens companies are finding that customers may have disappeared or that their spending behavior has changed. Suppliers are going out of business or requiring cash-up-front terms. Here’s how.

Customer 436

Customer Marketing Customer Development Lean 436