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. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? So far, so good.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Instead, each potential customer has to go through a self-serve process of signing up and paying money. Because they have no presence in the market, they have to find distribution channels to bring in customers. But in the meantime, by iterating on their product with customers, they have a chance to get there on their own.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 26, 2009

So we tried to craft a strategy that would give us the product development leverage we needed to serve all customers. We combined three tactics: extensive use of free software, an open platform for user-generated content, and leveraged distribution channels. Leveraged distribution channels.

Product Development 88

Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 88

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 4, 2009

, it seemed time to return to the subject of investigating who my customers are. Today, Id like to spend some time on two techniques: the problem presentation and learning what channels of information reach customers. But beyond the obvious, its also important to know where customers go to get answers to pressing questions.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 68

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

SEPTEMBER 19, 2009

In other words, the service transforms tweets into professional reports that are sent by snail mail, fax, and email - the channels that actually have attention paid to them. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 150

San Francisco Founder DC Washington 150

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 11, 2009

This model has not translated well to the world of social networking, because customers of social networks engage sites in a different way than customers of search engines. The difference is intent: when youre searching for a specific topic, ads have a chance to fulfill your interest in that topic.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Social Network Lean Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2009

g2s The very abbreviated version of Customer Development (channeling Steve Blank ). The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Boyds ideas have inspired a lot of the principles underlying my work.

San Francisco 92

San Francisco DC Washington Lean 92

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 7, 2008

The App Store is a channel for customer acquisition. As the channel gets more and more crowded, just launching an app in the store is getting worse and worse as a strategy for each new entrant. On the web, we have many of these channels: SEM, SEO, world of mouth, PR and viral. Its like knowing the future.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Retention SEM 68

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 31, 2009

My overwhelming takeaway from the most recent Lessons Learned survey is that there is tremendous hunger out there for in-depth opportunities for entrepreneurs of all stripes to develop their lean startup skills. As you can tell from recent posts, Ive been experimenting with different formats and channels to try and find the best way to help.

Lean 68

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 68

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 18, 2008

There are other models, in other distribution channels. Not many customers ever browse the app directory or search for specific apps - they dont have to, they find out about apps by being invited by a friend. And I dont see much searching for apps going on. And how can they tell the best app for a given search?

Distribution 74

Distribution San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 74

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 31, 2009

Maybe location-specific "channels"? I'm a technology hacker in exactly the searching situation you mention; having just come to the end of the setup of my current venture and looking for the next challenge. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Lean Startup Continuous Deployment 68

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Again, its critical to focus your marketing launch on those publications, venues, and channels that your potential partners are paying attention to. Do some Customer Development instead. Dont chicken out and do a closed beta; get real customers in through real renewable channels. Help you raise money. Dont scale.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

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

MARCH 24, 2009

This starts a downward spiral: as more and more apps become indistinguishable, they send out more and more notifications, which leads to increasing fatigue on the part of customers. As notification channels get stuffed full of these messages, customers tune them out (or platforms have to put in place dramatic limits on access).

Metrics 88

Metrics San Francisco Lean Viral 88

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. What is customer development?

.Net 158

.Net Operations San Francisco Lean 158

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 12, 2009

In fact, you cant go through traditional channels at all. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R. Expo (and a call for he.

San Francisco 89

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Ruby Lean 89

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

Most normal customers – even among early adopters - do not pay attention to the trolls. They are largely invisible in the normal channels where customer service and community management pays attention. I agree that listening and communicating is a key to success, but customer development can only do so much.

Community 158

Community Management Lean Software Review 158