Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 4, 2010

Whether your new software is ‘in the cloud,’ an online download, or distributed on a CD through various direct and indirect distribution channels, the process of localization is still a time consuming, manually intensive, and expensive effort. Optimize the costs of localization. Prior experience is critical.

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Software Distribution Europe Database 200

Steve Blank

MAY 6, 2015

Waterfall Development. 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. Waterfall Development was all about execution of the requirements document.

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Lean Agile Business Model Customer Development 120

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 7, 2022

It’s easy to get so pre-occupied with handling the business rollout that you forget to maintain and increase your social media interactions, search engine optimization efforts, and highlighting positive customer reviews on your website. Continually add new marketing and distribution partners. Real growth always requires real marketing.

Startup 335

Startup Social Media Metrics Viral 335

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 1, 2023

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

Merger 275

Merger Analytics Open Source America 275

Steve Blank

APRIL 23, 2018

When Sloan arrived at GM in 1920 he realized that the traditional centralized management structures organized by function (sales, manufacturing, distribution, and marketing) were a poor fit for managing GM’s diverse product lines. Ford’s Model T cost just $260 ($3,700 in today’s dollars) and Ford held 60% of the U.S. car market.

Michigan 268

Michigan Cofounder Stock Forecast 268

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. So what’s wrong the product development model?

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 238

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 5, 2020

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

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Merger Analytics Open Source America 433

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 9, 2020

It’s easy to get so pre-occupied with handling the business rollout that you forget to maintain and increase your social media interactions, search engine optimization efforts, and highlighting positive customer reviews on your website. Continually add new marketing and distribution partners. Real growth always requires real marketing.

Social Media 329

Social Media Metrics Viral Channel 329

Duct Tape Marketing

NOVEMBER 1, 2017

Transcript of How to Turn Marketing Costs Into Profit written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing. That’s not really true, but in this episode of The Duct Tape Marketing podcast I do speak with Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose, authors of Killing Marketing: How Innovative Businesses are Turning Marketing Costs into Profit.

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Cost Marketing Audience Media 37

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

In times when venture capital is hard to get, investors extract high costs for failure (down-rounds, cram downs , new management teams, shut down the company.) Sales people cost money, and when they’re not bringing in revenue, their wandering in the woods is time consuming, cash-draining and demoralizing. Who recommends a sale?

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Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 244

Up and Running

JUNE 14, 2017

Some believe in the all-in approach to product development: build an advanced app. Then, about two weeks before launch, I distributed a survey to those 256 partners. Almost on a weekly basis, I meet new aspiring entrepreneurs looking to execute on their ideas. It wasn’t a scalable solution, but it was a start.

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Technical Review Distribution Redemption Demand 96

Transformify

MARCH 14, 2020

Work from home and remote work also significantly cut office costs. Instead of paying ridiculously high rent in San Francisco or London, startups and small businesses can spend on product development and marketing, thus tremendously increasing the chances of successful market entry and expansion.

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Hiring Bulgaria Italy Spain 98

Austin Startup

FEBRUARY 7, 2019

They will initially generate crowdsourcing revenues by matchmaking science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) researchers with government, academia and industry employers who pay to access the scientists seeking employment. On the positive, the cost of living is amongst the lowest in the nation.

Intellectual Property 48

Intellectual Property Technical Review Malta Startup 48

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

The application of agile development methodologies which dramatically reduce waste and unlock creativity in product development. See Customer Development Engineering for my first stab at articulating the theory involved) Ferocious customer-centric rapid iteration, as exemplified by the Customer Development process.

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Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 16, 2018

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

Merger 276

Merger Analytics Open Source America 276

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

So I initially gravitated to the CTO title, and not VP of Engineering. But since I spent a long time in a hybrid CTO/VP Engineering role, I still have this nagging question. In my mind, theyre racking up costs (one month for that part, two months for that other part, uh oh). I mean, have you seen other people? Heres my take.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Hearpreneur

SEPTEMBER 25, 2022

Besides the general focus on customer and product development, an entrepreneur should foresee the next moves that will serve to guide him on the right path. Nufactur is a marketplace for industrial distribution so it is important to grow both the demand side, the users, and the supply side, the distributors.

Forecast 127

Forecast Artificial Inteligence Entrepreneur Technical Review 127

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 4, 2021

Lean Methodology consists of three tools designed for entrepreneurs building new ventures: The Business Model Canvas – to write down all the hypotheses about a new business; Customer Development – a process for testing those hypotheses outside the building; Agile Engineering – to rapidly build minimal viable products to test product/market fit.

Customer 420

Customer Marketing Lean Vertical 420

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, September 13, 2008 SEM on five dollars a day How do you build a new product with constant customer feedback while simultaneously staying under the radar? Trying to answer that question at IMVU led me to discover Google AdWords and the world of search engine marketing. SEM is a simple idea.

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SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 10, 2008

I am convinced one of Joel Spolskys lasting contributions to the field of managing software teams will turn out to be the Joel Test , a checklist of 12 essential practices that you could use to rate the effectiveness of a software product development team. He wrote it in 2000, and as far as I know has never updated it.

Software Review 144

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 144

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2009

This series of posts is a brief explanation of how we’ve evolved from Product Development to Customer Development to the Lean Startup. The Product Development Diagram Emerging early in the twentieth century, this product-centric model described a process that evolved in manufacturing industries.

Silicon Valley 260

Silicon Valley Product Startup Product Development 260

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 1, 2009

Which comes to the second major principle: halt work that leads to more waste, even if it means abandoning sunk costs. Most executives, especially in startups, dont have the courage to hold their teams to a high standard for new products or features. This is a version of the andon cord technique from lean manufacturing.

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 166

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

We wanted an agile approach that would allow us to build our software architecture as we needed it, without downtime, but also without large amounts of up-front cost. After all, the worst kind of waste in software development is code to support a use case that never materializes. How to listen to customers, and not just the loud.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Agile Lean 94

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 5, 2008

MogileFS - "Distributed (meta) file system. link] And - of course - going through [link] and reading up on the various different approaches different companies have (successfully) taken towards getting scalability at reasonably low cost. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

Open Source 107

Open Source San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean 107

mashable.com

SEPTEMBER 12, 2011

While all of these factors are true to an extent, the truth of the matter is that the reduced costs of hardware and software are easily offset by the expense of engineers and experienced business people. Nearly all of your costs will be headcount, primarily in the engineering department.

Startup 79

Startup Social Media RSS Social Network 79

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

One is explaining the world as it used to work: the importance of gatekeepers, the scarcity implied by limited distribution, and the resulting quality bar that the industry is so proud of. Mostly it is the time and expense required to create the means of distribution for that industry. It’s just taking some longer than others.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 25, 2013

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Jerry Leven and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

Merger 239

Merger Entrepreneur Analytics Open Source 239

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 29, 2016

It’s easy to get so pre-occupied with handling the business rollout that you forget to maintain and increase your social media interactions, search engine optimization efforts, and highlighting positive customer reviews on your website. Continually add new marketing and distribution partners. Real growth always requires real marketing.

Social Media 120

Social Media Metrics Viral Channel 120

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. Their product development team is hard at work on a next-generation product platform, which is designed to offer a new suite of products – but this effort is months behind schedule.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 2, 2010

The cost of creating new companies is falling rapidly, and access to markets, distribution, and information is within the reach of anyone with an internet connection. The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production. The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production.

San Francisco 122

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 122

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 22, 2010

The cost of creating new companies is falling rapidly, and access to markets, distribution, and information is within the reach of anyone with an Internet connection. The result is a profound democratization of the digital means of production. [.] We will not lose on their products -- after all, most of them are global.

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San Francisco Indiana Lean Startup 121

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 16, 2016

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

Merger 120

Merger Analytics Open Source America 120

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 26, 2012

One of the biggest in this decade was the merger of America Online (AOL) with Time Warner, engineered in the early 2000’s by Time Warner CEO Jerry Leven and AOL CEO Steve Case for a whopping $164 billion. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.

Merger 235

Merger Analytics Open Source America 235

Steve Blank

MARCH 15, 2011

what’s the product? what distribution channel? Their hypotheses when they first left the campus were: Value Proposition : Labor costs in mowing and weeding applications are significant, and autonomous implementation would solve the problem. Come up with ways to test each of the 9 business model canvas hypotheses.

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Business Model Nebraska Peru Germany 236

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2008

It cost us a few hundred thousand dollars to get our app up and running, but none of that was dollars spent on software licenses or professional services. I cant really imagine how much it cost our "grownup" counterparts at other dot-com startups to get their first app up and running. Looking back, that was a special moment.

San Francisco 68

San Francisco Technology Continuous Deployment Lean 68

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

It is becoming easier and cheaper for companies to bring products to market, leveraging free and open source software , cloud computing, open social data (Facebook, OpenSocial ), and open distribution (AdWords, SEO). Lean startups have the ability to use this commodity stack to lower costs and, more importantly, reduce time to market.

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Lean San Francisco Agile Continuous Deployment 102

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Or your cost of customer acquisition just magically floats up to match your customer lifetime value. For readers concerned about the chasm, I recommend reading Seth Godin's thoughts on "Being remarkable" and finding a unique edge/twist for your products and marketing (edgecraft). we dont talk enough about how it feels.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 60