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Fear of Failure and Lack of Speed In a Large Corporation

Steve Blank

I just spent a day working with Bob, the Chief Innovation Officer of a very smart large company I’ll call Acme Widgets. There are financial metrics (Return on Investment, Hurdle Rate, etc.) for new product development that emphasize immediate returns. Bob summarized Acme’s impediments to innovation. “At Lessons Learned.

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Lean Analytics: The Best Numbers for Non-Tech Companies

Startup Lessons Learned

It provides a basic introduction to analytics as they apply to Lean Startup, including sections on what metrics to use and how to interpret them. For instance, Ben lists out the worst of the “vanity metrics,” a term that describes appealing but meaningless or misleading numbers. Alistair: There are plenty. Consider a restaurant.

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Customer Development is Not a Focus Group

Steve Blank

Customer Development is all about gathering a list of what features customers want by talking to them, surveying them, or running “focus groups.” Gathering feature requests from customers is not what marketing should be doing in a startup. And it’s certainly not Customer Development.

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Andrew Chen: Growing renewable audiences

Startup Lessons Learned

vs. sustainable: Compare this to the renewable strategies, like viral marketing, SEO, widgets, and ads, which can scale into 10s of millions of users but are primarily centered around tough, non-user centric work. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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On deployment

Startup Lessons Learned

And the same is true in reverse - a lone brilliant coder can build a great widget, but it takes a system of people working well together to produce consistently great results. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23.

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Video update on the Startup Visa Act

Startup Lessons Learned

(<30 sec) Write your local newspaper & tell them you support the Startup Visa Act Call your senators & let them know you support Startup Visa legislation Add the Startup Visa Widget to your blog or website Follow the #startupvisa hash tag on Twitter and voice your support Contribute to Startup Visa so we can spread the word!

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Startup Visa update

Startup Lessons Learned

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Startup Visa update ► February (5) Kiwi lean startup + Australia next Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business) Beware of Vanity Metrics (for Harvard Business Rev. Startup Lessons Learned - the Conference (April 23.