Steve Blank

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Of course we also hoped that in listening to their advice in how to build the perfect computer for customers just like them, they would actually buy one of the first computers. Our company’s stock was an inducement, but all of them were in it to help us build a better computer.

Engineer 198

Engineer Silicon Valley Part-Time VPE Advisory Board 198

Steve Blank

AUGUST 12, 2013

Not for stock. Filed under: Customer Development , Family/Career/Culture. Customer Development Family/Career/Culture' If I’d had infinite time I’d take every one of these “can I have coffee” meetings. But I don’t. So I now prioritize meetings with a new filter: Who is offering me something in return.

Silicon Valley 335

Silicon Valley Deal Flow Customer Development Stock 335

The Next Web

MARCH 11, 2014

For the past year, they invested in the team and technology to prioritize speed of iteration with disregard to traditional methods of customer development and company building. WhatsApp, recently acquired by Facebook for $19 billion in cash and stock options , challenged traditional Silicon Valley logic. They just built it.

Silicon Valley 151

Silicon Valley Cofounder Stock Options Mobile 151

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 5, 2009

As the conversation began to get down to how much stock and salary we could offer van Dam, we left the barber to finish his work and went to a payphone to call our CEO to confirm the deal. We were painting a picture of hypertext on every desktop computer. The response from across the country?

North Carolina 125

North Carolina Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 125

ConversionXL

JANUARY 31, 2014

note: If you’re a startup, you’ll want to use customer development questions for your page to resonate with future traffic). Do This: Use customer development techniques found in this post to build a profile of your ideal buyer personas. What are you using our product for? Do you consider any alternatives?

Analytics 134

Analytics Video Matching Conversion 134

conversionxl.com

SEPTEMBER 10, 2013

It’s Not a Conversion Problem, It’s a Customer Development Problem. This is a customer development problem. So What is Customer Development? The core idea behind customer development is that the assumptions you make about a target market are only guesses. Website Analysis.

Customer Development 60

Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 60

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 10, 2016

The limited partners could put their money in the stock market, but instead, they give it to you, the venture capitalist, which is much more risky, but you’re promising them huge returns. Filed under: Customer Development , SiriusXM Radio Show.

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley Ohio Columbus Entrepreneur 120

K9 Ventures

AUGUST 13, 2010

One of our first customers was a stock trading company in NY that wanted to host live stock chats. Another customer was my alma mater, Carnegie Mellon University, who was using it to host online class discussions for its distance education program. In a nutshell, Product Development is about building something.

Revenue 72

Revenue Developer Java Customer Development 72

Steve Blank

APRIL 6, 2009

If you are a practitioner of Customer Development, ESL was doing it before most us were born. One key difference: unlike HP, which had restricted stock ownership to the founders and top management, Perry made sure everyone at ESL had stock. The “customers’” contracts funded the company.

Silicon Valley 171

Silicon Valley Stealth RSS California 171

Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2013

The other big change was the creation of ChiNext, China’s equivalent of NASDAQ stock exchange for start-ups, in 2009. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. China Customer Development Technology Venture Capital'

Venture Capital 271

Venture Capital China Offshore SBIR 271

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 23, 2009

Sure I can build a stock chart, like this one , that shows that eBays stock price went into a four-year decline immediately after "eBay Inc Acquires Dutch Company Marktplaats.nl." The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Youve just experienced vanity metrics hell.

Metrics 167

Metrics San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Steve Blank

JUNE 23, 2016

Here are four reasons: First, companies bought into the false premise that they exist to maximize shareholder value – which said “keep the stock price high.” Filed under: Corporate Innovation , Customer Development. What’s holding large companies back? this article first appeared in the Peoples Daily.)

Architecture 227

Architecture IRR Balance Sheet Liquidity Event 227

Steve Blank

JULY 15, 2010

VC’s invested their limited partners’ “risk capital” in a portfolio of startups in exchange for illiquid stock. The public markets for venture-backed technology stocks never really recovered after the collapse of the dot-com boom. In either case Customer Development provides entrepreneurs with a methodology for being capital efficient.

Venture Capital 297

Venture Capital IPO Liquidity Event Entrepreneur 297

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 3, 2015

It was a check for $435,635 from a customer. And not just any customer; it was from one of the largest supermarket chains in the U.S. It was Krave’s first national stocking order. Filed under: Customer Development , Teaching. Customer Development Teaching'

North America 120

North America Lean Customer Development Distribution 120

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

He’d wasted a year of his life and had a pile of stock options that weren’t very interesting. They’re deep into Customer Development ,” he said. He’d been working at a well-funded startup for about a year and had come to terms with the fact that the startup was really a pretty dumb idea. Tesla is not. Here’s why.

Fractional CTO 248

Fractional CTO Startup Venture Capital Cofounder 248

Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2010

Do they “get&# Customer Development ? Do They Get Customer Development? Have they heard about Customer Development ? Can they tell you what you should be doing in Customer Discovery and Customer Validation ? Is Your VC Founder Friendly? How do you figure out which VC firm is best for you?

Founder 231

Founder Vesting Later Stage Early Stage 231

Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2013

The other big change was the creation of ChiNext, China’s equivalent of NASDAQ stock exchange for start-ups, in 2009. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. China Customer Development Technology Venture Capital'

Venture Capital 163

Venture Capital China Offshore SBIR 163

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 2, 2008

But the investor is already being compensated for that risk in the low price of the stock, so it is unfair to delay. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? When a company is only two months old, every day you wait gives you 1.7% more data about their trajectory. Even VCs do it.

San Francisco 125

San Francisco Software Review Technical Review Continuous Deployment 125

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 10, 2014

They’ve become famous for overnighting a groom’s shoes for free because he showed up shoeless for his own wedding, sending flowers to customers, and even shopping competitors when the company ran out of stock so that the customer could get what she wanted. Few companies will go to these lengths to please customers.

Customer 228

Customer Retention Programming Customer Development 228

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 23, 2012

.” Here’s the summary of his track record (excerpted from the Fast Company article): Forefront — IPO’ed in 1995 by CBT — CBT stock fell 85% in 1998 and prompted class-action lawsuits. invested, IPO’ed in 2000 for $32/share — stock price now $2. Which explains why their stock price is at $2.43

IPO 240

IPO Flash Bootstrapping Private Equity 240

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

Customer Development , Agile Engineering and the Lean methodology enforced a process of incremental and iterative development. Startups could now get a first version of a product out to customers in weeks/months rather than months/years. That requires building a company using Agile and Customer Development.

Internet 334

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 334

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

They take common stock, not preferred, a fact that the entrepreneurs mentioned to me many times. And do your customer development. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? They dont invest a lot of money; just enough to keep them going through the summer.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Continuous Deployment 113

ConversionXL

MARCH 28, 2014

In another study, Wistia dug into the visitor data for their own homepage video & found that roughly 30% of their video views came from prospective customers. While these may seem like sturdy benchmarks, don’t put too much stock in them. This is an example of “averages lie.” I’ll explain why in just a bit.

Video 122

Video Software Review Cofounder Metrics 122

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 21, 2010

Contrast this with other high-risk situations, like buying a high-risk stock. Although the specific payoff of a specific risky stock is not known, investing in many such stocks can be modeled accurately. Thus a decent financial advisor can give you a reasonably accurate long-term expected return for a set of risky stocks.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco Startup Lean Continuous Deployment 168

Duct Tape Marketing

DECEMBER 17, 2019

You never go into a physical journey without taking stock of where you’re headed. So why wouldn’t you do the same for the customer journey? Understanding where your customers go when they’re interacting with your business can help transform your marketing efforts. Ask them how they discovered your brand.

Customer 65

Customer Social Network Social Media Conversion 65

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 30, 2015

There is a ton of things I had to learn about lawyers, which I’ve hated every minute of… There are (also) challenges in the beginning like negotiating equity (how to split up stock) among your founders and with your employees and things like that. There are lots of things that need to be negotiated.

Artificial Inteligence 120

Artificial Inteligence Entrepreneur Silicon Valley New York 120

Steve Blank

APRIL 2, 2009

It’s the decisions that you make that might cost you an order, a sale or a higher stock price. Just remember ethics and values are about what you practice when the going gets tough. Do the right thing. It pays off in the end.

Silicon Valley 124

Silicon Valley RSS Startup California 124

www.instigatorblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Jason Penny Stocks stockexplosion I completely agree with you. Jason Penny Stocks stockexplosion I completely agree with you. Jason Penny Stocks [link] poker rakeback Employees that feel they have a vested interest in their company will work much harder than those who don't. stockexplosion I completely agree with you.

Equity 41

Equity Employee Startup Vesting 41

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 16, 2013

On Customer Development in a growing company, Wyatt offered the following advice: Wyatt: We''ve employed a number of systems in the organization that keep all of us close to the customer. There are 5-10 customers in our office (or remote) per week for developers, product owners and marketers to speak to and validate learning.

Lean 167

Lean Startup Software Engineering Agile 167

David Teten

OCTOBER 1, 2015

Customer development would be reduced to a single person exercise that could be repeated in parallel dozens of times over, ultimately yielding 30+ companies a year. With that as a backdrop, as I ponder the question, my view is that a hybrid approach would work better than all cash or stock. Our model at Casual Corp.

Software Developers 60

Software Developers Software Development Software Review Technical Cofounder 60

VC Cafe

JANUARY 22, 2012

I found they all apply to tech startups and below is my effort to apply the theory to the practice of customer development. Offline, companies like Zara thrive on this, as customers know that a product that fits and is in stock probably won’t be there tomorrow. Online, examples of scarcity as a persuader are many.

Startup 121

Startup Oauth Chicago Product 121

Steve Blank

APRIL 19, 2010

NASDAQ stock exchange than any other country. (In Filed under: Customer Development , Venture Capital. Tags: Customer Development Venture Capital. I’ve written and presented a bit on this subject.). Or look at Israel. They have more public companies on the U.S. Is it their DNA?

Silicon Valley 219

Silicon Valley Venture Capital China New York 219

VC Cafe

JANUARY 22, 2012

I found they all apply to tech startups and below is my effort to apply the theory to the practice of customer development. Offline, companies like Zara thrive on this, as customers know that a product that fits and is in stock probably won’t be there tomorrow. Online, examples of scarcity as a persuader are many.

Startup 111

Startup Oauth Chicago Product 111

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 20, 2022

When I asked what they already knew about it, they tossed me a tall stack of industry and stock analyst reports, company names, web sites, blogs. “I just got handed a project to help our firm enter a new industry – semiconductors. They want me to map out the space so we can figure out where we can add value.

Forecast 376

Forecast China Demand Web 376

Steve Blank

JANUARY 10, 2023

We lingered over coffee as I suggested it was time for her to take stock of what’s next. She had something rare – a services company that provided real value with products that early customers loved. Covid let me do that for a few years. I guess now I’m just avoiding jumping back into an environment I thought I had left.”.

New York 333

New York Miami Silicon Valley Sales 333

Steve Blank

JULY 29, 2013

Spend the time and take stock of who’s on the journey with you. Filed under: Customer Development , Family/Career/Culture. Customer Development Family/Career/Culture' Great founding CEO’s live for these moments. FIgure out who you are. Lessons Learned. Founder has the initial idea.

Cofounder 335

Cofounder Advisory Board Customer Development Leadership 335

conversionxl.com

FEBRUARY 4, 2014

note: If you’re a startup, you’ll want to use customer development questions for your page to resonate with future traffic). Do This: Use customer development techniques found in this post to build a profile of your ideal buyer personas. What are you using our product for? Do you consider any alternatives?

Analytics 98

Analytics Software Review Conversion Video 98