Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

It should be even more important to the founders themselves, because it demonstrates that their business hypothesis is grounded in reality. These founders have not managed, to borrow a phrase from Steve Blank , to create a scalable and repeatable sales process. More on that in a moment. They are close to breakeven.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2010

I am grateful to everyone who helped make this event a success, especially my co-organizers Charles Hudson and David Sachs. Unfortunately, the video of our sllconf conversation is not online (due to technical problems), but we have a physical tape backup which we are endeavoring to get online soon.

San Francisco 133

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 133

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 7, 2010

At least, not in the traditional sense of trying to squeeze every tenth of a point out of a conversion metric or landing page. When you read stories of successful startups in the popular and business press, you usually hear about how the founders anticipated several of these challenges in their initial vision.

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Lean Metrics Design 154

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 5, 2010

I have personally sold many copies of his book, and continue to recommend it as one of the most important books a startup founder can read. It is written in a conversational tone, doesnt take itself too seriously, and avoids extraneous fluff. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

Customer Development 166

Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 166

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 29, 2010

Weve gone from total obscurity to something people are beginning to misunderstand and even co-opt. The way forward requires getting everyone together in a room, and having a conversation about where were headed. Doesnt the communication overhead of a large team lead to chaos of overlapping experiments and continuously-deployed bugs?"

San Francisco 120

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 120

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 16, 2009

Ive had at least three conversations this week about the relationship between agile methodologies and customer development. Thats why I prefer to think of them as two co-equals: the problem team and the solution team. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Im pretty excited youve written this post, Eric.

Agile 111

Agile Customer Development Developer San Francisco 111

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 19, 2009

Returning to our example of the beleaguered founder who still has the pager, before hiring an operations guy, try promoting someone from within to take on the job. Given that most recruiting channels are pay-for-performance, its usually cheaper, too, because it has a lower conversion rate. The blog is fantastic as well.

Lean 140

Lean Hiring San Francisco Continuous Deployment 140

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

And then we would use that simple analytics system I mentioned to monitor the conversion rates of customers from each campaign. ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th.

SEM 164

SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2010

Heres an excerpt: The Startups Rules of Speed - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review Every startup that achieves success eventually faces a critical moment — whether to speed up or slow down. Read the rest of The Startups Rules of Speed - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. This is the speed-up-or-slow-down moment.

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

So I generally feel right at home in these conversations. ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 2, 2010

The Five Whys for Start-Ups - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review Root cause analysis and preventive maintenance are concepts we expect to see in a factory setting. As start-ups scale, this agility will be lost unless the founders maintain a consistent investment in that discipline.

Technical Review 132

Technical Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 132

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 6, 2008

We tried and tried to boost our conversion numbers, each time analyzing what worked and what didnt, and iterating. We were excited by each new discovery, and each iteration we managed to move the conversion needle a little bit more. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 128

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 7, 2010

Id be honored to have you join the conversation. The Conversation - Harvard Business Review For most of us, the phrase management science conjures up a decidedly non-entrepreneurial image, and for good reason. Read the rest at The Conversation - Harvard Business Review. Id be honored to have you join the conversation.

San Francisco 119

San Francisco Management Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 28, 2008

Most important slide: about the founders In a pitch meeting, try to spend as much time as possible talking about the key questions for your pitch. If you find yourself getting asked non-key questions, try to use your answers to steer the conversation back to the key questions. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 128

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 8, 2009

► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

Software Review 87

Software Review Design Software San Francisco 87

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

For example, say that your business model calls for a 4% conversion rate – as ours did initially at IMVU. After a few months of early beta at IMVU, we discovered that our actual conversion rate was about 0.4%. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable (for Ha.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 3, 2009

The same has been true of an unfortunate number of startups, they manage to generate a lot of hype, raise a lot of money, and sometimes make some of their investors, employees, or founders rich. ericries #leanstartup Another new idea in the section on continuous deployment and the cluster immune system. Danger, Will Robinson.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Cofounder 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 15, 2010

Two Ways to Hold Entrepreneurs Accountable - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review Way back when the money was doled out, the team made a compelling pitch about the large market that was going to adopt their new innovative product or service. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

Hockey Stick 105

Hockey Stick San Francisco Entrepreneur Lean 105

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 6, 2008

I believe that having the whole team work from a common task list, in priority order, lets everyone feel that "all hands on deck" sense that the founders experienced in the early days of the company. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Lots of little projects erodes teamwork and builds up work-in-progress.

San Francisco 74

San Francisco SCRUM Lean Continuous Deployment 74

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

Beyond just those who will be hearing about the lean startup for the first time, Im expecting to shake a lot of hands and have a lot of interesting side conversations. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Support the Startup Founders Visa with a tweet Testing the new Disqus comment system Gov 2.0

DC 90

DC Washington San Francisco SBIR 90

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 24, 2009

Each of those levers -- conversion rate, action/user, msgs/action, etc. -- are important when thinking about how and why users engage with your product. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Towards a new entrepreneurship ▼ 2009 (88) ► December (4) Continuous deployment for mission-critical applica.

Metrics 88

Metrics San Francisco Lean Viral 88

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 14, 2009

Most importantly, if you know a high-quality entrepreneur who you think would add to the conversation, would you be willing to try and convince them to attend? Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Would you be willing to link to the Master Class info page from your blog? Take a look and let me know what you think.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review 60

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 16, 2010

Rashmi Sinha, co-founder and CEO of SlideShare , describes an early version of the analytics package that’s part of the Pro accounts the company announced today. ’&# They removed the core plan, and conversions went up. ’&# They removed the core plan, and conversions went up.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Analytics Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2010

Paul quotes one of his founders like this: “Thats the actual beauty in the off-the-record-ness: you hear just how screwed up most of these successful startups were on the way up.&# It makes successful founders famous. It makes successful founders famous. It sells newspapers and magazines. It helps companies with PR.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean PR Metrics 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2010

By only releasing vanity metrics , companies co-opt the press into helping them mislead others. Notice that cohort and conversion based metrics do not suffer from this problem. When we look at the same conversion percentage for cohort after cohort, we are effectively getting a new, independent, report card for our efforts each period.

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Metrics Lean PR 154

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 27, 2009

For founders, I think it also has another big attraction: the ability to avoid a lot of " free vs paid " arguments. Do it right, and your conversion rates might be as high as 20%. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. You can reach for all the scale of a free service and still make money.

San Francisco 148

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 148

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 16, 2008

We were trying to broaden the conversation beyond just viral customer acquisition. Share your stories, and well incorporate them as we continue to flesh out this theory. Thanks for being part of the conversation. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. Have you struggled with engagement and retention?

Viral 140

Viral San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 140

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 2, 2010

By all accounts, the conversation was a success. By all accounts, the conversation was a success. ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th.

San Francisco 149

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 149

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 8, 2010

Entrepreneurs: Beware of Vanity Metrics - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review : The idea is simple. Read the rest of Entrepreneurs: Beware of Vanity Metrics at The Conversation on Harvard Business Review. Entrepreneurs: Beware of Vanity Metrics - The Conversation - Harvard Business Review : The idea is simple.

Metrics 121

Metrics San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 121

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 11, 2010

The Conversation - Harvard Business Review : Still, startups develop some kind of process — whether its disciplined, haphazard, bureaucratic or empowering — because building a great product depends on it. The Conversation - Harvard Business Review For Startups, How Much Process Is Too Much?

San Francisco 120

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 120

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 6, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, March 6, 2010 Startup Visa update As I write this, I am traveling at 30,000 feet on Virgin Americas excellent IAD->SFO nonstop, following an intense few days of conversations in Washington, DC about the Startup Visa. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco DC Washington Startup 113

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 28, 2010

This conference will be the first of its kind: an opportunity to have a conversation about the future of the lean startup movement. We want everyone who can contribute to that conversation to be there, regardless of their ability to pay. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

Lean 109

Lean Programming San Francisco Continuous Deployment 109

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 30, 2008

How do you drop a phrase like "voluntary salary reduction tool" and then not describe it :) Unless youre simply talking about the standard "hey, take less cash and Ill give you more options" type conversation. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n. When you said "tool" I thought you actually meant you had a tool.

Lean 121

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 121

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 22, 2009

This is the thinking that allowed us to overcome our fear of continuous deployment at IMVU. Thanks so much to everyone who made the trip to SIPA and participated in the conversation, as well as to SIPA and HP for hosting me. Eric, do you have any discussions planned for the co-founding dynamics of a successful lean startup?

Lean 76

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Startup 76

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2009

A lot of conversation was about what "the federal government" should do. ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th. Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases n.

San Francisco 92

San Francisco DC Washington Lean 92

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 23, 2009

fbFund REV featuring Eric Ries The Lean Startup Host: fbFund Type: Education - Lecture Network: Global Date: Thursday, June 25, 2009 Time: 1:30pm - 3:30pm Location: fbFund REV Garage Street: 164 Hamilton City/Town: Palo Alto, CA RSVP Here So, if you are in the Bay Area and want to swing by Palo Alto on Thursday afternoon, come join the conversation.

Lean 74

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment DC 74

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 1, 2009

Related articles by Zemanta Continuous deployment in 5 easy steps (4cloudcomputing.blogspot.com) The Lean Startup workshop coming soon (startuplessonslearned.blogspot.com) The Lean Startup Talk From Web 2.0 You mentioned as many as 50 deployments a day to production after successful local continuous integration.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 60