Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 26, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Sunday, April 26, 2009 Product development leverage Leverage has once again become a dirty word in the world of finance, and rightly so. But I want to talk about a different kind of leverage, the kind that you can get in product development. Its a key lean startup concept. Great post!

Product Development 88

Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 88

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 1, 2009

I know that this all seems obvious now with the movements started by Steven Blank ( Four Steps of Epiphany ) with the whole Customer Development processes / Lean Startup movements also popularized by people like Eric Ries. My Dad uses email – he still doesn’t understand the ‘forward’ button.&#.

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Customer Technical Review Software Review Mexico 280

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.

Lean 168

Lean San Francisco Startup Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, September 22, 2008 Thoughts on scientific product development I enjoyed reading a post today from Laserlike (Mike Speiser), on Scientific product development. I agree with the less is more product development approach, but for a different reason. Now that is fun.

Product Development 68

Product Development Developer San Francisco Product 68

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 3, 2009

Refreshing to finally see lean and agile thinking emerge in product/business-floors and not only in technology. Critical also, as the lean company/start-up can not be lean by just using lean principles in IT and not in Product Development/Management - a common misinterpretation of the Toyota Production System.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 168

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

Finally the day came, we unleashed the landing page, emailed our existing customers, and started advertising online. If you cant find any , maybe that means you havent figured out who your customer is yet. And if you dont know who your customer is, perhaps some customer development is in order?

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008

I had the opportunity to pioneer this approach to funnel analysis at IMVU, where it became a core part of our customer development process. To promote this metrics discipline, we would present the full funnel to our board (and advisers) at the end of every development cycle. Check your assumptions, what went wrong?

San Francisco 166

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Continuous Deployment 166

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 5, 2008

They exchange countless emails, and hes being constantly interrupted and being asked to clarify exactly what the spec means. The fourth spec exists only in these emails, which are changing the design in an ad-hoc fashion. Labels: product development 8comments: Vincent van Wylick said. Want to learn more about me?

San Francisco 158

San Francisco Management Software Review Product 158

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

Own the development methodology - in a traditional product development setup, the VP Engineering or some other full-time manager would be responsible for making sure the engineers wrote adequate specs, interfaced well with QA, and also run the scheduling "trains" for releases. Labels: product development 15comments: mukund said.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 17, 2009

This post describes a solution – the Customer Development Model. In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provide the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development.

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 255

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

JUNE 25, 2009

They couldn’t keep up with the fast product development times that were enabled by using standard microprocessors. So their management teams were insisting that they OEM (buy from someone else) these products. The answer depends on your answer to two questions: which step in the Customer Development process are you on?

Technology 145

Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 145

Steve Blank

AUGUST 18, 2010

Here’s his story of when Customer Development failed. We were lucky to learn about Customer Development early on in the life of our startup. More importantly, we’d witnessed Customer Development’s massive success at another local startup. So how did Customer Development fail us?

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Customer Development Developer Customer California 231

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

I was between my 7th and 8th and final startup; licking my wounds from Rocket Science, the company I had cratered as my first and last attempt as a startup CEO. We’ve managed startups like this forever; there is no other way to manage them.” To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice.

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Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital Customer Development 133

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Startups especially can benefit by using technical debt to experiment, invest in process, and increase their product development leverage. The biggest source of waste in new product development is building something that nobody wants. Leverage product development with open source and third parties.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 20, 2009

Luckily, I now have the benefit of a forthcoming book, The Principles of Product Development Flow. Labels: five whys root cause analysis , product development 11comments: Peter Severin said. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Interesting post.

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Software Review Continuous Deployment Development Team Review 161

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

SEPTEMBER 13, 2008

Those rates gave us a map that told us a lot about our customers; insights that proved stable even when the company grew orders of magnitude bigger. Only much later did I realize that this was an application of customer development to online marketing. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

SEM 164

SEM San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 164

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 6, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 6, 2008 When NOT to listen to your users; when NOT to rely on split-tests There are three legs to the lean startup concept: agile product development , low-cost (fast to market) platforms , and rapid-iteration customer development. I think Drucker said it best. Any thoughts?

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Agile 128

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

Once that responsibility has been assigned, have that new person email the whole company with the results of the analysis. Now, everyone is learning together - about your product, process, and team. Each five whys email is a teaching document. What is customer development? Five whys should read like plain English.

Software Review 167

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

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.

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Lean Startup Software Engineering Agile 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

Its inspired by the classic OODA Loop and is really just a simplified version of that concept, applied specifically to creating a software product development team. There are three stages: We start with ideas about what our product could be. Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you?

San Francisco 142

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean DC 142

Steve Blank

MAY 28, 2009

Market Risk vs. Invention Risk - Click to Enlarge For companies building web-based products, product development may be difficult, but with enough time and iteration engineering will eventually converge on a solution and ship a functional product - i t’s engineering, not invention. To Order Outside of the U.S.

Vertical 167

Vertical Silicon Valley Marketing Customer 167

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 25, 2010

This is the first post that moves into making specific process recommendations for product development. Labels: product development Speed up or slow down? This is the first post that moves into making specific process recommendations for product development. Want to learn more about me? Try About the author.

Software Review 141

Software Review San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 141

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

Please email me if you are interested. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Get in touch: Twitter Email Facebook Linkedin Additional resources Startup LessonsLearned, All Seasons : Every post from the blog, in one 600+ page PDF. My first time at your blog.

San Francisco 155

San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 2, 2008

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Thoughts on scientific product development Lo, my 5 subscribers, who are you? Get in touch: Twitter Email Facebook Linkedin Additional resources Startup LessonsLearned, All Seasons : Every post from the blog, in one 600+ page PDF.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Agile Lean 94

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

Early customer development talks are going great which keeps the team really excited. A bunch of potential customers are kicking the tires on the product but it seems that every engaged beta customer needs something slightly different or feels as if the product is not ready to be truly used in production.

Burn Rate 153

Burn Rate Equity Software Review Early Stage 153

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

Customer development. Its not enough just to build a product with great features - you have to figure out if there is a market for it. For those interested in getting started with agile or customer development, I thought Id include a few links. This speeds up the Ideas-Code-Data feedback loop. Excellent ideas!

Lean 102

Lean San Francisco Agile Continuous Deployment 102

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 4, 2010

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Get in touch: Twitter Email Facebook Linkedin Additional resources Startup LessonsLearned, All Seasons : Every post from the blog, in one 600+ page PDF. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

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Agile Software Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 99

Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

And other startups are in a New Market — creating a market from scratch (like Apple with the iPhone, or iPod/iTunes.) (“Market Type&# radically changes how you sell and market at each step in Customer Development. steve Terence Pua , on July 31, 2009 at 12:20 am Said: You need email reply notifications Yes, got it.

Silicon Valley 146

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 146

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 12, 2008

You might get a bunch of inbound emails from other press and partners, and all of these things can contribute to a feeling that you’re on your way to getting tons of traffic. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? It strokes your ego.

Audience 119

Audience San Francisco Continuous Deployment Lean 119

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 14, 2008

Today, when I talk to startup founders, the most common answer I get to the question "do you talk to your customers?" is something like "yes, I personally answer the customer support emails." The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Dont confuse passion with volume.

San Francisco 131

San Francisco Customer Lean Continuous Deployment 131

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

This product development diagram had become part of the DNA of Silicon Valley. That’s in stark contrast to the traditional Product Development Model where it’s expected a customer is already there and waiting and it’s simply a matter of [.] familiar with Customer Development you should be.

Product Development 163

Product Development Developer Silicon Valley Product 163

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 7, 2010

There are often counter-intuitive changes in customer behavior that depend on little details. In fact, the curse of product development is that sometimes small things make a huge difference and sometimes huge things make no difference. When we’re optimizing, product development teams encounter similar situations.

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Lean Metrics Design 154

ConversionXL

JUNE 14, 2021

ConvertKit’s strategy is geared around building email marketing tools for independent creators, allowing their customers to build and nurture their own audience. Here’s an example invitation email for existing customers: Hi [NAME], You’ve been a loyal customer of [COMPANY] for over two years now!

Software Review 158

Software Review Audience Differentiation Framework 158

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 2, 2009

Labels: five whys root cause analysis , product development 15comments: Anonymoussaid. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Leave your thoughts in a comment. If you’ve tried Five Whys, please share your experiences so far. I’ll do my best to help.)

San Francisco 164

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Software Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 12, 2010

For the many entrepreneurs that send me cold emails asking for me to review a business plan or answer a strategic dilemma: Im much more likely to answer if youve already tried getting an answer on the mailing list. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Try About the author.

Lean 146

Lean San Francisco Wiki Startup 146