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Chasing funding versus chasing customers and a repeatable and scalable business model, is one reason startups fail. Product Development – Getting Funded as The Goal In a traditional product development model, entrepreneurs come up with an idea or concept, write a business plan and try to get funding to bring that idea to fruition.
In the next few posts that follow, I’ll describe more specifically how this model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. —– Part 2 of the CustomerDevelopment Manifesto to follow. related recent reading: The CustomerDevelopment Manifesto: Reasons for the Revolution, The CustomerDevelopment [.]
I was in New York last week with my class at Columbia University and several events made me realize that the CustomerDevelopment model needs to better describe its fit with web-based businesses. And without revenue how do we know if we achieved product/market fit to exit Customer Validation?” It’s an impressive portfolio.
CustomerDevelopment 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 CustomerDevelopment.
This post describes how following the traditional product development can lead to a “startup death spiral.&# In the next posts that follow, I’ll describe how this model’s failures led to the CustomerDevelopment Model – offering a new way to approach startup sales and marketing activities.
Over the last decade we assumed that once we found repeatable methodologies (Agile and CustomerDevelopment , Business Model Design) to build early stage ventures, entrepreneurship would become a “science,” and anyone could do it. Filed under: Big Companies versus Startups: Durant versus Sloan , CustomerDevelopment , Family/Career.
Use CustomerDevelopment to identify and refine the potential profitable niche and stay in close contact with customers as you build, to be sure you’re building something they’ll want to have…and keep. Filed under: CustomerDevelopment. What’s the point? What are they waiting for?
For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of CustomerDevelopment , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. The CustomerDevelopment process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that.
Filed under: CustomerDevelopment , Venture Capital | Tagged: Entrepreneurs « CustomerDevelopment Manifesto: Market Type (part 4) CustomerDevelopment Manifesto: The Path of Warriors and Winners (part 5) » 16 Responses Jon Ziskind , on September 14, 2009 at 9:19 am Said: Steve – Great post and really great advice.
PS1- I run a small software startup in Brazil and just found out about CustomerDevelopment and your blog (I’ve been reading and listening to everything I can get my hands on online, like Venturehacks and Ries’ blog). You can get away with effective behavior in a large company.
Berkeley Haas Business School was courageous enough to give me a forum teach the CustomerDevelopment Methodology. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance I always had been curious about how Silicon Valley, a place I had lived and worked in, came to be. After I retired, Jerry Engel , director of the Lester Center on Entrepreneurship , at U.C.
CustomerDevelopment ) to help you quickly recognize and reverse any incorrect decisions. CustomerDevelopment) to help you quickly recognize and reverse any incorrect decisions.&# My advice was to start a policy of making reversible decisions before anyone left his office or before a meeting ended.
In it Shackleton defined courage and leadership. Working with him, I’ve been impressed to watch his small team embrace CustomerDevelopment (and Business Model Generation ) and search the world for the right product/market fit. This would be one of the most heroic journeys of exploration ever undertaken. So why this post?
With not too much convincing, Henrich agreed that rather than quarterly reviews, the leadership team would to talk to 4-5 project managers every week, looking at 16-20 projects. The reviews would be about frequent delivery, incremental development and how leadership could remove obstacles. Pivoting the Process. Lessons Learned.
Their leadership has shown incredible foresight in engineering an amazing economic engine and formidable military. They are the signs of a leadership frightened not by external enemies but by their own people. Filed under: China , CustomerDevelopment , Technology , Venture Capital. was known for.
CustomerDevelopment We were starting Epiphany, my last company. I was out and about in Silicon Valley doing what I would now call Customer Discovery trying to understand how marketing departments in large corporations worked. See part one for the first time it happened. This time it was serious. Good stuff too.
Home Books for Startups Secret History-Bibliography Steve Blank Startup Resources Steve Blank Entries RSS | Comments RSS Categories Air Force (9) Ardent (9) Big Companies versus Startups: Durant versus Sloan (29) California Coastal Commission (3) Conservation (2) Convergent Technologies (1) CustomerDevelopment (98) CustomerDevelopment Manifesto (..)
However, you will be dealing with almost daily change, (new customer feedback/insights from a CustomerDevelopment process and technical roadblocks ,) as the company searches for a repeatable and scalable business model. » Dig for Leadership - Stories that try to make the world a better place. , carry on reading.
The presentation didn’t have a single word about Lean Startups or CustomerDevelopment. Reply Dan Hodgins , on November 13, 2009 at 1:12 am Said: Hi Steve, Just listened to your “Retooling Early Stage Development&# for about the 10th time tonight as I was cleaning my room. Your results may vary.
Filed under: CustomerDevelopment , Family/Career , Technology | Tagged: Steve Blank , Entrepreneurs , Tips for Startups « Am I a Founder? I have been swinging for the fences for several years as a young entrepreneur at the executive leadership level for several start-ups and most recently starting my own.
his next article on SuperMac, “Building the Killer Team – Mission, Intent, and Values&# , Steve further pounds the table on some principles of leadership that I think are [.] on April 10, 2009 at 6:58 am Said: Amazing blog. Reply How to close a term sheet quickly - Venture Hacks , on April 28, 2009 at 10:43 am Said: [.]
The ultimate in this perspective is to adopt the “ servant leadership ” model, where your goal is to make sure that employees’ highest priority needs are being served. Flexible – listen to allow flex hours and customization. Develop a strong feedback loop to allow responsiveness in improving team member’s day-to-day-experience.
Home Books for Startups Secret History-Bibliography Steve Blank Startup Resources Steve Blank Entries RSS | Comments RSS Categories Air Force (9) Ardent (9) Big Companies versus Startups: Durant versus Sloan (29) California Coastal Commission (3) Conservation (2) Convergent Technologies (1) CustomerDevelopment (98) CustomerDevelopment Manifesto (..)
CustomerDevelopment There was nothing wrong about Rocket Science having a vision radically different than the conventional wisdom. CustomerDevelopment says having a vision, faith and a set of hypotheses are a normal part of the startup experience. The mistake isn’t having a vision and taking risks.
New strategic direction in companies with loyal customers have different consequences then when you had no customers Acquiring new customers are a lot more expensive that converting existing ones.
CustomerDevelopment/Lean Startups In hindsight startups and the venture capital community left out the most important first step any startup ought to be doing – hypothesis testing in front of customers- from day one. It’s what my textbook on CustomerDevelopment describes. I was an idiot. Berkeley and at Stanford.
This typically plays out in three ways: Often the first plan from leadership for innovation is hiring management consultants who bring out their 20th-century playbook. A competitive environment should drive a company/government agency into new forms of organization that can rapidly respond to these new threats.
This post describes a solution – the CustomerDevelopment 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.
Filed under: CustomerDevelopment , ESL , Technology | Tagged: Steve Blank , Entrepreneurs , ESL « Convergent Technologies: War Story 1 – Selling with Sports Scores A Wilderness of Mirrors » 17 Responses Michael F.
The Times Square Strategy discussion I had with Eric Ries , was still top of mind, so instead of my standard CustomerDevelopment lecture , I offered my thoughts on: the origin of CustomerDevelopment, where we are today, and where does CustomerDevelopment go, and how you can help get it there.
Lessons Learned No one will tell you to work fewer hours You need to be responsible for your own health and happiness Burnout sneaks up on you Burnout is self-induced. You created it and own it.
It didn’t help that “innovation” was the new hot-button buzzword from senior leadership, and incubators were sprouting in every division of their company, it just made their job more unmanageable. — Fast forward a year, and slowly, like turning a supertanker, the innovation pipeline we proposed is taking shape. Lessons Learned.
Their leadership has shown incredible foresight in engineering an amazing economic engine and formidable military. They are the signs of a leadership frightened not by external enemies but by their own people. Filed under: China , CustomerDevelopment , Technology , Venture Capital. was known for.
The answer depends on your answer to two questions: which step in the CustomerDevelopment process are you on? CustomerDevelopment and Selling Strategy If you’ve just started your company you are in customer discovery. Hiring a VP of Sales in customer discovery typically sets a startup back.
Filed under: CustomerDevelopment , Marketing , SuperMac , Technology | Tagged: Steve Blank , SuperMac « Love/Hate Business Plan Competitions Gravity Will be Turned Off » 17 Responses EricS , on May 11, 2009 at 11:05 am Said: I loved my Spigot. It was fun watching it happen.
Home Books for Startups Secret History-Bibliography Steve Blank Startup Resources Steve Blank Entries RSS | Comments RSS Categories Air Force (9) Ardent (9) Big Companies versus Startups: Durant versus Sloan (29) California Coastal Commission (3) Conservation (2) Convergent Technologies (1) CustomerDevelopment (98) CustomerDevelopment Manifesto (..)
TLDR: Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits , authors of The Entrepreneur's Guide to CustomerDevelopment are back with a new book called The Lean Entrepreneur. It took the idea of CustomerDevelopment and made it accessible to a whole new audience. Illustrations by FAKEGRIMLOCK. You can pre-order it starting today.
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. Yet when I talked to my venture capital friends, they said, “Well, that’s just how startups work. We’ve managed startups like this forever; there is no other way to manage them.”
This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development. This post describes how the traditional product development model distorts startup sales, marketing and business development.
Filed under: CustomerDevelopment , Family/Career , Technology | Tagged: Steve Blank , Entrepreneurs , Startups , Early Stage Startup , Tips for Startups « The Curse of a New Building Going to Trade Shows Like it Matters – Part 1 » 33 Responses William , on May 18, 2009 at 5:44 am Said: Heh.
If you are a practitioner of CustomerDevelopment, ESL was doing it before most us were born. Two years out of the Air Force, serendipity (which would be my lifelong form of career planning) found me in Silicon Valley working for my first company: ESL. If you’re an entrepreneur, ESL is the most important company you’ve never heard of.
So no post today on entrepreneurship, Secret History of Silicon Valley, CustomerDevelopment, Lean Startups, etc. Our friends who run the state park surrounding our ranch will join all of us for Thanksgiving dinner. Just a reflection on my family and hopes for our children.
But then, because there might be entrenched competitors and your concept is radically new, you still need to invest in the customerdevelopment process to learn how to get design wins from companies who may be happy with their existing vendors. For example, complex new semiconductor architectures, (i.e.
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