Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

When we build products, we use a methodology. But too often when its time to think about customers, marketing, positioning, or PR, we delegate it to "marketroids" or "suits." We know some products succeed and others fail, but the reasons are complex and the unpredictable. This is a common mistake.

Customer Development 168

Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 29, 2013

Oh, and your salespeople have to make sure bookstores will stock it, and your marketing and PR people will have to make sure readers know it exists. You can give advice about applying Lean Startup ideas to business areas other than product development. George Bilbrey gave insight on using the methods on a sales team.

Lean 165

Lean Technical Review Startup Software Review 165

crowdSPRING Blog

SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

Recommendations for usability in product development – [link]. Children’s Websites: Usability Issues in Designing for Kids – [link]. Testing Accordion Forms – [link]. 100+ Excellent Examples of Well Designed Login Forms – [link]. One purpose, so many designs. The car door handle - [link].

Social Media 90

Social Media Small Business Design Media 90

Business Plan Blog

OCTOBER 4, 2013

Furthermore, when faced with adversity only great teams can respond to competitors, markets, funding environments, staff departures, PR disasters and the like. Typically, these hires fall into 2 buckets: product development and sales. Don’t hire people with skills and qualifications similar to yours.

Part-Time VPE 79

Part-Time VPE Fractional VPE Cofounder CTO Hire 79

crowdSPRING Blog

OCTOBER 20, 2010

Amazon’s Approach to Product Development – [link]. A Complete Guide to Effective Writing – [link]. Five Ways to Write Magnificent Copy – [link]. Put Crowdsourcing to Work for You – [link]. How We Collaborate is More Important Than Who Collaborates – [link]. – [link].

Social Media 91

Social Media Small Business Design Media 91

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 7, 2010

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. I mean, here we are, paying them to be there, and they won’t use the product!

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Lean Metrics Design 154

ConversionXL

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

It outlines four major growth strategies: market penetration , market development , product development , and diversification. Product development. Product development allows you to expand your existing market share by developing a new product for that audience. New channels.

Marketing 115

Marketing Framework Metrics Channel 115

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 21, 2019

No matter what a business owner needs an app for — accounting, communication, brainstorming, compliance, financial transactions, employee evaluations, advertising & promotions, collaborations, creativity, management, PR, customer relations, eCommerce, web design — there’s an app for that, and it’s probably free.

Cloud 113

Cloud eCommerce Security Advertising 113

crowdSPRING Blog

JULY 10, 2014

Good insight on startups and product development in this AMA with Jason Fried – crowdspring.co/TmVP1. “A Minimum Viable Product doesn’t count in SaaS – it has to be a Minimum Sellable Product.” How Fast-Growing Startups Can Fix Internal Communication Before It Breaks – crowdspring.co/VrHqmQ.

Social Media 97

Social Media Small Business Design Silicon Valley 97

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

Thanks to Suns amazing PR blitz, there was tremendous demand for experts on Java, and I did my best to convince people that I was one of that mythical breed. Later, I discovered you could get paid to program computers, and really never looked back. Thanks to the anonymity of the internet , I landed a few jobs, and did quite a bit of writing.

San Francisco 155

San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

ConversionXL

OCTOBER 7, 2021

These are the four stages of a product we’ll be focusing on. . However, on a more granular graph, the introduction phase would be preceded by a product development stage. This stage is used to determine the viability of your product and confirm when it should go to market. Slow skimming.

Product 142

Product Marketing Software Review Social Media 142

mashable.com

SEPTEMBER 12, 2011

And no matter what the latest trends indicate, you will eventually have to spend money on PR and marketing. For example, my company decided early on to hire a UI designer, which has helped tremendously with our product development. I’m now in my second founder/CEO role, having raised more than $18.5 million in venture financing.

Startup 79

Startup Social Media RSS Social Network 79

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2010

Engineers are offenders in this category too, but so is any gender-segregated activity, like an all-female PR or marketing team. Engineers are offenders in this category too, but so is any gender-segregated activity, like an all-female PR or marketing team. Diversity is not the only requirement for making good group decisions.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean Sweden Continuous Deployment 167

OnlyOnce

MARCH 14, 2011

Second is the ability to capitalize on a well-known brand—the result of many years of marketing, PR, and thought leadership within the industry. Finally, back-end support and process—an accounting team that gets the invoices out, an HR team that helps make strategic hires—makes the folks engaged in product development more productive.

Software Review 67

Software Review Development Team Review Later Stage Technical Review 67

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2023

You act as a tactical implementer as you add no insight/or value to product development. You’ll collect a laundry-list of customer feature requests and deliver them to product development, without any insight. This is essentially a denial of service attack on engineering’s time.

Business Model 355

Business Model Product Development Early Stage Customer Development 355

crowdSPRING Blog

MAY 11, 2012

Six Myths of Product Development – [link]. Unlimited Vacation Doesn’t Create Slackers–It Ensures Productivity – [link]. Six Myths of Product Development – [link]. The 5 Qualities of Remarkable Bosses – [link]. Four Things to Get Right When Starting a Company – [link].

Social Media 92

Social Media Small Business Design Media 92

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 27, 2009

Journalists, PR firms, investors, and the public at large love a scrappy come-from-behind story about two guys in a garage who figured out how to take down Goliath. Customer Development : a disciplined approach to finding out if there is a market for your product before its too late. Work in small batches.

San Francisco 117

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 117

Transformify

MARCH 14, 2020

Instead of paying ridiculously high rent in San Francisco or London, startups and small businesses can spend on product development and marketing, thus tremendously increasing the chances of successful market entry and expansion. Work from home and remote work also significantly cut office costs.

Hiring 75

Hiring Bulgaria Italy Spain 75

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 22, 2009

Whats striking about these stories, if you get past the PR hype, are two very important themes: These prodigies were self-taught, and had a fundamental fascination with technology from a very young age. Their stories would not have been possible without access to sympathetic adults with the necessary equipment and knowledge to get started.

Programming 143

Programming San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 143

ConversionXL

JUNE 25, 2021

Your brand (and product) should be easily recognizable no matter the channel you’re promoting it on. Done right, your PR campaign should incentivize media outlets to pick it up. Because none of the product developers were parents themselves, this emotional aspect was overlooked. The key to success is consistency.

Product 96

Product Social Media Audience Software Review 96

viniciusvacanti.com

APRIL 2, 2012

In fact, many of those early users enjoyed seeing our product develop. Startups succeed because they have a good product and not because they got good launch PR. After we re-launched as a daily deal aggregator, we got exactly one email from a user saying they missed the sample sales. That’s it. I had quit my job.

Aggregator 71

Aggregator Lean New York Email 71

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

Another great way to test your idea is to create a minimum viable product, or MVP. This is the simplest version of your product minus the frills and frosting. It’s a particularly popular strategy in the world of product development and is used to quickly and quantitatively test a product or a product feature.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Version One Ventures

FEBRUARY 6, 2013

For most startups, the core areas to build in house include: product design, product development, marketing, sales, PR, and customer service. For example, startups will want to outsource PR help for a launch or other large one-time event. In other words, you can’t build a great company on an outside agency’s stuff.

PR 165

PR Vertical Mobile Hiring 165

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 17, 2011

When competitors raise money and you don’t the following happens (assuming all else equal on product development, which I know is not always the case): they have a PR advantage both in terms of perceived momentum and also money to spend on it. They get the PR bump. They evolve the product faster.

Pre-Money Valuation 303

Pre-Money Valuation Dilution Valuation PR 303

techcocktail.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

be the manager and product developer). Make sure someone is thinking about overarching plans around PR, marketing and sales and spends time crafting the right messages, understanding audiences and figuring out distribution channels. In a new venture, it’s typical that each team member will likely wear multiple hats (i.e.

San Francisco 44

San Francisco Startup PHP San Diego 44

betashop.com

OCTOBER 8, 2012

I firmly believe that in this age where the product development life-cycle is so short and user feedback comes so quickly, you will know within a year whether you are focusing on a worthwhile one thing. My rule is that conferences are to be avoided unless it’s purely for PR purposes or if you’re in sales. .

Technical Review 108

Technical Review Technology Software Review Valuation 108

VC Cafe

JULY 15, 2021

Blogs/ press – to get consumers to learn about your new app, PR remains a viable source, especially when it comes to buzzy/social apps. ProductHunt/ Reddit/ Directories – another form of PR/social media, directories of new products and forums solicit feedback from users and contribute to discovery. Unfortunately not.

Mobile 190

Mobile Social Media Distribution PR 190

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 13, 2010

Even worse, entrepreneurs are faced with a constant barrage of vanity metrics from competitors and other companies engaged in PR. That’s what you pay PR firms for: to get an article written that is entirely factual and yet still provides positive spin for your company. The PR firm helpfully left out that context.)

San Francisco 154

San Francisco Metrics Lean PR 154

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 18, 2012

VCs talk about customer acquisition and competition as critical parts of the pitch--when 99% of the time the real answers are: a) Well, we'll do some PR, some social, some paid when we figure out what a customer is worth, some BD. Top talent drives revenues, business development, great product development.

Hiring 111

Hiring PR Differentiation Acquisition 111

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2010

The higher the vanity ratio, the more effective the PR. It helps companies with PR. And companies crave positive PR and control over their message – all for rational reasons. The higher the vanity ratio, the more effective the PR. It helps companies with PR. It sells newspapers and magazines.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco Lean PR Metrics 167

ConversionXL

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

PR and publicity drive attention…to drive sales. And you need to understand the potential impact of product-economic fit so that you can be better prepared for it.”. Growth hacking is done best when it begins at the start of product development. Because growth should be built into the product itself for maximum ROI.

Retention 48

Retention Metrics Acquisition Conversion 48

Venture Chronicles

JUNE 29, 2010

I received an email from the PR contact for the company that mentioned the BP oil spill in the Gulf and the process of idea collection on the web they were undertaking. The four products that Accepts offers as part of their innovation suite are: Ideas: A classic ideation offering, non-employees can submit and vote on ideas.

Software 34

Software Portfolio Agile Retention 34

YoungUpstarts

JANUARY 22, 2018

Everything flows from it, including strategy, operations, staffing, team building, product development, branding and PR. It’s the first question a potential investor will ask you about and the first thing a consumer will want to know before buying your product. A USP is the True North of any successful venture.

Turkey 124

Turkey PR Leadership Global 124

YoungUpstarts

JULY 23, 2012

Unfortunately, the last two chapters of the book were more rhetoric than anything else. Here, the author preached about the benefits and brickbacks of the Internet, and warned about the dangers of global warming.

Ruby 159

Ruby Fiji America Dilution 159

Seeing Both Sides

FEBRUARY 25, 2016

By viewing product development and marketing as integrated functions, not silos, leading tech companies like Facebook and Pinterest are rethinking their approach to driving growth and achieving breakthrough results. Earned Media: SEO, PR, Word of Mouth. Paid: Ads (Mobile, Web, Video, TV, Radio, SEM, Affiliate), Sponsorships.

Management 20

Management Analytics Technical Review Silicon Valley 20

Seeing Both Sides

FEBRUARY 25, 2016

By viewing product development and marketing as integrated functions, not silos, leading tech companies like Facebook and Pinterest are rethinking their approach to driving growth and achieving breakthrough results. Earned Media: SEO, PR, Word of Mouth. Paid: Ads (Mobile, Web, Video, TV, Radio, SEM, Affiliate), Sponsorships.

Management 20

Management Analytics Technical Review Silicon Valley 20

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 14, 2020

How do you feel when it takes months or a week for a PR to be resolved compared to hours or days? The consequences of moving too fast and not being able to fix things when they break are high. How we got here. What has gotten us to the point where we are moving too fast? In short, we have.

PR 147

PR Software Employee Developer 147