Date post: | 17-Oct-2014 |
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Technology |
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101Lessons Learned
for
StartupsAndy Harjanto
Collected from others’ and myexperience as running startups
More details, please visit
Shift Happens Blog
http://www.andyharjanto.com
I’m just one of youNot a startup celebrity, Nor a superstar genius
Why listening to me?
Building a startup todayis not the same as building it a decade ago
Shift Happens
Development CostCapital Expenditure
Time to Market
Down Trend
Better ToolsCloud Computing
Modern Programming
Distribution Cost
Social Media
Fund Size
Up Trend Market Size
Competition
Noise Level
Globalization
Social Media
Easier Barrier to Entry
Impatience
Thinking Of Starting Up?
Building A Team
Customers
Designing Product
Distribution
Lessons Learned Topics we’ll be discussing
Most of topics discussedare also applicable to “startup” teams
inside a company
Thinking Starting up?
1
Do you have what it takes?
to be a good
Entrepreneur
http://bit.ly/5dGJFb
Resilience
Risk Taker Competitive
Tenacity
2
Prepare to unlearnwhat you’ve
learned2010s Startups have to domany things backward andunconventional
more later…
3
Your “killer” idea is just a
hypothesis Talk to potential customers, friends,family without writing a single code
4
No need to perfect your idea
It’s almost a guarantee to change
5
Careful for creating a new
market
It’s a lot longer to create
than you think
Less competition, yes, but…
6
Some games are in town really over. Don’t compete
Let the big boys play
7
Ride the wave, Be the first
Facebook Apps
Twitter Based Services/Tools
You have millionsof potential users
from day one
8
At the end of the day, does your product solve problem?
Remember, just cool won’t cut it
Can you retain users?
9
A 5 year business plan? How about 5 day operating plan?
Startup is operatingunder extreme uncertainty
10
Targeting Consumer Market....seems so binary
More often than not, you have to be BIG fast (millions of users) in order to succeed
OR Go Home
11
Targeting Business Market…be prepared for long cycles
Work with channel partners, sales, build relationship.
12
Your Plan: Getting revenue from advertising… Think again Unless you’re to top 5 sites
in your market, you’re almost nobody
13
Overnight success is a mythBuild a long runway
Media loves overnight
success stories
All you heard is, 6 month start; 1 million users
14
Don’t sweat over your competitors
They could be even more clueless than you are
15
Going against entrenched players?
They resist to change
Provide a product that solvesproblems in a different, better way.
16
Be wary of a small number of competitors in your market
It’s either you’re genius OR there is no market
17
Sadly, luck plays roles in your startup success too
It’s the economy, stupid
Your product is ahead of its time
Celebrities love your product
18
Gauge market interest first via Social Media
Don’t worry about someone stealing your ideas
19
Be prepared for extreme rollercoaster emotional rides
Low of the lows
High of the highs
20
Be prepared for rejection after rejection
No one cares about your startup
Persistence is the key
21
Just Do-It, you’re ahead of99% of people
Too many people just talk with zero action
Money Matters
22
If you start a startup to get rich, you’re in the wrong business
Only few will make it “big”
Change The World
Solves ProblemsChallenges
Independence
23
Startup is a very high risk business
It does not makesense from
financialperspective
Many ways to minimize the risk
24
Be prepared for at least 18 months without pay & benefits
Don’t jumpbefore
you’re sure
Too many jump and abandon
before fully developed
25
Always operate under assumption of no investors
Got change formy startup?
26 More than anything else, tractions are what investors looking for
Number of users
Number of subscriptions
Growth
Retention Rate
Traffic
Can business scale?
27
Knowing when to fold
Gut Feeling will tell you
More of art than science
Measuring your tractions is a good indicator
28
In many countries, government grants are plenty for startups
Governments encouragehigh tech companies to
have presents locally, createlocal jobs, and national
pride
29
Your passionate user are sometimes your best investors
30
Watch your burn rate very carefully. You’re on diet
No Physical OfficeSkype (Free)
Free Email, Docs
Free Software
Open Source
Ramen profitability
31
Less money gives you senseurgency and boosts creativity It’s amazing to see how human
survival instinct kicks in
32
Charge for the service from day 1 is not a bad strategy
You’ll get very passionate customers
who believe in your product
33
Spend generously on tools, books, chance to network.
Your ROI is excellence
34
Don’t optimize your productFor VC
VC: How big is the market size?
Superstar developers?
At the end of the day,
traction matters the most
35
Get into partner programswith the big guys
Many offer free software and services
Building A Team
36
Find a great co-founder
Share the same values
Compliment skills
Check and balances
37
1st Stage: Hire Designer and Community Manager, instead
This could also be You
Ideas Validation
Gauge Market Interest
Quick Prototypes
38
2nd Stage: Hire Great Developers, Testers
This could also be You
Quality Code
Knows Scalability
Supportability
Security
39
Hire for Culture Fit & PassionateSet min-bar for Intelligent
Ideas Validation
Gauge Market InterestInterview Process: Make the candidate as ifan employee for a day
40
Hire temp, consultants to keepburn rate low
Gauge Market InterestChannel Partners
Product Videos
Marketing materials
41
A very short daily meeting is muchbetter than a long weekly meeting
Human needs constant reminder
of progress, accomplishmentand togetherness
42
Run effective meeting in22 minutes
http://bit.ly/caXq6h
43
Don’t grow fast, until youget to the product-fit phase
Gauge Market InterestKeep in in quick tight cycles of build, validate, learn
44
666 is the number to avoid
In a given startup project, no more than
6 people
6 months
6 day a week
45
Everyone should be CEO ofsomething
Promote a culture of
Veni, Vidi, Vici
I saw the problem
I own the problem
I solve the problem
46
Be decisive; majority of decisions are irreversible
“An hour meeting with 7 people to decide one API changeWhat a waste!”
Heard on the street:
47
External dependencies are kiss of death for startups
They’re not moving at the same speed
Reorg does happen
They can easily out-live you
48
Run your team on POT(progress, ownership, transparency)
http://bit.ly/6XT3NG
Designing Product
49
Why building an awesome product no body wants?
“Build it, they may not come”
Talk to customers, before writing a single code
50
Fail-Fast; andGet Traction-Fast
Really means Fail-Fast on bad ideasIt does not mean abandoning project too quickly
51
Quick build, validate, measure
and learn. It’s in our engineer DNA that welike to build a perfect system
Resist to be perfect
In an early stage,
52
Can you tell the difference:Progress vs. Wasted Progress?
Run tight, small loops of
Ideas (Hypothesis),
Validate/Measure and
Build
53
Don’t just accumulate work done without measuring
Measurement will give you feedback to continue path, or tochange direction User Traffic
Bounce Rate
Retention Rate
Conversion RateUser Happiness
54
It’s OK to write messy codesduring validation process
55
Your spec should be UIprototypes
Written spec is easily obsolete
The cost of writing,maintaining
UI prototype is minimal and fun
56
Suppress many of your ideas
It’s not a feature to featurecompetition
It’s who solves the problems the
best
57
Just build it now and fast. No need for optimization yet.
Your code will likelybe a throw away
as you gather feedback
58
Concentrate on core scenariosMake it great!
People either love it Or hate it!
No place for mediocrity
59
Ignore your 10% cases.That will take 90% of your energy
60
Eat your own dog food daily
In the early phase, It’s better than hiring
a full-time tester
Use your own product
regularly
61
Boost virality, make sharing a click a way
People love to share
62
Boost retention rate.Human is a curios being
Add a few analytics, newsabout themselves and friends
e.g.“your doc hasbeen viewed 5 times”
63
Boost retention rate.Human craves for attentions
RIM (Blackberry), Twitter, Facebook do this perfectly
They make users addicted to their product, by tellingthem – “You’re important”
64
Minimize FrictionsUsers are “very lazy” nowadays
One click
One minute setup
No installation
65
Don’t give user optionsSet appropriate default
They have enoughother things to
worry
66
Ship your product with a minimum feature set
Enough to showcaseYour core scenarios
Add featureslater after
after undisputablefeedback
67
After iterations, often ask what features to drop, instead of add
Remember, your ideas are justa hypothesis; willing to let go
Pivot on your core beliefs, andgo to other directions appropriately
68
What Microsoft, Google, Apple can’t afford, but you can?
They can’t ship a crappy product,
even for their betaThey have reputation to maintain, You don’t!
Use it to run a tight feedback loop to
improve your product
69
Without instant gratificationUsers drop like a fly
I saw dead users leaving
First 60 second experience is critical
70
Create a product that 10xbetter
Dare to be different
Stand up and get noticed
The world is a very noisy place(and getting worse by day…)
71
Collect less, better privacy,security.
Many analytics tools are goodenough to measure user behavior
72
Don’t put any features, concepts that you can’t explain in 15 secs
Does your product ship with you?
Don’t makeuser think
73
Reach Product-Market Fit Phase. Celebrate, Work Harder.
40%will be upset
If your service discontinues
74
Watch out for yoursite performance
Users have no patience for sluggish sites
75
Do a side project/experiment.Minimize your risk
Many side projects made it big
76
Use Cloud Computing
Let’s not be IT guysLet’s focus on building
great product
Sleep better at night
77
Building a new walled garden,community is really, really hard
Piggy back existing onesfacebook
twitterlinked-in
Customers, Where r u?
78
Never too early to start your marketing campaign
How about Day 1?Or even 90 days before
valuable contentsquality
comments
79 Show the world what you’re doing. Stealth Mode is counter intuitive.
Are you worried someonestealing your ideas?
Really?Are you building
space shuttle?
No need for private beta
80
There is no such thing is product launching for startups
Continuous improvement
Unless you’re Apple.
81Approaching Press. Do you have unique, interesting stories?
They’re not your writers
Build a human connection first
82
Don’t have good retention rate,Don’t go to press yet!
Newspublished
Traffic Wasted
83Most effective way to acquire customers? Your passionate customers
Good news, travel fast and far
84
Save your money on press releases. Ineffective.
Different countries, however, it could be different stories
85
SEO, Social Media takes time to develop
Millions of others are doing it;
how you stand out?
86
Viral is not a strategyPeople are immune. Mutate!
Unless yourProduct is irresistibly good
87
Simple pricing is almost always better than complex one
Have 1-3 pricingoptions as opposed to complex pricingchoices.
Customers want predictable costs,
not many options
Going Global
88
US is a crowded place. Go play outside
Less competitorsGrowing market
Of course, there is a catch…
89
Partner locally. Remote management is an illusion
Close, personal relationsoften are prerequisite
outside US
90
Global team communication is easy. Culture fit is hard
91
In many countries, social status is more important
…than your product itself.
“Your product sucks,But X uses it, so I use it”
92
One size does not fit all
Package your product differently in
other countriesbased on market
demand
Miscellaneous
93
Nice guy finishes first… in the long run
94
Admit mistakes, start from the top. We’re all learning
95
Set expectation to teamChanges are constant
We’re a startupnot a manufacturer
96
You’ll be surprised, many peopleare routing for small guys
Many offer a helping hand
97
Whom Microsoft, Google, Apple should be worried?
YouThey may have the muscles, but you can
run fasterFew of you will be the next them
98
Startup is not a job
It’s a life style. It’s drive and passion to change the world
with little financial reward.Yes, few made it very big
Yes, it has been known that startup entrepreneurs have genetic defects
99
It’s a growing pain experience with big personal rewards
100 Subscribe to these
excellent blogs, vlogs, podcasts
• Paul Graham http://bit.ly/pgqy8 • Steve Blank http://bit.ly/juvQr • Venture Hacks http://
bit.ly/1BOE8x • Both Side of Table http://
bit.ly/EsjT7 • Mixergy http://bit.ly/rgDKP
101
It’s a blank canvas… What are you waiting for!
For more presentations like this….
Please visit:
http://www.slideshare.net/Guppers/presentations