Customer Development

Steve Blank model of Start Up success

• key aspect of Eric Ries' Lean Startup model

http://steveblank.com/2009/02/23/theres-a-pattern-here/

In hindsight it appeared clear that startups that survive the first few tough years do not follow the traditional product-centric launch model espoused by product managers or the venture capital community. Through trial and error, hiring and firing, successful startups all invented a parallel process to Product Development. In particular, the winners invent and live by a process of customer Learning and discovery. It's a process that doesn't exist in large companies with existing customers and markets. But it is life and death for a new venture. I call this process "Customer Development," a sibling to "Product Development," and each and every startup that succeeds recapitulates it, knowingly or not.

his presentation

• process:

  • Customer Discovery: validate your hypotheses about problem and solution (Scientific Method)

    • how much will customer pay to solve problem?

    • does customer agree your product would solve the problem? how much will they pay for that solution?

    • draw before-and-after day-in-the-life for Persona

    • draw org chart for buyer, users

  • Customer Validation

    • repeatable sales process, org chart, influence map

    • understanding of Sales Cycle, Life Time Value, etc.

    • set of orders validating the Product Roadmap (he says you show the roadmap to potential customers, and that it includes release schedule for 12mo (?) - I'm not sure I agree with that)

  • Customer Creation

    • Crossing The Chasm

    • Vary process based on which of 3 Market Type-s

  • Company Building: re-build Mission, strategy, management

    • management needs to change as company grows: development-centric -> mission-centric -> process-centric

    • sales growth needs to match Market Type

• the goal for release1.0 is the minimum feature set for Early Vangelist-s (Minimum Viable Product)

  • use Agile Software Development

    • but with faster releases, almost Continuous Delivery

    • A-B Test (to validate feature value?)

    • Just In Time architecture and Infrastructure

    • automated Unit Test and Acceptance Test systems

    • immune system: reduce odds of deploying defects, automated identify/alert when it happens

• seeking funding

  • do the learning first

  • present the learnings during presentation