Managing Startups: Best Blog Posts

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• Managing Startups: Best Blog Posts
• Preface
  • Safari Books Online
  • How to Contact Us
• Foreword
• I. Lean Startup
  • 1. How We Fooled Ourselves into Delaying Our Startups Launch
    • Why Didnt We Release an Early Prototype?
    • The Excuses We Came Up With
    • The Excuse I Didnt Admit
    • Lastly
  • 2. How to Build It: Lean Prototyping Techniques for Hardware
    • The Dollar Store
    • Pen and Paper
    • Computer Modeling
    • 2D Cutting
    • Additive Manufacturing
    • CNC
    • Molding and Fiberglass
    • Welding
    • Arduino
    • User Feedback
      • How I (Try to) Pick People for Feedback
    • Summary
    • Acknowledgments
  • 3. How Many Metrics Do You Need to Run Your Startup?
    • Whats Your OMTM?
  • 4. The Lean Stack MVPA Different Approach
    • The Lean Stack Flow
      • The VisionLean Canvas
      • The StrategyStrategy and Risks Board
      • The ProductValidated Learning Board
        • Question: How does one create a card for a product prior to conducting problem and solution interviews?
        • Question: What is a minimum viable feature (MVF)? What is the relation to MVP? How does one know which one to use?
        • Question: Can you explain the lifecycle of a product through the four stages on the board?
        • Question: Where do you capture product and experiment details?
      • The Lean Stack in Action
      • Now Its Your Turn
  • 5. Software Inventory
  • 6. How to Get Out of the Building with the Validation Board
    • 1. The Exploration Method
      • Techniques (in Decreasing Order of Cost and Quality of Data)
      • Five Bonus Tips for Customer Development Interviews
      • Bad Questions
      • Good Questions
      • Recording Data and Scoring
      • Avoid a False Negative/Positive
    • 2. The Pitch Method
      • Forms of Pitch
      • Forms of Currency
    • 3. The Concierge Method
      • Concierge Tools
• II. Business Models
  • 7. MBA Mondays: Revenue ModelsCommerce
  • 8. Freemium Pricing for SaaS: Optimizing Paid Conversion Upgrades
  • 9. Why Churn Is So Critical to Success in SaaS
    • The Impact of Negative Churn
    • How Do You Achieve Negative Churn?
    • Same Sales Force for Expansion/Up-sell/Cross-sell?
    • How to Track the Different Factors That Make Up Bookings
    • When to Focus on Negative Churn?
    • Tactics to Help Reduce Churn
    • Managing Churn Is Harder if You Are Selling to Small Businesses
    • How Churn Affects Valuation
  • 10. Achieving the Network Effect: Solving the Chicken or the Egg
    • Two Versions of the Chicken or the Egg
      • Type #1: Platforms/Marketplaces
      • Type #2: Communities/Social Networks
    • Solving Platform and Marketplace Issues
    • Solving Community and Social Network Issues
    • Dont Be Afraid of Brute Force
  • 11. Reverse Network Effects: Why Scale May Be the Biggest Threat Facing Todays Social Networks
    • Network Effects and Value
    • Why Network Effects Work in Reverse
      • Reverse Network Effects: Connection
      • Reverse Network Effects: Content
        • Curation
        • Personalization
      • Reverse Network Effects: Clout
    • In Conclusion
  • 12. Business Model Canvas for Puppies (Part I)
    • Puppies-as-a-Service
    • Find a Wall
    • Customer
    • Value Proposition
    • Relationship
    • Channel
    • Minimum Viable Product
    • The End?
• III. Customer Discovery and Validation
  • 13. All Customers Are Not Created Equal
    • Part I
      • Consumers
      • Small and Mid-Sized Non-Technology Businesses
      • Technology Startups
    • Part II
      • Large Enterprise Customers
      • Existing Customers
  • 14. You Shouldnt Use a Survey If...
  • 15. A Perfect Use for Personas
    • The Business Person
    • The Barfly
    • The Group Luncher
    • And the Rest...
    • Postscript
  • 16. Fucking Ship It Already: Just Not to Everyone at Once
    • The Interactive Mockup
    • The Opt In
    • The Opt Out
    • The n% Rollout
    • The New User Rollout
  • 17. Stop Validating Your Product
    • Validate a Problem
    • Solve a Problem for a Particular Market
    • The Easiest Kind of Customer Development
  • 18. Using Surveys to Validate Key Startup Decisions
    • Introduction
    • Background
    • So How Do You Get Quality Feedback?
      • Learning About Your Own Customers
      • Learning About Potential Customers
    • Using a Survey and a Targeted Audience to Make Smart Decisions
      • Create Clear Objectives
      • Determine Your Target AudienceWho Do You Want to Survey?
    • Create a Great SurveyTurning Key Objectives into Great Questions
      • Modify Survey Questions:
    • Uncovering Critical Insights
      • Actionable Insights for Modify
        • Objective: Understand pricing
        • Objective: Identify demographics of Modifys target customers
          • Key demographic insights
        • Objective: Understand if a subscription option is viable
        • Objective: Understand market sizing
    • Putting Results into Action
      • Pricing
      • Brand Recognition
      • Demographics
      • Subscription Viability
      • Market Sizing
    • Conclusion
• IV. Marketing: Demand Generation and Optimization
  • 19. Very Basic Startup Marketing
    • Marketing as a Funnel
      • Awareness: How People First Hear About Your Company
      • Conversion: Getting People Who Are Aware to Take Action
      • Raving Fans: Getting Customers to Love You and Be Evangelists
    • Marketing as Understanding
    • Marketing as a Cycle
  • 20. The Ultimate Guide to Startup Marketing
    • Foundation
      • 1. Choosing a Market
      • 2. Defining Keywords
      • 3. Defining Success
      • 4. Setting Core Metrics
      • 5. Estimating a Conversion Rate
      • 6. Setting a Budget
    • Social Media
      • 1. Choosing the Right Social Media Networks
      • 2. Defining the Best Times to Post
      • 3. Using a Keyword List
      • 4. Creating and Using an Influencer List
      • 5. Setting Up a Blog
    • Startup PR
      • 1. Craft Meaningful Positioning Statements
      • 2. Define Your Startup Sensitivities
      • 3. Identifying the Right Writers for a Media List
      • 4. Creating a Press Kit
      • 5. Reaching Out to Journalists
    • Content Creation
      • 1. Creating a Topic List
      • 2. Knowing What Types of Content to Publish
      • 3. Guest Blogging
      • 4. Capturing Emails
    • Test and Iterate
      • 1. Setting Up Analytics Tools
      • 2. Measuring Against Benchmarks
      • 3. Brainstorming Creative New Ideas
    • Best Practices
      • 1. Sell the Solution
      • 2. Have a Compelling Story
      • 3. Use All Your Resources
    • Conclusion
  • 21. What the Highest-Converting Websites Do Differently
    • 1. They Make Their Unique Value Proposition(s) Clear
    • 2. They Test Their Calls to Action
      • How Do You Find Out What Questions Your Customers Have?
    • 3. They Test Their Headlines
    • 4. They Tend To Have Short Forms
      • Test the Number of Form Fields
      • Other Techniques to Try
  • 22. Understanding the Customer Buying Cycle and Triggers
    • The Customer Buying Cycle
    • How the Buying Cycle Impacts the Sales Approach Needed
      • Whats the Difference?
      • How Do You Adapt Marketing to a Buyers Stage in the Cycle?
      • What Do You Do with Visitors That Are Not Ready to Buy? (Lead Nurturing)
      • How Online Lead Sources Relate to the Customer Buying Cycle
    • Understanding Buying Triggers
      • Working with Triggers to Improve Marketing
        • 1 & 2. Identify the Personas that buy, and their specific triggers
        • 3. Build trigger-specific messaging and content
        • 4. Look to see if you can create the trigger, or help a customer realize a trigger has happened
    • Encountering a Customer Too Late in the Buying Cycle
    • Conclusions
  • 23. Building It Is Not Enough: Five Practical Tips on User Acquisition
    • If You Build It, They May Not Come
      • 1. Do Not Test a Lot of Channels at Once
      • 2. Diversity of Channels Is Not Important in the Early Stage
      • 3. Paying for Users Is Okay
      • 4. You Only Need Three Tools to Test Your Customer Acquisition Channels
      • 5. Avoid the Button Color A/B Testing Rabbit Hole
  • 24. Introduction to A/B Testing for Landing Pages
    • Improperly Segmenting Traffic
    • Misunderstanding Randomness
    • Mixing Experiment Factors
    • Data Dredging
    • Comparing the Results of Different and Unrelated Experiments
    • Inconsistent or Unimportant Metrics
    • Nave Analysis of Results
    • Substituting Testing for Creativity and Common Sense
    • Make It Easy on Your Developers
  • 25. You Built It But They Didnt Come: Eight Tricks for Marketing Your Mobile App
    • Build a Great App
    • Get Great Reviews
    • Build in Social
    • Pitch, Pitch, Pitch (and Then Pitch Some More)
    • SEO Your App Description
    • Be Free, Freemium, Cheap...
    • If All Else Fails, Advertise
    • If All Else *Really* Fails, Buy Users to Get in the Top App Lists
• V. Sales, Marketing, and PR Management
  • 26. At Times Not Losing Is as Important as Winning
    • Customer Validation
    • They Have a Problem and Know It
    • A Match Made in Heaven
    • The CIO
    • The IT Revolt
    • Were Going to Lose
    • The Third Way
    • The Take-Away Gambit
    • Lessons Learned
  • 27. Nine Ways to Make Your Startup Grow Virally
    • • Get Your Users to Spread the Word
      • Increasing Conversion
    • Conclusion
  • 28. Our PR Stinks: Heres What Your Startup Can Learn from It
    • The Familiar Doubt
    • How Did We Solve the First Problem of Filling the Platform?
    • Growth
    • The Big Guys
    • Our PR Still Stank
    • How, Exactly, Did We Manage to Grow?
    • What Were Our End Results with PR?
    • What Were Our End Results with Content Marketing?
    • At This Point in Time, Our PR Still Sucks
    • The Fate of Your Brand
  • 29. Some Tips for Interacting with the Press
  • 30. Startup Branding: A Practical Guide for Entrepreneurs
    • • • 1. What does startup branding really mean for an early-stage company? Is it just picking a name and a logo?
        • 2. Any favorite startup examples that you think are particularly clueful about brand and drawing out the right emotional response?
        • 3. Speaking of names, how do I pick a great name for my startup? Does it really matter all that much?
        • 4. What about logos? Can I just hack something together? Use a crowdsourcing service like 99designs? Or is that a waste of time?
        • 5. Any tips on where to find a great freelance designer for a startup logo? And what would you consider reasonably priced?
        • 6. How do I decide what category my startup falls into? Is it better to find an existing category, or blaze the trail of a new one?
        • 7. How much does good branding matter when trying to raise capital? Is smart money really fooled by that kind of thing? Will I look foolish for having invested in branding?
• VI. Product Management/Product Design
  • 31. Sometimes Its Not the Change They Hate
    • Did You Do Any Sort of User Testing Before Launch?
    • Did You Test with Current Users or Just New Ones?
    • Did You Add Something Useful to Users? Really?
    • Do You Mind Losing a Portion of Your Users?
    • Have You Honestly Listened to Your Users Complaints?
    • Have You Fixed the Problem by Letting Users Change Settings?
  • 32. What You Will/Wont Learn from Usability Testing
  • 33. Product Marketing Contribution
    • The Problem
    • The Job
    • Product Marketing Responsibilities
    • What to Do?
  • 34. Time-Boxing Product Discovery
  • 35. Product Management Then and Now
    • • • Organization:
        • Education:
        • Spends days:
        • Learns about customer behavior:
        • Makes case for project funding based on:
        • Reads:
        • Deep knowledge in:
        • Loves:
        • Sits with:
        • When things dont go well:
        • Strives to please:
        • Makes decisions based on:
        • Communicates with stakeholders:
        • Attitude:
        • Worries about:
        • Secret weapon:
        • Strives to create:
  • 36. Live-Data Prototypes Versus Production
  • 37. Continuous Discovery
  • 38. The Role of Product Managers
  • 39. Why Companies Should Have Product Editors, Not Product Managers
    • Product Manager: One of the Toughest and Worst-Defined Jobs in Tech
    • Bad Ideas Are Often Good Ideas That Dont Fit
    • Jack Dorsey in His Own Words
    • Lead with Product
  • 40. Five Outsourcing Mistakes That Will Kill Your Startup
    • Mistake #1: Outsourcing Something That Shouldnt Be Outsourced
    • Mistake #2: Not Sufficiently Vetting Your Staff
    • Mistake #3: Hiring Based on Technical Skills Rather than English Proficiency
    • Mistake #4: Insufficient Management
    • Mistake #5: Failure to Award Responsibility and Reward Good Work
    • Conclusion
• VII. Business Development and Scaling
  • 41. Who You Gonna Call? Partnering with Goliath: A Tale of Two Announcements
    • Time to Find a Partner
      • The Right Partner
      • Mission Clarity
      • Behind the HeadlinesA Deal with Teeth
      • Goliath Delivers...
      • ... With a Little Help from His Friend
    • In Summary
  • 42. A Recipe for Growth: Adding Layers to the Cake
• VIII. Funding Strategy
  • 43. Micro-VCs and Super Angels Two Years Later: Looking Back and Some Predictions for the Future
    • The Dedicated Seed Strategy Continues to Have Strong Benefits
    • Evolving and Converging Strategies
    • A New Normal?
    • A Few Predictions
  • 44. Why Do VCs Have Ownership Targets? And Why 20%?
  • 45. How to Evaluate Firms for a Seed VC Syndicate
  • 46. A Choir of Angel Investors Sing Different Parts
  • 47. Super Pro-Rata Rights Arent Super
• IX. Company Culture, Organizational Structure, Recruiting, and Other HR Issues
  • 48. Getting Promoted Too Quickly
  • 49. Recruiting Developers? Create an Awesome Candidate Experience
    • Ideas for Creating an Awesome Candidate Experience (CX)
  • 50. Startups: Stop Trying to Hire Ninja-Rockstar Engineers
  • 51. How to Hire Hackers: A Realistic Guide for Startups
    • Youre a StartupHave the Founders Make the First Contact
    • Interviewing: Its Not Just About the Role, Its Also About Who They Will Have Lunch With
    • Interviewing: Choose Carefully Which Opportunity to Pitch
    • Signing: How to Make Candidates Sign an Employment Agreement More Quickly
      • How to Hear No and How to Say No
  • 52. MBA Mondays: Best Hiring Practices
  • 53. How to Design a Successful Interview Process for Hiring Top Talent
    • 1. Reviewing Resumes
    • 2. Screening Candidates
    • 3. First In-Person Interview (with me)
    • 4. Second In-Person Interview (with Fred)
    • 5. Third In-Person Interview (with the team)
    • 6. The Practical
    • 7. The Post-Practical
    • Conclusions
  • 54. Snake-Oil Startup Recruiting
  • 55. Recruiting and Culture (MBA Mondays Guest Post)
    • Make Recruiting a Top Priority at the CEO Level
    • Communicate the Company Vision Broadly and Directly
    • Challenge Traditional Notions of Corporate Transparency
    • Be Patient: Slow Recruiting
    • Open-Source Your Culture: Generosity of Spirit
    • Cultivate the Spirit of the Organization
  • 56. Firing
  • 57. MBA Mondays: Asking an Employee to Leave the Company
  • 58. The Board of DirectorsSelecting, Electing, and Evolving
• X. Startup Failure
  • 59. What Goes Wrong
    • Determination
    • Variety of Problems
    • Cofounder Disputes
    • Investors
    • Distractions
    • HR Acquisitions
    • Making Something People Want Is Hard
    • Roller Coaster
    • Hard, But Not Impossible
  • 60. Why Startups Die
    • Post Mortems
    • How to Survive
• XI. Exiting by Selling Your Company
  • 61. The Economic Logic Behind Tech and Talent Acquisitions
  • 62. Knowing Where the Exits Are
    • Taking the Exit
    • Your Best Exit May Be Behind You
    • Stepping Back from the Fray: November 2005
    • Stepping Back from the Fray: February 2007
• XII. The Startup Mindset and Coping with Startup Pressures
  • 63. What Its Like to Be the CEO: Revelations and Reflections
    • What It Feels Like to Be the CEO of a Startup
    • Epilogue
  • 64. How We FightCofounders in Love and War
    • Introduction
    • How We Fight
      • Taking Time
      • Simulating Real Life
      • What Are You Fighting About?
  • 65. Vision Versus HallucinationFounders and Pivots
    • A Pivot a Week
    • Pivot as an Excuse
    • Sit on It for Awhile
    • Change the Value Proposition Last
    • Find a Brainstorm Buddy
    • Lessons Learned
  • 66. 50 Startup Lessons Learned in 12 Months
  • 67. Advice I Wish I Could Have Given Myself Five Years Ago
  • 68. The Only Two Questions Founders Need to Answer
    • Do You Need to Pass These Tests to Succeed?
    • When I Passed These Tests and When I Failed
  • 69. Once You Take Money, the Clock Starts Ticking
  • 70. The Series A Crunch Survivors Guide
    • 1. Your Team Lacks a Track Record
    • 2. Your Product Execution Is Not Competitive with Other Products Investors Are Seeing
    • 3. You Lack Product Traction
    • 4. The Market Youre Addressing Is Not Big or Important Enough
    • 5. Youre Fishing in a Recently Poisoned Pond (e.g., the Deal Space Pioneered by Groupon)
    • 6. Your Valuation Doesnt Match Reality
    • 7. Your Burn Is Unjustified, Scary, or Lacks Discipline
    • 8. You Lack Clients
• XIII. Management and Career Advice
  • 71. Selling or Funding a Startup? Tips on Surviving Technical Due Diligence
    • Be Better Prepared for Technical Due Diligence
    • Vitality
    • Scalability
    • Maintainability
    • Continuity
    • In Conclusion
  • 72. Playbook for Incoming MBAs to Start a Company out of School
  • 73. Manage Your Tech Career
    • How to Use the Tool
    • Find the Right Company (or Pie)
    • Get Whats Fair, but Dont Negotiate Too Much
    • The Bottom Line
  • 74. Hey EntrepreneurPlease Get an MBA
    • 1. What You Actually Learn
    • 2. Tuition Costs
    • 3. Time Commitment
    • 4. The Wrong Network
    • 5. Many MBAs Choose Not to Start Businesses (and Who Gives a Shit?)
    • My Suggestion
  • 75. Why I Left Consulting and Joined a Startup
• Colophon
• Copyright

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