Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 25, 2023

A common initiative I hear from business owners today is their effort to improve the customer experience. To achieve real growth, business leaders need to improve both employee as well as customer experiences. Flexible – listen to allow flex hours and customization. Proactive – timely communication to build trust.

Customer 113

Customer Custom Training Tool 113

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 3, 2019

That was a really fast stint, we started with only a couple of small customers but ended up taking it to $120K MRR and sold it to Home Depot at a significant multiple above revenue. The reason why, is my experience is in early stage sales and more specifically, in early stage customer development. Amos Schwartzfarb: Very often.

Sales 113

Sales Startup Custom Development Framework 113

SoCal CTO

JULY 13, 2011

As you might imagine, when you go to the page on Customer Development , you find the best and the latest content from people like Steve Blank and Vinicius Vacanti.

Content 175

Content Startup Social Media IP 175

socalTECH

APRIL 10, 2018

Matt Stodder: The most important thing is to understand their customers, and who they are going after. They fail to understand what the market is, what their differentiation is to their customers. Blake Caldwell: We believe heavily in customer in customer development. Also, you have to have a team.

Startup 172

Startup Seed Funding Mentor Ideas 172

InfoChachkie

APRIL 16, 2012

The Lean Startup approach dictates that successful customer development is an iterative process. By conceptualizing, selling, gathering feedback and then developing a product, startups achieve success more quickly and economically. Eric (Ries) was a student in one of the very earliest customer development classes at Berkley.

Startup 229

Startup Class Press Custom Development 229

SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 2, 2011

There's a lot out there around Customer Development - read Steve Blank : Entrepreneurship as a Science – The Business Model/Customer Development Stack - Steve Blank , October 25, 2010 Checklists for Chaos, The Path to Success - Steve Blank , October 28, 2010 and reading about Lean, MVPs, etc.

Startup 198

Startup Custom Development Sales Writing 198

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 13, 2013

I did have the wherewithal to visit potential customers and try to understand the pain points that I thought could be solved with our solution. Steve Blank calls this “ customer development ” in which you built an initial product that is in search of “product / market fit.” This answers the question of “why buy anything?”

Sales 393

Sales Startup Resource Customer 393

SoCal Tech Calendar

SEPTEMBER 15, 2012

Lean Startup Machine is a three-day workshop where attendees use Customer Development and Lean Startup principles to validate an idea for a new product or service. Friday, September 21, 2012 -- Lean Startup Machine. See [link] (more)

Startup 124

Startup Custom Development Ideas Customer 124

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 6, 2012

These two ads showed how disconnected from their customers these once industry leaders have become. Sadly this is just a single example of what is happening to thousand of companies that are not listening to their respective customers. What IMVU thought was game changing technology was not why customers used the software.

Customer 72

Customer Custom Blogging Startup 72

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2010

We’re here for Greycroft’s CEO Summit – a gathering of the CEO’s of their portfolio companies with guest speakers covering topics including how to build your team, PR, customer development, etc. It is the key to “customer development” that Steve Blank talks about. I’m going to save that for a future blog post.

Startup 279

Startup Venture Capital Tips Custom Development 279

SoCal Tech Calendar

JUNE 4, 2012

Sunday, June 10, 2012 -- Lean Startup Machine is a three-day workshop where attendees use Customer Development and Lean Startup principles to validate an idea for a new product or service. See [link] (more)

Startup 113

Startup Custom Development Ideas Customer 113

SoCal Tech Calendar

JUNE 3, 2012

Saturday, June 9, 2012 -- Lean Startup Machine is a three-day workshop where attendees use Customer Development and Lean Startup principles to validate an idea for a new product or service. See [link] (more)

Startup 113

Startup Custom Development Ideas Customer 113

SoCal Tech Calendar

JUNE 2, 2012

Friday, June 8, 2012 -- Lean Startup Machine is a three-day workshop where attendees use Customer Development and Lean Startup principles to validate an idea for a new product or service. See [link] (more)

Startup 113

Startup Custom Development Ideas Customer 113

TechCrunch LA

APRIL 12, 2018

Located at the southeastern tip of the San Fernando Valley, the Los Angeles suburb counts its biggest employers as the adhesive manufacturer Avery Dennison; the Los Angeles industrial team for the real estate developer CBRE; the International House of Pancakes; Disney Consumer Products; DreamWorks Studios; Walt Disney Animation and Univision.

Glendale 271

Glendale Los Angeles Startup Technical Review 271

socalTECH

OCTOBER 6, 2017

We're the official mobile app for whatever our customer is. Previous to this, I ran a custom, mobile application development shop. Why are these colleges using you, rather than investing in their own custom applications? We're now the biggest provider of mobile applications in college. What do your apps do?

Mobile 162

Mobile Platform El Segundo UCLA 162

socalTECH

NOVEMBER 16, 2010

Calabasas-based Fulcrum Microsystems , a provider of high speed Ethernet switching chips, and Aquantia , which develops 10GBASE-T PHY semiconductors, said this morning that the two have tied together in releasing a new, 48-port 10GBASE-T Ethernet Switch reference design.

Design 140

Design Palomar Calabasas Custom Development 140

SoCal Tech Calendar

DECEMBER 8, 2010

Battle stories and lessons learned about how Sharethrough, applying the lean startup process, figured out the advertising landscape and customer developed their way into the door of a myriad of Fortune 500 customers. link] (more)

Startup 100

Startup Advertising Custom Development Customer 100

socalTECH

NOVEMBER 30, 2010

RingRvenue develops technology which tracks responses to phone calls, allowing calls to be used for affiliate sales and tracking. RingRevenue said the new funding will go towards growth and expansion, including expansion of its customer development and support teams, and an expansion of its presence outside the U.S.

GRP Partners 154

GRP Partners Santa Barbara Custom Development Sales 154

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

It wasn’t so many years ago that starting a new e-commerce business on the Internet was a complex custom development project, usually costing a million dollars or more. Now you can do it for free, or a few hundred dollars, with one of the many web building tools available, like Shopify or Weebly.

Entrepreneur 162

Entrepreneur Startup Social Media Outsource Development 162

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 4, 2012

4:30 How did you come up with the idea of customer development? 37:45 Let’s talk about the dichotomy between customer development and Y Combinator? Steve, thanks so much for joining us today! What brings you to LA? 1:45 Are you also making your Udacity class available online? 3:30 What is the class all about?

Startup 350

Startup Ideas Education Class 350

Tech Zulu Event

FEBRUARY 8, 2013

The program is based on a highly developed process created by entrepreneurial thought-leader and Ivy League educator Steve Blank , author of the book The Four Steps to the Epiphany. Customer Development. What you will get at NEXT: You will be taught the what, how, and why of the customer development process.

Class 98

Class Mentor Startup UCLA 98

socalTECH

NOVEMBER 12, 2008

The RF technology is used by customers developing analog and mixed-signal semiconductors, typically in the wireless and high speed networking area. The technology involved allows users to create RF, systems-on-a-chip (SoC) designs that will be fabricated at Fujitsu's 300mm fab in Japan, in 90nm and 65nm process technologies.

Technology 100

Technology Design Custom Development Networking 100

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2009

That died with waterfall software development. It should talk about how many customers you think you will acquire and how much you’ll charge for your product. Do you really want to spent $100k building a product to discover through Customer Development that the market is too small? Do so at your peril.

Web 2.0 334

Web 2.0 Venture Capital Web Technical Review 334

Tech Zulu Event

MAY 10, 2011

He went on to explain a bit about the customer development model from Blanks: State business model assumptions. Vision-Driven (You’re definitely going to need a strong vision when those sleepless nights, crying kids, and angry spouse enter the picture). Iterate until validated (through sales or tangible exchange).

Startup 86

Startup Santa Monica Los Angeles Custom Development 86

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 23, 2016

Fenero is a provider of cloud-based contact center solutions for sales and customer service operations worldwide. The company currently has over 4,500 users worldwide and recently brought in Charles Callari, a former Global VP of Marketing and Strategy at Sykes Enterprises’, as its new Vice President (VP) of Customer Development.

SaaS 49

SaaS Artificial Inteligence Netflix Platform 49

Tech Zulu Event

AUGUST 21, 2011

Development languages varied from team to team. Some experience developers, project managers, and even some designers. Just like Startup Weekend most had never meet their team mates until the day of, and came together to develop a possible prize winning product in eight hours. Development. Product Design.

Santa Monica 90

Santa Monica Startup PHP HTML 90

Tech Zulu Event

OCTOBER 15, 2015

For many disabilities, empathic developers have provided new utilities that improve certain functions for the iPhone or Android. It has access to a lot of customization features, allowing you to build the interface with custom pictures and categories in order to facilitate sentence building as much as possible. Parking Mobility.

Mobile 40

Mobile Pricing Tool Customer 40

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 28, 2014

This person may be an extraordinary communicator, who rallies employees, customers, and colleagues around the vivid future he sees. What you really need is a VP of Marketing and Customer Development, who can help with lead generation and honing the message, rather than an executive to manage a sales team and existing customers.

CTO Hire 100

CTO Hire Funding Cloud Computing CIO 100

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2011

He wanted to build direct customer relationships to get product feedback but only 2% of customers would ever return their registration cards. So when he saw the browser it instantly dawned on him that this would be the greatest customer development tool ever. But also when you’re developing so is your competitor.

Competition 350

Competition Idealab Product CitySearch 350

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 27, 2014

It wasn’t so many years ago that starting a new e-commerce business on the Internet was a complex custom development project, usually costing a million dollars or more. Now you can do it for free, or a few hundred dollars, with one of the many web building tools available, like Shopify or Weebly Store.

Entrepreneur 104

Entrepreneur Startup Social Media Commerce 104

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2010

Research this market by doing market sizing, looking at existing products, talking to customers and deciding how you will make money. If you believe there is a market then build a prototype product that you can show customers, investors and potential employees. Paying customers. Validate that you can make money before starting.

Startup 308

Startup Entrepreneur Customer Custom 308

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 22, 2013

This person may be an extraordinary communicator, who rallies employees, customers, and colleagues around the vivid future he sees. What you really need is a VP of Marketing and Customer Development, who can help with lead generation and honing the message, rather than an executive to manage a sales team and existing customers.

Startup 97

Startup Invest CTO Hire Cloud Computing 97

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2010

Before they’re presenting I want to know “what unique experiences you bring to the table that are going to give your business a faster time to market, a better designed product, more knowledge of your customers problems – a higher likelihood of success.&# It’s what many VC’s call, “An unfair advantage.&#.

Entrepreneur 267

Entrepreneur Startup SaaS San Diego 267

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 3, 2010

If you’ve ever wondered what your customers think while on your website, you’ll love KISSinsights. If you’ve ever wanted to ask questions to your users, you’ll love KISSinsights. If you’ve ever read a post by Steve Blank or Eris Ries, you’ll love KISSinsights.

Customer 74

Customer Custom Custom Development Web 74

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

Kathy Sierra at Business of Software 2009 - Business of Software Blog , May 4, 2010 "In the old days, getting customers was easy. Putting customers first. Legendary customer support. Guide to Evaluating Startup Ideas - Tony Wright dot com , May 27, 2010 A great developer I once worked with was kvetching at lunch one day.

Startup 248

Startup Venture Capital Conference Social Media 248

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 1, 2010

This person may be an extraordinary communicator, who rallies employees, customers, and colleagues around the vivid future he sees. What you really need is a VP of Marketing and Customer Development, who can help with lead generation and honing the message, rather than an executive to manage a sales team and existing customers.

Startup 90

Startup CTO Hire Cloud Computing CIO 90

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 15, 2010

Stitcher - San Francisco-based service that lets users customize talk radio programming on their mobile devices. My take was that this follows three trends: a) customer involvement in product design, b) mass customization [e.g. Time will tell. So far it seems the former. TBD mm in Series C; $1.2 billion pre-money.

Venture Capital 271

Venture Capital Capital Google Platform 271