20 ways to avoid building stuff - practical customer development tricks
DESCRIPTION
A presentation I held at #UXCGN10, stolen from the awesome Cindy Alvarez' original talk. Watch the original talk here: http://video.dreamsimplicity.com/GJU4/cindy-alvarez-product-manager-kissmetrics-20-ways-to-not-build-stuff/ and the original slides here: http://www.slideshare.net/cindyalvarez/20-ways-to-not-build-stuff and follow Cindy Alvarez on twitter http://twitter.com/cindyalvarez and buy her new book "Lean Customer Development" http://oreil.ly/1hhCmcdTRANSCRIPT
20 Ways To Avoid Building Stuff
@ #UXCGN10Stolen from the awesome
@cindyalvarez’ talk “Ignite: Lean Startup”,
Parisoma Innovation Lofts, San Francisco
Source: http://video.dreamsimplicity.com/GJU4/cindy-alvarez-product-manager-kissmetrics-20-ways-to-not-build-stuff/http://www.slideshare.net/cindyalvarez/20-ways-to-not-build-stuff
Buy Cindy Alvarez’ new bookLean Customer Development Building Products Your Customers Will Buy
How do you develop products that people will actually use and buy? This practical guide shows you how to validate product and company ideas through customer development research—before you waste months and millions on a product or service that no one needs or wants
http://oreil.ly/1hhCmcd
I’m Vidar @blacktar Andersen•Norwegian living in Cologne, DE since 2005
•Professional experience creating enterprise solutions for global F500s and GOs since 1997
•Startup Founder (both hits & misses)
•Corporate Entrepreneurship Consultant to F100s http://plusandersen.com
•Educator (NEXT Instructor, University Lecturer on Startup Entrepreneurship, Lean Launchpad Instructor, EXIST Coach) http://vidarandersen.de
Some I’ve worked with
Some I’ve founded
plusandersen.comis.gd/onesec
vidarandersen.de getGauss.com
I’ve been around
Certified Lean Launchpad Educator by Steve Blank, June 2013 @Stanford
20 Ways To Avoid
Building Stuff
Why?Save TIME + MONEY + HEADACHES: Build the right stuff, at the right time, for the right reasons, right customers
1. Play Shrink: “Tell me how it
would make your life better?”
2. Say what you’re for;
Say what you are against
3. “This is what you
should do, instead”
4. Send the customer to
the competitor
5. Offer a workaround
6. Fake the functionality
7. Ignore it until you can’t
8. Be less attractive to certain
types of customers
9. Compensate: “Until we
can do X, use us for free”
10. Let some fish get away
11. Build a simple API
12. Hide things behind email
instead of building it
13. Force customers to pick a
single priority: Put it to a vote!
14. Charge a ridiculous amount
of money (e.g. for a feature request)
15. Have rules
but don’t enforce them
16. Only build it
if you can measure it (if you can’t measure if it actually works like
intended, it’s not important)
17. Ask for help
(Crowdsource: e.g. “Don’t see your language? Help us with the translation to make it happen!”)
18. Be grateful
19. Notify me when... (e.g. checkboxes)
20. Play nice with others
(enable combining different products, services for value-adds)
Follow Cindy Alvarez on Twitter:
@cindyalvarez
Source: http://video.dreamsimplicity.com/GJU4/cindy-alvarez-product-manager-kissmetrics-20-ways-to-not-build-stuff/
http://www.slideshare.net/cindyalvarez/20-ways-to-not-build-stuff
One more thing
21. MVP it
Minimum Viable Product
• The smallest batch that will teach you something
• That will enable you to test your hypotheses
• So what can you release in one day?
There are several types of MVPs: !
•Explainer Video (dropbox) •Landing Page (unbounce.com) Wizard of Oz MVP (zappos) •Concierge MVP (food on the table) •Piecemeal MVP (wizard of oz + concierge) •Crowd Funding (sell before you build) •Single-feature MVP (google) •What is your MVP going to be?
