“Isn’t Lean startup” supposed to prevent failure?” That was the question posed by Andrew Warner to Sean Ellis in a recent Mixergy interview. There is only one answer, “of course not.” Sean responds that not everyone is built to be an entrepreneur: even the best tools in the wrong hands go awry. True, and there are many other reasons startups …
You Won’t Find Letter.ly Here
A surprising number of NYC “startup” bloggers have started to adopt Letter.ly, a subscription email newsletter service. The root might simply be friendship with the creator, Sam Lessin, but I really do not understand or particularly like the trend. I have no problem with publishers charging for content, but if you don’t make your living as a publisher, why would …
Think goals, not functions
I just piggybacked on a twitter conversation between Sean Ellis and April Dunford talking about product management versus product marketing (see April’s post). Sean tweeted this comment which I just wanted to highlight: “Functions” is part of the problem in early stage. IMO goals better: PM fit, then conv eff, then growth… [Ed note: PM fit = product-market fit; conv …
Confidence, Transparency and Authenticity
Bob Sutton wrote an interesting post the other day called “The Wise Boss: More Evidence For Expressing Confidence, But Harboring Private Doubts“. He touches upon a topic that a lot of business leaders grapple with: what is the right balance between confidence and transparency. The interplay between the two is particularly heightened in a young startup, where you are inevitably …
Into the Deep End: Notes from Julie, our HackNY intern
This is a guest post from Julie Dinerman, the Columbia University student interning with Aprizi as part of the HackNY program, which paired area students with startups. I think HackNY’s organizers Hilary, Chris and Evan are creating something very important to the NY startup ecosystem, and we are really pleased to be among a great list of startups to get …
5 Tips for the Next Generation of Entrepreneurs
I just got back from speaking to 100 NYC high school kids about startups. The good folks at Global Kids asked me to say a few words at the NY Public Library Emoti-con festival, and I was more than happy to oblige and talk about one of my favorite subjects. I decided to give the kids some advice should they …
Our Customer Development Journey, Part 4 (8 thoughts from our MVP beta)
Aprizi has been in open beta for six weeks now. These last six weeks have been an intense blur, a fire hose of information, and going open beta was the best possible thing we could have done. We are making some fairly big near-term changes because of this process. Here are 8 thoughts on the latest phase of our customer …
My Take on the iPad
I held off prognosticating on the iPad. I was not even planning on buying the first generation. That changed when someone demoed my own product to me over lunch. I love this thing and, if you aren’t bored of hearing about the iPad, you can read below for my reasons why: Sales: a laptop is a horrible thing during a …
Are Game Dynamics Jumping the Shark?
AdAge today asks “What’s saving the current crop of virtual games from becoming the next Second Life?”, with their answer being game dynamics. I am a huge believer in the power of creatively designed incentives and game-like compulsion loops, but I suspect enthusiasm for badges, levels and points have hit “fad” and “over-reliance” territory. Foursquare, for example, used gaming very …