Lean Startup

1. Lean Startup Theory & Motivation Examples & Learnings Rémy Blättler Chief of the System, Supertext AG remy.supertext.ch @swissghostrider

2. Born in Eschenbach • Electronics technician @ Cerberus • BSc in CS at HSR in Rapperswil • Co-founder Collaboral • Startup @ Technopark Zurich Reto Remy East Coast (NYC) West Coast (SF)

3. Remy Blaettler “Chief of the System” at Supertext, the fastest growing Swiss translation and copywriting company remy@supertext.ch remy.supertext.ch @swissghostrider

4. What does a successful startup need? A great idea Good timing A rocking team VC capital and lots of hard work (and time) Right?

5. Enter the lean startup

6. The background Eric Ries was a fairly unsuccessful serial entrepreneur. He was searching for a way to increase the success rate of his startups. Based on the principles of lean manufacturing from Japan (Toyota)

7. The principles Entrepreneurs are everywhere Entrepreneurship is management Validated learning Build-measure-learn Innovation accounting

8. Traditional management Set exact targets based on experience and existing clients. Plan and execute accordingly. Successful execution of a plan that leads to nowhere. School: Waterfall, maybe Agile

9. Traditional management Clearly does not work for startups. “Let’s just do it” is adopted. No management does not work either.

10. Build – measure – learn feedback loop

11. First: a reality check Idea! Does your customer have the problem that you are trying to solve? Will they pay for it? Will they pay YOU for it? Can you build the solution for that problem?

12. Try to sell the product before you build it (It’s not the same as asking customers what they want.)

13. Build – measure – learn feedback loop

14. MVP (minimum viable product) Skimp on features not on quality. Remove any feature, process or effort that does not contribute to the “test”.

15. NOBODY is going to steal your idea And if they can execute your idea quicker and better than you, you’re in trouble anyway.

16. Build – measure – learn feedback loop

17. Quantitative learning You can always justify failure as part of the learning experience, but that's a bit cheap…. Use experiments, not market research.

18. Innovation accounting Traditional Time Budget Features Quality Lean Actionable vs. vanity metrics Only measure things with a clear cause & effect. Split tests

19. Dave McClure’s pirate metrics (AARRR)

20. Pivot? Don’t give up too quickly. But don’t try to ride a dead horse either. Listen to customer feedback! And adding more services to the wrong idea is not the answer.

21. Results Enter your qualitative/ quantitative data Background What are you trying to achieve? Hypothesis [Specific repeatable action] will [Expected measurable outcome] Validated learning What did you learn?  Validated or not Details How will you setup this experiment? Next action What is your next experiment?

22. Accelerate

23. Grow & adapt Make sure the paid acquisition is not higher than the customer lifetime value. Eventually your business should grow faster than the build-measure-learn feedback can loop.

24. Examples

25. It’s simple: API sourcing An online database for pharmaceutical ingredient suppliers. Traditional $20k for a web agency Lean $30 for a Wordpress template $25/month for an online db knack

26. Just start somewhere Pain: project managers send out complicated Excel sheetsthat are always out of sync. Solution: build something that keeps them in sync. First idea: synced project management in Excel Better idea: generic synced spreadsheet!

27. Collaboral Remy Shared Excel Shared Word Shared PowerPoint Desktop and web version Enterprise edition School edition Free edition Spent 2 weeks on the login page Reto Shared Excel desktop version Spent 2 weeks building the VB client

29. Supertext What we sold to our clients

30. Supertext What we actually had

31. Supertext Our plan…

32. Supertext … and the reality

33. Keeping deadlines - Dosensio Built shared drive for Sharepoint First working prototype after 2 months Perfected it for another 12 months Ran out of money and released it Turns out the customer wanted something different

34. Startup excuses I have no idea I have no money I’m not a developer I need a logo first

35. Need an idea? Photos of tourists with a camera drone at the Eiffel tower “Create an event app” app Email snooze for Outlook Hollywood tours with a lift platform

36. Funny footnote Eric Ries was working on something completely different when he came up with the lean startup approach.

37. Forget about the million dollar idea Just start something. Anything.

38. Download the presentation http://remy.supertext.ch http://remy.supertext.ch/2014/10/lean-startup-talk-at-google/ https://twitter.com/swissghostrider

39. Lean Startup Machine by Trevor Owens Learn to build a successful business in three days. Lean Startup Machine (LSM) is a three-day workshop on building a successful business. https://www.leanstartupmachine.com/

40. Lean Startup Factory Build a real startup in one weekend. And we’re not talking about just a business plan. http://www.leanstartupfactory.com/

41. Reduce the batch size Example: letters Fold, pack, close the envelop and put on a stamp. Single-piece flow instead large-batch approach Speed up release and learning cycles

42. Your prototype should not take more than 90 days to build. Full time or part time.