lean startup conference 2012 (notes & quotes)

Notes & Quotes

Lean Startup Conference 2012

presents…  

Eric Ries e Lean Startup / theleanstartup.com / @ericries

If you hate big companies so much, why are you trying to create one?

Todd Park United States Chief Technology Officer / ostp.eop.gov / @Todd_Park

Open data sets = innovation (see data.gov)

Don’t even think about talking to the VA

Tendai Charasika EnterpriseCorp / enterprisecorp.com / @XcellentTea

Don’t ask your uncle – the first version of your product won’t be your last!

If you don’t get out of the building, you are missing an opportunity to learn.

Beth Comstock GE / ge.com / @bethcomstock

Fall in love with the customer problem,

not the solution.

Jessica Scorpio Getaround / getaround.com / @jessicascorpio

Use prototyping to validate your big idea

Danny Kim LitMotors / LitMotors.com / @LitMotors

If you’re going to run a car company, build a car.

In 3 months, LitMotors built a full-scale prototype of their car by hand, saving $2.8M in manufacturing

& proving it possible

Lane Halley Carbon Five / carbonfive.com / @thinknow

Sketching is a form of Making. It can be superior to talking – like a visual shorthand for thinking.

Matt Brezina Sincerely / sincerely.com / @brezina

10 tips for rapid app development: 1.  Minimal viable product 2.  Off-brand testing (or test in Canada) 3.  De-emphasize visual design – especially off-brand products, not

interaction design, engineers do their own visual design 4.  Reuse common components 5.  Buy cheap, disposable users – no cross promotion, no PR, buy users

from Stumbleupon, Admob 6.  Be comfortable with killing your app and losing customers 7.  Use android for quick testing – android apps have no approval, updates

go live in hours, apple updates go live in 7 days, 8.  APIs are everything 9.  (Missed this one) 10.  Minimize interdependencies – “my goal: empower an engineer to have

4-6 hours of uninterrupted magic each day”

Ron J. Williams Knodes / knod.es / @ronjdub

Just like knowing your body type helps you with fitness, knowing your entrepreneur type helps you with your startup

Andres Glusman Meetup / Meetup.com / @glusman

Myth #1: People give a damn about ‘lean’

Nobody wants to buy a process. Just start doing it. Myth #2:

People want to test things. People actually like building things. To make it worse, they

wanna make big bets. Test: Sales funnel, Subject Lines, Buttons in email, Onboarding

Flow, Algorithm changes Myth #3:

There’s no room for failure. Myth #4:

You can test your way to a great experience – you end up with an incoherent experience. Design + Lean is the way to go.

Jocelyn Wyatt IDEO.org / @jocelynw

Speed your thinking by conceptualizing it… even with toilets for Ghana – it helps.

Adam Goldstein Hipmunk.com / @adamjgoldstein

After enough people ask you a question, you learn certain things that aren’t easy.

You may have to lose a lot of customers.

Justin Wilcox Customer Development Labs / CustomerDevLabs.com / @Justin_Wilcox

Is your startup a business or a hobby? The question, “How much will they pay?” determines that.

Alejandro Velez Back to the Roots / backtotheroots.com / @BTTRVentures

Customer engagement with the product moved the vision from

fresh mushrooms to mushroom kits.

Stephanie Hay FastCustomer / Stephaniehay.com / @steph_hay

Use REAL PEOPLE words to Find, Understand & Choose.

1.  Test your messages in adwords

2.  Embrace the unsexy words used in organic searches 3.  Look at entry points and top content in Google Analytics

Steve Blank Steveblank.com / @sgblank

Entrepreneurship is about

theory and practice.

People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill,

they want a quarter-inch hole

How do you create 10,000 startups?

George Bilbrey Return Path, Inc. / returnpath.com / @gbilbrey

Prepare for pivoting. Start small and organize for experimentation.

Not every suspect is a prospect. Training will require pivots and iteration.

Ivory Madison Red Room / redroom.com / @ivorymadison

Numbers you shouldn’t be using: Page views, new members, total members, unique visitors,

percent growth, conversion rate, twitter followers, facebook friends, facebook likes.

Characteristics of actionable metrics: Measure success at your core business

Show or directly relates to revenue Track real, individual customers

Illustrate cause and effect

Ash Maurya Spark59 / ashmaurya.com / @ashmaurya

Build a continuous feedback loop

Metrics alone aren’t enough –

go beyond numbers

Leah Busque TaskRabbit / TaskRabbit.com / @labusque

Trying to do everything at once will leave it all poorly.

Understand where to begin –

know your customers.

Be holistic in marketing and customer acquisition.

Dan Milstein Wingu / @danmil

F.A.E. - Fundamental Attribution Error

Robert Fan Sharethrough / sharethrough.com / @rfan

Innovate or die.

Disruptive innovation – gets you the hockey stick 1.  Create the right environment

2.  Set goals and boundaries 3.  Milestones and progress checks

When you finish, have a transition plan

Scott Cook Intuit / intuit.com / @intuit

Mindset leads to behavior. Make experimentation become part of your work.

When results aren’t how you expected, its usually the market trying to show you something.

Change lives so profoundly that they can’t imagine going back.

Drew Houston Dropbox / dropbox.com / @drewhouston

Live in the future and build what’s missing.

Your vision is a constant – rely on it to guide and inform your decisions.

Set a vision to share with others.

Marc Andreessen Andreessen  Horowitz  /  a16z.com  /  @a16z  

Neither Tesla nor Spacex could be done as a lean startup

ese notes and quotes were taken by Chase Jennings @33voices

during a Livestream event in San Diego.

I had to leave early, so many speakers are missing

(as well as valuable insights provided by them).

If you’d like to contribute any additional notes and quotes,

please feel free to leave a comment

or email me at Chase@33voices.com.

anks! J

NOTE TO THE READER

Livestream hosted at Vistage in San Diego, CA.

Special thanks to Moe Abdou @moeabdou

Speaker information provided by http://leanstartup.co/

Thanks!

Connect and learn about us at

.com

h7p://www.twi7er.com/33voices  

h7p://www.facebook.com/33voices