My VentureBeat Marketing and Customer Development Articles
A new way of looking at sales and marketing Have you ever viewed a world map where South is up? It’s a useful frame of reference, since our Eurocentric view of North as “up” and South as “down” is really just an arbitrary one (a sphere has no top or bottom – nor left...Updated Customer Development Image
Based on input from Steve Blank and others, I updated the Customer Development image I created a few weeks ago. Steve suggested I attempt to structure the image so that it was business model-independent. So it is, but with a web-based model serving as an example. ...Treat Your Customers Like Children (or your Children like Customers)
One of the more intriguing dynamics in startups and business in general, is customer communication. Customer Development is, of course, all about talking with customers to test fundamental business hypotheses, match product solution to customer problem, and in...State of Customer Development Survey Raffle Winners
Hi everyone! Thank you for your participation in the survey, especially if you were kind enough to tweet about it. (While the raffle is over, if you haven’t responded, the survey is still open.) The purpose of the survey was two-fold. First, we thought it would...State of Customer Development (Part II)
Thanks to all who have filled out the survey. I thought it would be fun to share some of the results! (Updated 12/22/09: for those interested, the survey is still open, but the raffle is over. ==> I have read Steve Blank’s The Four Steps to the Epiphany....The State of Customer Development
When I first started blogging about Customer Development, last February, I felt like there were only a handful of people talking about it. I’m sure that’s just a matter of perception. The likes of Sean Ellis, Sean Murphy, Nivi at VentureHacks, Dave...Seller Beware: Customers Have Their Own Agenda
Note: One of the more difficult aspects of customer development is understanding when to listen to customers/prospects and when not to. When should you rely on intuition and when is the customer right, if not always? Steve Blank’s oft quoted clarion call to...Customer Development Slide
For some reason, I’ve always wanted to try and put Steve Blank’s Customer Development, Eric Ries’ Lean Startup and Dave McClure’s AARRR[G] in one slide. Here’s what I’ve come up with: Is this at all helpful? Let me know if you have...Your Business "Driving Force"
In Andrew Chen’s recent post, “Does every startup need a Steve Jobs?”, he discusses IDEO’s “product framework for Desirability, Feasibility, and Viability.” Chen’s descriptions of business-, engineering-, and design-focused product perspectives reminded me of the work on companies’ “driving force” popularized by Michel Robert in his series of business strategy books. Understanding your “driving force” is critical to understanding what products to build and who to build them for. The driving force helps shape technology choices, importance of design, market segment, and business model as well as company culture, growth plan and exit strategy.
The basic point, is that while all companies employ technology, sell products or services, employ technology, market to specific segments and use certain distribution methods, one factor dominates (or should dominate) the others in terms of business strategy.
one component of the business is the driving force of the strategy — the company’s so-called DNA. This driving force, in turn, greatly determines the array of products, customers, industry segments, and geographic markets that management chooses to emphasize more or emphasize less
Here is a subset of driving forces Robert discusses: