Scobleizer - Latest Comments in The worst things startups do

Re: The worst things startups do

SEO Expert — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 08:58:29 -0000

Awesome suggestions, really appreciate. Strongly agree with point 1, 2 and 4, thanks for sharing such informative ideas about startups

Re: The worst things startups do

Greg Solovyev — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 03:56:05 -0000

dead on

Re: The worst things startups do

joelima — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:35:33 -0000

You all will laugh, but I use the good old US mail as a weapon to get attention from potential clients. Email is really easy to ignore, just hit the delete button. I use Endicia which prints a cool looking barcode on the envelopes for postage. For most recipients, the envelope looks cool enough to make them curious about what's inside.

Re: The worst things startups do

AndresD — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:07:33 -0000

@scobleizer -- thanks for the note on the name @rrripple -- we're definitely spending some time considering alternatives -- we look forward to sharing final candidates with you.

Re: The worst things startups do

Barry O'Gorman — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:01:12 -0000

Useful summary of bad things.

One I've come across a couple of times: the founder/ entrepreneur/ ideas man gets some great professionals on board but then tries to manage them (or more accurately, interferes in their management of the resources).

The other: burying yourself in building the new solution/ product without really roadtesting the idea. As in pharma - fail early!

Re: The worst things startups do

Mike — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:35:14 -0000

"Posterous, for instance, has ONLY programmers."

Um, Posterous' cofounder Garry Tan is also an interaction designer, and judging from his LinkedIn profile, most of his career was in that role. Still, Posterous is a good model: don't just create a programmer monoculture and lavish them with toys, get a diversity of thought in your company.

Also, be an IxD.

Re: The worst things startups do

Nick Stamoulis — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 09:48:25 -0000

I think the general consensus is that if most start ups acted like the money came out of their personal savings account than many more would probably last a bit longer.

Re: The worst things startups do

Mark Faggiano — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:46:35 -0000

For me, #10 really stands out. I've also heard it referred to as the temptation to be perfect. It's so important, like you said Robert, to prioritize development. If you are building something like Posterous, for example, launch it and keep hammering away at your features. Don't hold it up an extra 10 months because it has a couple of bugs or it's not all that it can be. Besides, what you have in your specs may end up being completely different in a year because your users give you guidance on where to go.

Re: The worst things startups do

AlexSchleber — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 03:05:27 -0000

If the start-up is for Business-To-Consumer (B2C) purposes, the ease with which the name can be spelled, and the relative "joy" in saying it out loud can have a large impact on the viral spread of the brand and hence the success of the start-up.

This is somewhat less of an issue with B2B, but of course the basics of human psychology still apply, companies are run by people (i.e. consumers in another setting) after all :)

Most of the Web 2.0 brand names we all have heard over the past 5 years or so where afflicted by poor decisions in this regard. I think the initial novelty/surprise factor that made flickr, del.icio.us, and a few others succeed (they had innovative products to begin with as well), lured countless others into "too cute by half" type of names that ultimately proved more of a detriment than anything else.

And it doesn't take a brand consultant to get the basics right, here is a start:

http://businessmindhacks.com/post/pownce-shuts-down-a-branding-post-mortem

Re: The worst things startups do

SEO Italy — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:58:06 -0000

Thanks for the great tips - especially number one, here in Italy IT startups used to spend most of their money in "accessories" failing to understand that a basement full of tech junkies is a much better and more productive place than a luxurious office full of "managers" not knowing what the heck they are talking about.

Re: The worst things startups do

Seo Web Consulting — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:47:05 -0000

A great post. Thank you!
Valerie DiCarlo

Re: The worst things startups do

bern galvin — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:03:41 -0000

We're doing a start-up - http://MyBucha.com. It's a very good tasting, shelf stable Kombucha drink - fermented Chinese tea using a live culture. Because our partners are in different geographic locations we started out using Wordpress for a. collaborative work, b. public facing website, c. file repository. We now use Wordpress just for the public facing website. We now use Ning for our intranet, and for several specific purpose extranets. We use Skype for conf calls. We use Google reader and TweetDeck to query and record relevant tweets; we have Facebook and Twitter and several other web 2.0 type technologies. We're still using MS Office, but we're looking at Zoho and some others. We're using Dia (an Open Source Visio clone, but better) for our manufacturing facility layouts and graphical depictions of our processes. We're using Access for our databases, mainly because we haven't been able to find a better Open Source (read 'free') alternative.

Re: The worst things startups do

christianl — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 13:09:19 -0000

Right on. Motorola (wireless) is the same story. Great engineers/developers, but sorely lacking in product management and market knowledge. They rode (and still ride, albeit a bit shabbily) on the RAZR success from the late 90s. There's a great article on it in Harvard Business Review from a year back.

Re: The worst things startups do

Brian Longest — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:58:32 -0000

Here are my thoughts, no particular order, except my number 1:

Lead by example - too many founders/ceo's do not lead by example

Focus (part of your #6) - there needs to be a clear vision that can be easily articulated to everyone by the leadership and by everyone to the outside world

Job and Vision - if there is a clear vision everyone should understand how their job and day to day activities advance the company and goals, then they can determine on their own whether they should do a particular task by evaluating it themselves

Internal Communication - that vision of what the company does and where it is going needs to be communicated to everyone in the company, often, even if it changes be sure to let everyone know, walk into a startup and ask 5 people what they do - you'll be surprised how varied the answers can be

FIRE, FIRE, FIRE : Removal of Bad Apples - you mention firing, in a startup you typically are hiring very smart, hard working, motivated individuals, IF you have someone that is not pulling their weight not only are they wasting money and taking a seat but others will quickly realize who is not contributing and that one bad apple can sour the whole bunch if you do not remove them quickly, I have seen exceptional individuals leave a company because they lost confidence in the companies leadership when certain individuals are not removed, the end result is that the good ones go and the bad ones stay - it can kill you

Customer Acquisition - do not wait until you have developed a product/service for a year or two to ask the question, "how do we acquire customers?"

Metrics - if it's an online business you should have a metric for everything and anything that can be measured, at the very least those key metrics that show whether you are succeeding or failing, just think of what you will put on a slide to show your board and work backwards to figuring out how to justify your "things are great" slide

Revenue (part of your #6) - do not wait until you have developed a product/service for a year or two to ask "how do we make money?", and if your business model requires that you build a sales team please do not look at a year 3 20 MM goal and say "one salesperson can hit that, right?" - sounds dumb but many do not build in a revenue model or determine how to build their company to hit it

my ramblings after 10+ years in startups

Re: The worst things startups do

ujjwaltrivedi — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:17:32 -0000

Pretty interesting list. liked it.

Re: The worst things startups do

Laura Chapman — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:04:08 -0000

I agree that a product should talk for itself. If a product sucks then it will be rejected by consumers or users no matter the PR behind it. Marketing and PR people just jump in to boost the overall the quality of the product as well as to strengthen sales and user suppport.

Laura Chapamn
follow my #Labels at http://wadja.com/l.chapman

Re: The worst things startups do

Michele Neylon — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:50:02 -0000

Some interesting points, but I'd have to disagree with several

Point 1 - you're assuming that the money is from an external investor

Point 3 - Letting a business be run by programmers is a recipe for disaster. Geeks are wonderful and all that, but a lot of them have no idea about business, marketing, sales or anything else. If you let them run a business you'll end up with "wonderful" code, but no customers, no sales and no money

Point 5 - While I semi-agree I think it's also part of the experience to make some mistakes. If you have the common sense to not waste money on overly plush offices, then I'd hope you won't waste huge amounts of money on massive screens etc.,

Point 11 - that's just inane. If someone has the time to go off and experiment with new toys - fine, but expecting people to use new software and looking down on them for not doing so is just silly

Michele

Re: The worst things startups do

cathlyndriscoll — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 07:19:09 -0000

Great topic! I can see what you are saying about PR firms- "If you don't have a Twitter account of blog, yet you have a PR firm..." However, I believe that is the point. Companies starting out need to concentrate on what they do best. If they don't have a clue about social networking, maybe they shouldn't be doing it. A good PR firm can point them in the right direction and get a company clear about what messages they want to send out, what they want the firm to represent, and be concise about what they do.

Re: The worst things startups do

cathlyndriscoll — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 07:15:04 -0000

Great topic! I can see both side of your PR comments- about if you don't have a Twitter Acct or Blog, but have a PR firm...but I think that is the point. There are so many types of firms and they need to focus on what they do best- and if they don't have a clue about social networking, maybe they shouldn't be doing it. I'm not saying leave it all up to the PR firm, but a PR firm can point them in the right direction and let them get a handle on how the company wants to be viewed, and what messages they really want to send out.

Re: The worst things startups do

interactivemix — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 05:40:22 -0000

A couple of other people hav3e picked up on the point about a company having programmers and your point that a good company can never have too many of them. I can't agree. Surely a good technology company has exactly the right number of programmers for the work they need to do. Also a lot of companies are not necessarily technology companies and can function perfectly well with off the shelf software and so don’t need programmers at all. The Open Source projects available provide an incredibly rich set of resources for people to establish infrastructure.

If programming is needed (and I can see plenty of situations where it is), then you need to spend time working out schedules and implementing collaborative project management with realistic deadlines. All too often a startup (and plenty of established companies) either bombard programmers with unrealistic deadlines that were worked out without talking to a single programmer or flood the floor with talent that is given no direction and expected to work it out themselves. I don’t think that’s a great recipe for success.

Programmes like Dragons Den and The Apprentice have done a lot to encourage entrepreneurial culture but in their wake have walked a series of so called Startup Business Consultants and mentors. Now I am sure that there are many people in this profession who are actually brilliantly motivated and offer real value but there are also a huge number of charlatans out there who are charging startups enormous fees for regurgitating things that someone else wrote in a book that can be purchased for less than £30. There is a sense of belonging and comfort to be gained from this kind of relationship but being an entrepreneur is about walking alone and trusting and testing your own judgement.

In general I think the way to do it as a startup is
1) Build the best product you can with the resources available to you
2) Be honest about your skills and your failings and allocate resources appropriately.
3) Hire people who are better than you at things.
4) Read as much as you can about business skills like sales and marketing, building it isn't enough you have to get people to want it and take their money for it. These are completely different skills and you need to have both of them.
5) Concentrate on quality, sales and service and ignore brand building activity
6) Talk to your customers and listen to them
7) Think of every penny you spend as if it was an investment and demand that your return on investment is at least 4 times what you spend.

Re: The worst things startups do

Brian Benenhaley — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 21:37:06 -0000

In my opinion, we should all be evaluating what we are doing weekly. Holding a group meeting and looking at last weeks events, then looking at how we can make next weeks even better.

Re: The worst things startups do

Deb J Jones — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 20:55:12 -0000

Prius' unique value proposition is that it gets better mileage than your car. You car's unique value proposition might be that it handles better and looks nicer than any other car in its price range. It's not a matter of "better." It's a matter of what the customer values.

Is this an example of why a company needs more than programmers?

Re: The worst things startups do

Deb J Jones — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 20:32:35 -0000

Glad to see someone made this point. Said another way, much of the success of the project depends on the roles people are allowed to play. If the leader is very astute at discerning their team members' strengths and perspectives, regardless of job roles (developer, product manager, etc.) and creates a complementary team with customer, engineering, and profit perspectives balanced, she has a leg up on the startup that is focused on the superficial or that knows how to create, but doesn't know how to find customers, position a product, or communicate value.

Re: The worst things startups do

dj adelaide — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 18:55:36 -0000

too many people focus on being cool instead of actually providing value for others

Re: The worst things startups do

Bruce Stewart — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 17:30:02 -0000

A lot of business do not recognize a changing market soon enough!