Running Lean · Iterate From Plan a to a Plan That Works by Maurya, Ash -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works Praise for Running Lean, Second Edition Foreword Preface

Safari® Books Online We’d Like to Hear from You Attributions and Permissions

Introduction

What Is Running Lean?

Why Are Startups Hard? Is There a Better Way?

Customer Development Lean Startup Bootstrapping

What Will This Book Teach You? Is This Book for You? How Is This Book Organized?

Part 1: Roadmap Part 2: Document Your Plan A Part 3: Identify the Riskiest Parts of Your Plan Part 4: Systematically Test Your Plan

About Me

Why This Book? Field-Tested

Disclaimers

Practice Trumps Theory There Are No Silver Bullets

I. Roadmap

1. Meta-Principles

Step 1: Document Your Plan A

There Is an “I” in Vision Capture Your Business Model Hypotheses Your Product Is NOT “the Product”

Step 2: Identify the Riskiest Parts of Your Plan

The Three Stages of a Startup

Stage 1: Problem/Solution Fit Stage 2: Product/Market Fit Stage 3: Scale

Pivot Before Product/Market Fit, Optimize After Where Does Funding Fit into All This?

Step 3: Systematically Test Your Plan

What Is an Experiment? The Iteration Meta-Pattern

2. Running Lean Illustrated

Case Study: How I Wrote Iterated This Book

Understand the Problem Define the Solution Validate Qualitatively Verify Quantitatively Is the Book Finished?

II. Document Your Plan A

3. Create Your Lean Canvas

Brainstorm Possible Customers Sketching a Lean Canvas

Problem and Customer Segments Unique Value Proposition

How to craft a unique value proposition

Solution Channels

Freer versus paid Inbound versus outbound Direct versus automated Direct versus indirect Retention before referral

Revenue Streams and Cost Structure

Revenue streams Cost structure

Key Metrics

Acquisition Activation Retention Revenue Referral

Unfair Advantage

Now It’s Your Turn

III. Identify the Riskiest Parts of Your Plan

4. Prioritize Where to Start

What Is Risk? Rank Your Business Models Seek External Advice

5. Get Ready to Experiment

Assemble a Problem/Solution Team

Forget Traditional Departments Start with the Smallest Team Possible, but No Smaller

The three must-haves: development, design, and marketing

Be Wary of Outsourcing Your Problem/Solution Team

Running Effective Experiments

Maximize for Speed, Learning, and Focus Identify a Single Key Metric or Goal Do the Smallest Thing Possible to Learn Formulate a Falsifiable Hypothesis Validate Qualitatively, Verify Quantitatively Make Sure You Can Correlate Results Back to Specific Actions Create Accessible Dashboards Communicate Learning Early and Often

Applying the Iteration Meta-Pattern to Risks

What About Unfair Advantage?

IV. Systematically Test Your Plan

6. Get Ready to Interview Customers

No Surveys or Focus Groups, Please

Are Surveys Good for Anything?

But Talking to People Is Hard Finding Prospects Preemptive Strikes and Other Objections (or Why I Don’t Need to Interview Customers)

7. The Problem Interview

What You Need to Learn Testing the Problem Formulate Falsifiable Hypotheses Conduct Problem Interviews

Welcome (Set the Stage) Collect Demographics (Test Customer Segment) Tell a Story (Set Problem Context) Problem Ranking (Test Problem) Explore Customer’s Worldview (Test Problem) Wrapping Up (the Hook and Ask) Document Results

Do You Understand the Problem?

What Are the Problem Interview Exit Criteria?

8. The Solution Interview

What You Need to Learn Testing Your Solution Testing Your Pricing

Don’t Ask Customers What They’ll Pay, Tell Them Don’t Lower Signup Friction, Raise It The Solution Interview as AIDA How Is This Different from a Pitch?

Formulate Testable Hypotheses Conduct Solution Interviews

Welcome (Set the Stage) Collect Demographics (Test Customer Segment) Tell a Story (Set Problem Context) Demo (Test Solution) Test Pricing (Revenue Streams) Wrapping Up (the Ask) Document Results

Do You Have a Problem Worth Solving?

What Are the Solution Interview Exit Criteria?

9. Get to Release 1.0

Product Development Gets in the Way of Learning Reduce your mVP Get Started Deploying Continuously Define your activation Flow

The Anatomy of an Activation Flow

Build a Marketing Website

The Anatomy of a Marketing Website The Landing Page Deconstructed

10. Get Ready to Measure

The Need for Actionable Metrics

What Is an Actionable Metric?

Metrics Are People First Simple Funnel Reports Aren’t Enough Say Hello to the Cohort How to Build Your Conversion Dashboard

11. The MVP Interview

What You Need to Learn Formulate Testable Hypotheses Conduct MVP Interviews

Welcome (Set the Stage) Show Landing Page (Test UVP) Show Pricing Page (Test Pricing) Signup and Activation (Test Solution) Wrapping Up (Keep Feedback Loop Open) Document Results

12. Validate Customer Lifecycle

Make Feedback Easy Troubleshoot Customer Trials

Acquisition and Activation Retention Revenue Referral

Are You Ready to Launch?

What Are the Launch Criteria? 3, 2, 1 ... Launch!

13. Don’t Be a Feature Pusher

Features Must Be Pulled, Not Pushed Implement an 80/20 Rule Constrain Your Features Pipeline Process Feature Requests The Feature Lifecycle

How to Track Features on a Kanban Board The Process Steps Explained

14. Measure Product/Market Fit

What Is Product/Market Fit? The Sean Ellis Test Focus on the “Right” Macro What About Revenue? Have You Built Something People Want?

What Are the Early Traction Exit Criteria?

What About the Market in Product/Market Fit?

Start by Identifying Your Key Engine of Growth

Summary

Design Pattern for a Network Effects Product Design Pattern for a Multisided (Marketplace) Product

15. Conclusion

What’s Next?

Life After Product/Market Fit Did I Keep My Promise? Keep In Touch

Resources

Books Blogs Tools

A. Bonus Material

How to Build a Low-Burn Startup Why Premature Fundraising Is a Form of Waste How to Achieve Flow in a Lean Startup

The Conflicting Pull for Time Creating Daily Flow Creating Weekly Flow Eliminating Software Waste

How to Set Pricing for a SaaS Product

What About Freemium? The Problems with Freemium How to Approach Freemium

How to Build a Teaser Page

How to Write a Sales Letter How to Create a Teaser Landing Page

How to Get Started with Continuous Deployment

Commit Test Deploy Monitor

How to Build a Conversion Dashboard

How to Collect Data How to Visualize Your Conversion Dashboard How to Track Retention

Index About the Author

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