Tech and Design Blog

It was somewhere in the middle of 2010 and I was preparing a keynote for our two private investors. We’ve lent a small amount of money, and it was time again to tell them about where we were with our company…. but I felt I did not have a clear idea. We were performing good, but what is good? I had a lot of questions that somehow needed an answer: At what ‘stage’ is our company? How can we make it more successful? Do we need more money for promotion? Do we need new investors? What do we have to do next?

A strange titled book gave the answer. ‘The Four Steps to the Ephiphany‘, self-published by Steven Gary Blank. The book gave us a ‘model’ that explained at what ‘stage’ we were and what was to be expected as ‘next steps’ in the future. It pretty well answered all of my questions above. Wow! Yeah. Really it felt like a revelation.

What the book basically does is tear down the idea of the ‘overnight success‘ and instead present a process of ‘discovery and validation’ before even going further with your idea. This is what we used to think about, when executing an idea. First you ‘define the concept’ then ‘develop the product’, ‘alpha and beta test it’ and finally the ‘big launch’, Bang! How sad this ‘big launch’ almost never brings the succes you thought it would bring. But more important, what happens when you’ve launched?

Steven Gary brings us a new model. It’s very simple:

1. Discover your customers
Finding out who the customers for your product are and whether the problem you believe are solving is important to them.

2. Validate if the customer really wants your product, pays for it!
Do you have a proven and repeatable sales process that has been field-tested by succesfully selling the product to early customers?

3. If so start activities that create more customers
If you can definitely say a loud ‘yes’ to the steps above you can start spending money on promotional activities.

4. Then grow your company
Time to structure your company when it grows.

Well that’s very simple, almost obvious. Yes it is, but it’s oh so tempting to think your product will be ‘the next big hit’, without discovering thourougly what your customers want and what you are really solving for them. We were somewhere between step 1 and 2 at that moment. As with most products you do not have one clear target group, but a lot of segmented groups. It’s a challenge to find the right focus for your product.

Steve’s ideas gave us a ‘framework’ to think better about where we were as a company, when to invest in what. He gives many more insights, like what type of market you think you’re in and what this means for your marketing and positioning. In essence it’s about ‘learning and iterating versus linear execution’. This stuff wil definitely help you when you’re starting your own startup or when you just tarted.