Q: My software consultancy has reached the point of needing to hire someone to help manage the sales pipeline. I’ve hired all kinds of technical related folks, but never for sales.
Q: How To Find Help Selling Professional Services Read More »
Entrepreneurs who limit themselves to what they could learn if their prospects lacked the power of speech adopt what I call a veterinary marketing model. It’s not a viable approach to market exploration.
Q: Is Veterinary Marketing A Viable Approach To Market Exploration? Read More »
Q: We have a product for bloggers but I am having a lot of trouble getting leads. I have met bloggers from popular media companies at events, I have cold called them, e-mailed them, and e-mailed to on-line groups that I am a member of. None of this has worked. How do I interest people
Q: How Do I Interest People In My Product? Read More »
Q: I struggle with the value proposition for our product. Either I am too abstract “we offer a positive return on time invested” or too vague “help increase your ability to manage critical challenges.” Do you have any suggestions for how to frame or formulate a value proposition? Here a few questions that a value
Crafting a Value Proposition Read More »
Build A B2B MVP That Inspires Trust Q: I am preparing to launch a website for my minimum viable product (MVP). It’s a few pages and has has some forms and a file upload capability. Potential customers will be able to explain a particular type of problem that they have and then upload some relevant
Q: Is It Waste To Build A B2B MVP That Inspires Trust? Read More »
Q: What is the target allocation for each of these critical tasks in a successful startup? Here is my list of critical tasks in a startup and a percentage allocation: Planning 10% Execution 50% Ideation 20% Talking to Potential Customers 15% Recruiting 5% What Is The Real Decision? Can you clarify : At what stage of company? What time frame
Q: What Are Critical Tasks In A Startup? Read More »
While truly new markets have no history, their business model parameters can be estimated by what they replace or substitute for.
Q: How Do I Calculate Business Model Parameters For A Novel Product? Read More »
Q: We have been in customer discovery for a few months and have a situation in a negotiation that I am not sure how to deal with. A decision maker at a potential customer says he believes that our product can help but it’s not addressing a burning problem. The wrinkle that I have not
Q: Side Payment Requested In Negotiation Read More »
Q: My research focused on the assessment of atherosclerosis in coronary arteries using Computed Tomography examinations as the imaging modality. I have looked at various aspects of atherosclerosis such as volume scores, automatic extraction of anatomical structures, plaque detection, dual energy CT and plaque distribution patterns. I am new to the lean innovation methods and am
Q: How to Apply Lean Innovation Methods To Regulated Industries? Read More »
The prisoners dilemma thought experiment that posits a single isolated transaction as the entire relationship does not offer a good model for business and dealing with prospects, customers, partners, suppliers, employees, or really anyone. Q: Is the Prisoners Dilemma A Good Model for Doing Business? Q: I am currently working on a degree in Computer
Q: Is the Prisoners Dilemma A Good Model for Doing Business? Read More »
Product-market fit is not a ratchet: competitive response, new entrants, changes in technology and customer preference require ongoing customer development. You will need to continue to do customer development–and customer discovery for that matter–even after you have a first prototype, an MVP, early customers, and an established niche. Markets and competitors don’t stand still, no
Q: We Already Have a Prototype, Can We Still Do Customer Development? Read More »
Q: I am starting a service business that will help clients with advertising and search engine marketing but I am not sure how to price my services. Do you have any suggestions for how to look at pricing professional services?
Q: Pricing Professional Services Read More »
Q: I run a SaaS B2B startup that boosts employee engagement by bringing co-workers together for peer-to-peer knowledge sharing. We have an MVP. We have done some customer development interviews and have half a dozen potential early adopter customers. The next step would be to do a free pilot of our product on a subset of
Q: How To Speed Up Early Trials, Adoption, and Sales Read More »
Q: I have worked on large enterprise software systems but am now struggling working at a startup creating a Minimum Viable Product (MVP). I am a big believer in BDD and TDD, so I’ve developed an automated testing suite for the MVP that has high coverage and great specifications describing and asserting its behaviors in
Q: How Much Effort Should I Invest in Automated Testing For An MVP? Read More »
Instead of looking left and right for potential competition, I would walk around the table and look at the situation from your prospect’s perspective.
Q: How Much Attention Should I Pay To Potential Competition? Read More »
Don’t do a big launch before you have completed customer discovery or you are running a very expensive test of your key customer and market hypotheses.
Q: Can We Launch First and Ask Customer Discovery Questions Later? Read More »
One question entrepreneurs ask themselves is whether to persevere or get a job. What follows is an email exchange that has been edited into a Q&A.
Q: Should I Persevere With My Product Or Get A Job? Read More »
Q: We have started selling and are looking for resources for a lean approach to sales, in particular for new product introduction. Lean Approach To Sales at Lean Startup Conference 2012 Scott Sambucci and I presented a workshop at Lean Startup 2012 on “Engineering Your Sales Process.” The deck is posted at http://www.slideshare.net/SalesQualia/engineering-your-sales-process About 70%
Q: Resources For A Lean Approach to Sales, In Particular New Product Introduction Read More »
It can be difficult to put a price on a new product service, much less to develop a pricing model you can use to offer pricing to many different prospects. Here are some tips.
Q: How To Pull The Trigger On A Pricing Model Read More »
Q: We have a SaaS offering that has been on the market for three years now and we have several dozen paying customers. Our offering is useful for firms with more than a hundred employees up to several thousand and is licensed at a corporate level. We have only lost two customers, one was acquired
Q: Customer Exit Interview Questions Read More »
