17 ms·

Startup idea checklist

1251 points by adrian_mrd 7y ago

mojuba 7y ago
> Which subset of your target customers are so constrained by the status quo, they’ll welcome a buggy product? I understand this is just a mental test, but really... don't release buggy products. Don't create buggy products. Firstly, the line between forgivable bugs and unforgivable ones is too thin. Or sometimes N forgivable bugs become one big unforgivable show stopper. Second, you will always have a competitor with more experienced engineers and a better choice of tools that they'll beat you at least at quality if nothing else.
- BoorishBears 7y ago
  If I had a dollar for every business that was killed by a buggier competitor, I bet I’d have a lot more dollars than if I got one for every time a business was killed by bugs. People will put up with a lot of nonsense for a product that does what they want.
  - AmericanChopper 7y ago
    I dunno, I’ve seen plenty of startups killed by the mentality that calling their shitty product an ‘MVP’ somehow makes up for how shitty it is.
    - randomsearch 7y ago
      It's very unlikely the bugs killed those startups.
      - AmericanChopper 7y ago
        Depends on how you classify bugs. If a bug is anytime your product doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to, then yeah, I’ve seen startups suffer massively from that. I worked with one that had 90% of new customers churn out in their first month (you might be able to guess, that company doesn’t exist any more). If you broaden your definition to include ‘problems with the code base that significantly slow down new features’, then I’ve seen even more startups die trying to release their ‘v2.0’. The thing about the ‘we’ll iterate on it later’ mentality is that your product has to be in pretty good shape to be able to benefit from small incremental improvements. If it’s a garbage fire then making the smallest changes turns into an arduous nightmare, that inevitably just ends up introducing even more bugs to your product. But to be fair, for as many startups as I’ve seen go out of business due to these problems, I’ve seen just as many stagnate into a state where they have just enough revenue to cover their small payroll, and remain in that state for a very long time.
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        What if I take bug to mean what it means? > A software bug is an error, flaw, failure or fault in a computer program or system that causes it to produce an incorrect or unexpected result, or to behave in unintended ways. 90% churn out rate is not a software bug... If you mean there was a software bug that was causing that, it sounds like they had a bug that was completely preventing them from providing value. It’s a given your product needs to be able to provide some sort of value. My point is people place much more emphasis on provided value and utility over frustration from bugs
        AmericanChopper 7y ago
        But even if the app crashes every time it loads, that would meet your definition of a bug. I’ve never personally seen a single bug so bad that it killed a company, but I’ve seen products so riddled with bugs that they killed companies. An app with chronic stability issues? Those are bugs. Automated processes silently fail some times? Bugs. Interactive processes randomly fail sometimes? Bugs. I’ve seen plenty of companies with ideas that seemed decent fail because they were unable to deliver an adequately functional product, for the sort of reasons I mentioned above. All of which I’d consider bugs.
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        I already addressed an app crashing every time it loads in another comment. My point wasn’t you can deliver an app that does nothing and succeed. My point was bugginess is not what kills most start ups. Lack of bugginess is not a moat. Your competitors will not automatically fail because your app is the most stable one.
    - BoorishBears 7y ago
      There'll always be examples to the contrary, but usually that’s a problem of not providing enough value. Think about how much crappy software there is out there that people use because it does something they need. If “not having bugs” is literally your only moat, there were always bigger problems
      - dustinmr 7y ago
        Examples?
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        I mean, take it to it’s logical extreme, I make an app that does X, but every time you start it, it crashes. I doubt it’s going to be long before my product fails, bugs are affecting the value users derive from it to an extreme degree, past what they can overlook. I honestly can’t even think of a real-world example off the top of my head though. But that’s probably just a testament to how badly you need to screw up for bugs to be the actual reason a product fails, and not some external factor that’s possibly exacerbated by bugginess
        lifeisstillgood 7y ago
        >>> I make an app that does X, but every time you start it, it crashes. Then it doesn't do X Buggy code is a huge drag on any codebase and any business built on that codebase - absolutely. But if you list all the things you think you MUST fix in a codebase, they are all things that make you as a developers life harder. The bugs that a user sees are the ones that take away the value they get - the ones you see are the ones that make it harder as a developer to work on the code base - they are rarely the same bugs this is the cause of most tension
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        That’s pretty much my point...
- xmprt 7y ago
  You know what's worse than a buggy product? No product. It's better to launch with a few bugs that you can fix and iterate on the final product design than making the perfect product that no one wants. Also, the question could be reworded to refer to not just bugs but also features since a startup will often pivot in some way even after launching which users will have to deal with.
- jasonwen 7y ago
  If the pain point you are solving is big enough, people will accept buggy and slow products regardless. Sometimes its better to ship, especially if you are testing product market fit. A bug free, slick, with awesome tech used, is worth nothing if no one is willing to pay for it/solves a big enough problem.
- krsrhe 7y ago
  Maybe if you are building rocket ships. But even SpaceX is doing pretty well with rockets that explode sometimes.
  - mojuba 7y ago
    Because when you build a rocket there are a lot of unknowns for you that you'd be discovering and testing in the field. With software the only unknown is usually the market fit. There are rarely any unknowns in the implementation and there is no reason not to test your software before you release it to the public.
    - mobjack 7y ago
      Bugs get missed in testing because developers can't anticipate all the ways users can break it. That is why beta testing exists. There are also bugs that are rare and take lots of effort to fix. You can first see how often that bug actually occurs in the wild before prioritizing it. Sometimes it never occurs or if it does happen, the user can recover from it easily so it doesn't break your product.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- koonsolo 7y ago
  > Second, you will always have a competitor with more experienced engineers and a better choice of tools that they'll beat you at least at quality if nothing else. Software development is always about trade-offs. You can churn out way more features if you don't need to take quality into account. I would welcome any competitor in my field who is super focused on quality, since they will waste a lot of time and money that could better be spent elsewhere. For example, I'm not going to make some code bug-free, when there is a 50% chance that that feature will end up in the wastebasket 2 months later. Besides, you talk about unforgivable bugs, but what are they to your early adopters anyway? I had users lose half a day of work because the save crashed right in the middle of it. They weren't even angry. They said is was inconvenient and just remade the whole thing. When I fixed it they were happy. They are still users now. That's how "unforgivable" these are to early adopters. So yeah, don't forget one of the bigger companies had a "Move fast and break things" policy. In the end it's the market that decides. And according to my experience, early adopters are super forgiving.
  - mojuba 7y ago
    >You can churn out way more features if you don't need to take quality into account. Creating quality code should not be at the expense of extra features. Just hire more competent, experienced engineers and there will be no need to sacrifice one for the other. Quality is a function of experience and skill, it is not (or should not be) a function of development time.
    - mobjack 7y ago
      There are still tradeoffs to be made no matter your skill level. Good engineers choose between the minimal acceptable quality vs high quality code. Bad engineers struggle to get create minimal acceptable quality in the first place.
    - koonsolo 7y ago
      I was talking about bug quality, not code quality. Sorry if that was not clear. And as any competent, experienced engineer knows, those two are less related than a junior would think. I agree you have to keep your code clean. But the absence of bugs is an entirely different thing.
- vincentmarle 7y ago
  I’ve heard this complaint before (and it’s usually from junior engineers who don’t have much experience). Here’s my take: I worked on a project that arguably had the worst code I’ve ever worked on but still made $100 million dollars in annual revenue. And then I worked on an app with terrible UX that became a billion dollar company. In both cases we had terrible reviews and a huge customer support team to process thousands of complaints, but it worked for the majority of the millions of users. And then I realized that terrible design and bugs don’t really matter if you have true product market fit. And vice versa you can have the best design and flawless error logs but still fail if you’re not creating something that people want, especially if it takes you extra time and resources to create that “perfect product” while your competitors bypass you with a shittier product, but with faster iterations.
- sah2ed 7y ago
  I think the mental test could have been framed better using the IMHO far more intuitive framing used by Don Dodge in his 2008 article about how to assess a fresh batch of YC startups. Is your product a vitamin (nice to have) or a pain killer (a must have to improve quality of life)? https://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2008/03/does-your-start.html https://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2008/03/does...
- carapace 7y ago
  I hate it but you're wrong. (I agree with you, but I'm wrong too.) I used to work for a small company that made it big (you've heard of them.) We went from ~25k to ~250k users while I was there and the VCs were lining up to pound money up the founders' asses. Limosine rides and $500 steak dinners to woo them, the whole thing. I left, they eventually went public, and last I heard the Walton family owns it now or something. Anyway... The front-end guy "Chris" (not his real name) and the back-end guy were pals, and they would just push any old shit to production. The CEO had no clue, and I wasn't in a position to get them to stop. There was one other guy working remotely who didn't care or also had no clue. So, "Chris" (not his real name) would shit out some PHP, bang on the new feature or whatever for a few seconds, and if it worked even slightly at all he would push it. Shit broke all the time. The poor dumb users would be on the support forums telling each other how the heroic Chris was working furiously to fix it, and I'm sitting there fuming because Chris is the ruthless asshole using them as unpaid QA. That fucker is a millionaire now. Go figure.
  - sonnyblarney 7y ago
    This is a very good anecdote, and helps us understand that 'shit' is in the eye of the beholder. If it solves a real problem, and allows companies to do 'xyz' , maybe it doesn't matter if there are bugs and glitches here and there. If there is only 'one kind of car' and that's all anyone knew, nobody would mind that there were always leaky oil issues if the alternative was 'horses'.
    - kyshoc 7y ago
      Indeed. The YC application has a question along the lines of "why is the thing you're building so compelling that customers will tolerate a buggy product?"
    - carapace 7y ago
      It's a terrible anecdote, it's only redeeming quality is that it's based on a true story. We could have fired Chris and replaced him the next day. We should have. We will never be able to know or quantify the loss accrued to Chris's irresponsible behavior. We got lucky. It costs nothing extra to write correct bug-free code if you know how, and bug-free code will always be preferable to buggy code.
codingdave 7y ago
> What would need to be true in 18 months for you to get essentially unlimited cheap capital? I'd first ask, what would need to be true in 18 months to never have needed capital, and to be self-sustaining as a bootstrapped organization. Raising funds should be an option, but not the assumed path of all products.
- punnerud 7y ago
  Easier and cheaper to raise some capital when you don’t need it (as backup and for scaling) than later.
  - codingdave 7y ago
    I've heard that, too. But I've never bought into it. Maybe I'm naive, but it seems to me that giving up any equity when you don't need to is unwise. As far as easier and cheaper, I have not seen costlier terms sheets due to need. Easier... maybe, if you are doing so well that it is a no-brainer to want to be part of it. But then it gets back to the point of giving up equity when there is no need.
    - nikanj 7y ago
      Pay attention to the messenger too. If a VC tells you to raise money ”just in case”, they might mean ”I want in on your explosive growth”. Nothing wrong with that, just be mindful of people’s motives.
    - Arnt 7y ago
      In my experience, VCs are friendly, honest, helpful and understanding — and they absolutely will adjust their offers depending on whether you have time to shop around for better offers before you have to start laying off people or even closing altogether.
    - vchak1 7y ago
      The analogy I give is this - when you fly SF to NY, the pilot does not have exactly the correct amount of fuel to make the trip. That would be foolish. You'd want to have some reserve (say another hour or two of fuel) as insurance. Sure, that costs you equity, but its insurance equity.
lifeisstillgood 7y ago
>>> Why now? What’s true about the world that nobody else figured out yet? I have three ideas I am working on and the one i like best is ... not passing that test :-(
- anderspitman 7y ago
  Lists like this are models to help frame your thinking, not immutable laws set in stone. Maybe your idea can still work. If you want to do it, do it. Just proceed with caution.
blodovnik 7y ago
There's a school of thought that you must only build things that solve a problem or ease a pain or fix someone's dissatisfaction. This list seems very focused on that and seems to entirely miss asking questions like "is this cool or fun or entertaining"?
- ThomPete 7y ago
  Thats because thats how you normally get people to give you money. Fun or entertainment is in the hits based genre with no way of knowing if its going to be successful, there is nothing to aim at.
  - blodovnik 7y ago
    >> Thats because thats how you normally get people to give you money. That's not right. People spend vast amounts of money and time on fun and entertainment hobbies education pleasure and leisure. It's misguided to focus only on finding problems that need solving and pain that needs alleviation.
    - macspoofing 7y ago
      >That's not right. People spend vast amounts of money and time on fun and entertainment hobbies education pleasure and leisure You'd think so but let me tell you - the hardest thing in the world is to convince someone to give you money for your product. You can easily get lots of compliments, lots of feedback, lots of positivity, but money? Oh boy. Just try and see how easy it is to find customers.
    - ThomPete 7y ago
      If you are making entertainment you aren't a startup in any meaningful term, you are an entertainer who is trying to create a hit that requires a very different way of thinking about things. You are more like a musician.
      - manquer 7y ago
macspoofing 7y ago
Almost every developer at some point will be approached by someone to work for free for some killer idea that that person had. In those cases, I found it useful to have them fill out a checklist list this, or put together a multi-page Executive Summary and a Business Plan. You'd be surprised how quickly you can get someone off your back and them off their idea, if they now have to go and do some actual work. And you never have to say 'no' and get that person offended.
- randomsearch 7y ago
  That's a great idea. Do you have a specific link you send them to?
  - macspoofing 7y ago
    This checklist is actually pretty good. But I usually ask them to put together 30-50 page Business Plan with an Executive Summary. If they don't know how I tell them to look online for examples. In one case I pointed them at a local startup incubator that runs workshops for things like this. All this does is add up to a non-trivial (but not onerous and with little cash outlay) investment of THEIR time. And if this small investment of their time is too much work for them ... well, I guess they weren't that serious to begin with. So far I'm 5 for 5 when asked for a 50/50 partnership (where I do all the dev work and my partner is the 'idea man') and then never hearing again about the idea after I asked they put together this document - all without having to say 'no'. There has not been bitterness on their part, because next steps are on them. In the off-chance they will actually do this (and it hasn't happened yet), I will take it seriously and really consider it. But even if I decide not to pursue it, I feel like the exercise isn't a waste of their time as they will be able to use it when looking for funding or other partners.
    - dopeboy 7y ago
      As someone in your spot (solicited by ~10 or so people in the past couple years), this is an interesting response. On first blush, it seems to set an adversarial tone rather than a collaborative one. On the other hand, it's good due diligence and probably filters out the serious from the not so serious. I mostly agree with your response. I think the only place where it may not work is when the person wants a thought partner to help think through these things. There isn't always a strict dichotomy of duties in the framing of a venture - I think all partners should be involved in that. Different story when it comes to execution, though.
meerita 7y ago
I dislike the idea of the startup for "solving a problem". Problems are very specific, personal and not so broad as other options. In fact: 1. Not everyone has a problem. 2. Not everyone is aware is having a problem. 3. People bear problems. Even the worst ones (ex. health). So, why build your startup around a problem. Why don't you better build it around a "need". A need would be much stronger usage driver than problems.
- xmprt 7y ago
  A problem is tangible and can have a solution. A "need" isn't something that can easily be put in words unless it's "I need this problem to be solved."
- randomsearch 7y ago
  One of the biggest mistakes nerds make is to build a project, not a business. Business have to create value. Most businesses do that by solving problems. The difficulty with going for a "need" that is not "I need to solve this problem" is that you have to convince people that they have the need, and that your product best satisfies it. General needs (Maslow hierarchy etc.) tend to be vague and served by many different product types. Sure, there are exceptions, but most businesses solve problems and if you're not explicitly doing that then you're either taking a more difficult road, or you're not building a business.
  - meerita 7y ago
    Exactly. Slack people created a new communicational need. There were email, forums, etc. Even chats, but they created a good product that enhanced the need to have better chat system to work better. They weren't solving any major problem. That is my point.
- inapis 7y ago
  I think this is just words getting interpreted differently. We just can't have strict definitions of words when it comes to contemporary conversations especially when we have to allow for ambiguity and benefit of doubt because everyone's vocabulary varies. Only scientific, technical, legal etc texts (specifically where non-ambiguity is demanded) need a strict definition. I'm building an alternative for Pocket/Instapaper because I find the current tools sorely lacking. No one needs it but it solves a legitimate problem in my life and hopefully those of others. Expanding onwards, no one "needs" a mobile phone, television, reddit or even HN itself but these solve legitimate problems in life. By the strictest definition, no one "needs" anything more than clean air, water, food and shelter. So needs can be approximated to problems for the sake of conversation around startups, ideas, business etc.
xondono 7y ago
Maybe it’s because I’m too negative, maybe it’s the cynical engineer in me, or maybe my ideas aren’t so good to start with, but every time I think I have a ‘good’ business idea, I tend to slaughter it through in a couple of days. Not one of them has passed my test..
- inapis 7y ago
  As an engineer, that is the biggest disservice you can do to yourself. Business needs a different mindset than engineering. Without actually putting it in the market and letting it stand for itself, you have no idea if it's ACTUALLY good or not. Or if it was just a fluke in your life. Sometimes, what you think are, terrible ideas can be legitimately life changing for other people.
- sovande 7y ago
  One trait most successful founders have is not being overly analytical. This correlate with higher education as well, the higher, the more analytical. Creating a successful startup is basically a lottery and it almost does not matter what idea you come up with. In this metaphor, smart and analytical people will not buy a lottery ticket because the cost vs the chance to win is just too small. But if you don't buy a lottery ticket you most certainly cannot win the lottery.
  - vikramkr 7y ago
    I disagree. The trait needed is being intensely analytical but only with the right data. Its physically impossible to sit in a room, look at an idea or a lottery ticket, and analytically reason your way to knowing it is good or not. The only way to know is to get data on it from the real world, something you can't do with lottery tickets, and unlike lottery tickets, startups are not negative sum and there aren't rules to win and odds that you can't shift - the whole point is shifting odds of success.
    - sovande 7y ago
      I don't disagree, once you have crossed the rubicon. When Julius Caesar _actually_ crossed the Rubicon, the risk was immense and there was no guarantee of a successful outcome. That's what I mean, going all in on a risky adventure is not for everyone and if you analyse and think too much about it, few will want to take the jump. However, once you have crossed and are in the "battle" then of course you will use all the tactical advantages you can and try "shifting odds of success".
allenleein 7y ago
These are questions Michael Seibel mentioned that he likes to ask startups as part of his 2018 “Building Product” Startup School presentation: Problem What problem are you solving? What problem will be solved at the end of what you are doing? What do we expect the result to be? Can you state the problem clearly in two sentences? Have you experienced the problem yourself? Can you define this problem narrowly? Who can you help first? What can we address immediately? How do we get the first indication this thing is working? Is the problem solveable? Customer Who is your customer? Who is the ideal first customer? How will they know if your product has solved the problem? How often (frequency) does your user have the problem? Who is getting the most value out of your product? How intense is the problem? Are they willing to pay? How easy is it for your customer to find your product? Which customers should you run away from? Product Does your product actually solve the problem? Be truthful. How and why not? Which customers should you go after first? How do you find people who are willing to use your “bad” first versions of your product? Who are the most desperate customers as how do you talk to them first? Whose business is going to go out of business without using you? Are you discounting or starting with a super low price? Are you consider this approach? If so, why? Performance What are you using to measure how users are interacting with your product? What 5-10 metrics are you measuring to understand how your product functions? Why those metrics? When you build a new product or feature, what is the metric that will improve because of that feature/product? What number do you track to show how well your company is doing? What is your top level KPI (revenue, usage)? What are the underlying metrics that contribute to achieving your top level KPI (new users, retention of users, content created => DAUs at Social Cam)? Which of these metrics are you trying to move this development cycle? Product Development How long is your product dev cycle? What is causing it to be that long? Who is writing down notes at your product dev meeting? Which category does each of your brainstormed ideas fit: New features/interactions on existing ones; bug fixes/other maintenance; A/B tests? How easy/medium/hard are they to do? How can you restate the hard ideas (disaggregate idea into smaller ideas)? What parts of hard ideas are useless or hard? Are there other options? Which hard idea will improve act the KPI the most? Which medium? Which easy? What is the spec for the product/feature we want to build? Problem What problem are you solving? What problem will be solved at the end of what you are doing? What do we expect the result to be? Can you state the problem clearly in two sentences? Have you experienced the problem yourself? Can you define this problem narrowly? Who can you help first? What can we address immediately? How do we get the first indication this thing is working? Is the problem solveable? Customer Who is your customer? Who is the ideal first customer? How will they know if your product has solved the problem? How often (frequency) does your user have the problem? Who is getting the most value out of your product? How intense is the problem? Are they willing to pay? How easy is it for your customer to find your product? Which customers should you run away from? Product Does your product actually solve the problem? Be truthful. How and why not? Which customers should you go after first? How do you find people who are willing to use your “bad” first versions of your product? Who are the most desperate customers as how do you talk to them first? Whose business is going to go out of business without using you? Are you discounting or starting with a super low price? Are you consider this approach? If so, why? Performance What are you using to measure how users are interacting with your product? What 5-10 metrics are you measuring to understand how your product functions? Why those metrics? When you build a new product or feature, what is the metric that will improve because of that feature/product? What number do you track to show how well your company is doing? What is your top level KPI (revenue, usage)? What are the underlying metrics that contribute to achieving your top level KPI (new users, retention of users, content created => DAUs at Social Cam)? Which of these metrics are you trying to move this development cycle? Product Development How long is your product dev cycle? What is causing it to be that long? Who is writing down notes at your product dev meeting? Which category does each of your brainstormed ideas fit: New features/interactions on existing ones; bug fixes/other maintenance; A/B tests? How easy/medium/hard are they to do? How can you restate the hard ideas (disaggregate idea into smaller ideas)? What parts of hard ideas are useless or hard? Are there other options? Which hard idea will improve act the KPI the most? Which medium? Which easy? What is the spec for the product/feature we want to build? Doc link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ungItAgriaQk_lDI4aEJNigmmn0cSy93NW6rCZvujYM/edit?usp=sharing https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ungItAgriaQk_lDI4aEJNigm...
mlthoughts2018 7y ago
I see a lot of businesses that don’t create value, like Uber, or even destroy value in multiple senses, like Uber, that go relatively unpunished by markets and create huge financial windfalls for executives, investors and some employees. Similar things have happened with some cryptocurrencies. Often a business is run solely to generate enough hype to externalize losses onto an acquirer or public retail traders or unwitting retirement plan holders, while creating space for personal profit for a small set of people.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- randomsearch 7y ago
  I see your point, thought I’d say “often” is not fair, we just see a disproportionate amount of coverage for these companies - for the problems you’re alluding to. My post is for those who want to build a solid business (I disagree with the other post above that startup = VC and hockey stick on HN - there’s plenty of overlap between here and indie hackers, for example).
- karmakaze 7y ago
  When we're talking 'value' here for startups, we mean value to the user. If Uber didn't produce any value for the user people wouldn't be taking them. Or if there was no value for the drivers they wouldn't drive. Whether or not people get windfalls from the process doesn't change what the end-user gets in the transaction.
  - mlthoughts2018 7y ago
    > “If Uber didn't produce any value for the user people wouldn't be taking them” At current prices, which are unsustainbly low due to VC subsidy, people find value in the trade of money for the service. At a price that fairly reflects the cost of delivering the service unsubsidized and maintaining driver quality of life at a socially acceptable level, nobody would pay for it. So the game was to lever perceived market value up very high with VC subsidy and hype, all the while knowing that they are selling a dollar for fifty cents, just long enough to be acquired or go public at prices that pay back the original VC subsidizers at a multiple allowing them to profit, while whomever bought in is left holding the bag when the company is left in an unsustainable operating position and there’s no more hype-profit carrot to attract new subsidy investors.
viach 7y ago
Could it be narrowed to a single question "what's your marketing channel?"
rotten 7y ago
Is the only reason to create a startup to experience exponential growth and get really rich and have your own stock symbol? Or, could someone create a lifestyle business and call that a startup? Where the goals might be simply to make a living doing what you love without working for some big company somewhere? Or maybe could someone create a startup that makes the world a better place without concern for getting oneself crazy rich? I am not a fan of the idea that the only driving motivation for establishing a small tech company is to make the VC's happy.
- dean177 7y ago
  Whenever you see “startup” on hacker news, people are almost always referring to the aim for massive VC funding, exponential growth, get big or die trying types of companies. Paul Graham wrote an essay which differentiated startups from other new businesses based solely on growth: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
  - rorykoehler 7y ago
    That essay is incredibly self serving. I think it should be taken with a pinch of salt. At very least any counter point to it shouldn't be immediately shut down with a link back to the essay. It's text book circular logic.
    - JasonFruit 7y ago
      They're not really making an argument here, just pointing out how people who use the word "startup" intend it to be interpreted.
      - jacquesm 7y ago
        > people Some people.
    - dean177 7y ago
      I wasn’t endorsing the essay or advocating for these hyper growth vc fuelled businesses, just pointing out that this checklist doesn’t apply to the kinds of businesses you were talking about if you accept this (common?) distinction between ‘startups’ and other kinds of new businesses.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
vskeleton 7y ago
Great list! Will use it in my lectures
phkahler 7y ago
All those future looking goals, who is going to benefit, how great will it be for them... what's your ticket symbol? I've been sitting on a possibly world changing idea that would be ruined by money. How do we foster those types of things?
- rgoldste 7y ago
  Potentially relevant article (soft-paywall) https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/technology/start-ups-rejecting-venture-capital.amp.html https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/tech...
- kiliantics 7y ago
  Build it as a co-operative where all the workers (and maybe even consumers) are also owners of the organisation, and have equal say in how it is run. Combine this with a clear mission and set of principles that all new members are taught so the organisation will stay on track for its initial purpose and keep democratic and equitable control.
karmakaze 7y ago
The ordering of points can be very important: Product 1. What are you building? <= 70 chars From the post I can tell the author is just organizing deeply considered thoughts. For a consumer of this checklist beware about thinking of the product first. By putting this as the first item, one can fall into the trap of shoehorning this answer into all the following points. As I'm sure others here have mentioned, fall in love with a problem not a solution or product. Usually it's best to find a narrow set of users who have this problem and explore around the problem to get a better picture of it. This can often lead to a different product solving a more key problem.
- Liron 7y ago
  Yes, most founders still get the order of operations wrong and build too much before understanding a problem. I actually think [1] the term "MVP" gives people a misleading idea of a lean startup, because you don't need a "product" per se to serve your first 10 users. [1] https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/the-lean-mvp-flowchart-add48d7bcbae https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/the-lean-mvp-flowchart-add48d...
  - levythe 7y ago
    I've heard, "Product," be replaced with, "Prototype," where a prototype is not a pre-product but more a thing that can be offered that will give information about what needs you should be addressing, how the product might solve them, and help you identify who your most satisfied customers will be (among other things). While you still have the agility you can only get from zero operational overhead, worry more about finding something people want, who wants it, and why they want it. Scaling is less than worthless if what you're scaling is worthless.
    - karmakaze 7y ago
      This is great--I'm using "Minimal Viable Prototype" from now on. "Product" brings along so much expectation baggage. I also chose "Minimal" over "Minimum"--one being desirable with purpose and the other perceivable as deficient.
- 7y ago
EGordon 7y ago
This checklist will be great for the eternal entrepreneurs, looking for the perfect idea. You know who I'm talking about, those who never actually start something!
paul7986 7y ago
Id keep your ideas to yourself! Especially if they are novel!
hartator 7y ago
> Who is it for? I hate this question. I think it’s from the marketing from the past. Now you have one to one relationship with your customers. Who cares what marketing group they belongs to? At SerpApi.com, we have this issue constantly from industry outsiders. If you have the need, you’ll use us. If not, you don’t and that’s fine.
- djstein 7y ago
  hey this is actually a really interesting product. thanks for posting it
- davidivadavid 7y ago
  "Who is it for" can be answered through needs-based segmentation, i.e. exactly what you said. Who is it for? It's for people who need x,y,z. You still need to have a clear definition of that if you want to e.g. evaluate market size, or do any sort of marketing/sales afterwards.
- maxlamb 7y ago
  Why do you assume this question related to marketing at all? A company founder should always have an idea of what kind of people would most benefit/need the product, and target that audience first.
z3t4 7y ago
Ask yourself what do I need to do right now. If you can foresee the future start trading instead.
riantogo 7y ago
I would like to suggest a section called constraints. And to me that is the most important section to answer: Are you going to go at it full time or part time? How many hours in a week can you dedicate to it without wrecking relationships (kids, partner, friends etc.)? Do you see a path to raising funds or are you thinking of bootstrapping? If going all in, how much runway do you have if no funding came through? Did you know that the path to startup hell is paved with "but everyone told me it was a great idea"?
Waterluvian 7y ago
It's amazing to me how effective it is just to write down these things. I'm planning to rebuild my deck and I've been thinking and brainstorming for days. But just the act of writing down the step by step order of what is already in my head made me discover all kinds of holes in my plan. There's a magic there. You can be convinced you know something intimately but if you write it all down I almost guarantee you'll find holes.
- aaronm14 7y ago
  You (and others) may enjoy Adam Savage's new book. He was one of the Mythbusters guys. In one of the first chapters he writes about his love of lists and checklists, and the impact it makes on the process of "making." I'm only a few chapters in so far but it's been a fun read so far. It looks like there is an article talking about this specifically here on Wired if you want to dip your toes in: https://www.wired.com/story/adam-savage-lists-more-lists-power-checkboxes/ https://www.wired.com/story/adam-savage-lists-more-lists-pow...
  - m33k44 7y ago
    Also there is Dr. Atul Gawande's "The Checklist Manifesto".
- amorphous 7y ago
  Somewhat related but it is amazing how clear things become to me when I draw a diagram about something I have to learn or build. Make visual connections leads to an immediate deeper understanding. It has become second nature for me to start up my diagramming app the moment I don't understand something
chiefalchemist 7y ago
Really good stuff, even for small and/or personal side projects. Under Bonus I'd like to add: Exit - What might that look like? If nothing else, I think it helps vet the previous assumptions.
galaxyLogic 7y ago
The article ... sorry wrong topic
hutch120 7y ago
Your questions are interesting, but I think are for MUCH later than an idea. My new idea list starts something like this: 1. Does this product/service exist and pretty much solve my problem? Then use that. 2. If not... I am the first customer... I am building it for myself because I want to use it. (If it's a network product, then find a partner for the idea.) 3. Evaluate MVP do I find it useful, am I using it regularly? Does it solve the problem for me? 4. Introduce someone else to your product/service maybe a friend or family and get them hooked. 5. Evaluate engagement is my friend still using it ... am I still using it? 6. Build features for you and them. 7. Evaluate ... do you guys both love it? 8. Get some more friends using it... if it's great maybe you even start to get strangers. Now get to your questions... how can I grow... how can I make money.
grogenaut 7y ago
The top section of the document is similar to amazon's PR/FAQ process, which having been forced to use to speak to amazon folks, I've found to be pretty good for getting your thoughts and end customer defined. It's actually pretty good for junior to mid level engineers as well: it keeps them from focusing on the pure tech they want to deliver and focus more on the why. I find a lot of people get stuck on what/how they want to deliver, thus delivering the wrong solution. I know it helped me out personally.
idoubtit 7y ago
In many cases, customer ≠ user. The customer that buys the product may not be the one that uses it. The OP makes no distinction. For example, hardware and software that help teaching are usually chosen by the school or the university. Teachers may have a word on this, but in my experience they rarely decide. Another example is products for children: some of them (e.g. educational games) clearly target the parents or relatives. Others (e.g. food) focus on the children, hoping they will persuade their parents.
- wanderingstan 7y ago
  Yes, and likewise all ad-supported business models like Google or Facebook, where the paying customer is the advertiser.
dandare 7y ago
These kinds of checklists may work for a product like Airbnb but will hardly work for something like Twitter or Instagram where the entrepreneur is rewarded for fulfilling a need that never existed before.
- lelima 7y ago
  >> fulfilling a need that never existed before. Phone text messages existed before, Messenger in desktop, even forums that work very similar to twitter. I might be wrong but I think the need was there, they improve a similar product with more features and Voila!
- welfare 7y ago
  You've been able to find properties to rent through craigslist since the beginning of the internet. Airbnb is not a new concept, but it's a revolutionizing UX.
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netdur 7y ago
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1251 points by adrian_mrd 7y ago

> Which subset of your target customers are so constrained by the status quo, they’ll welcome a buggy product? I understand this is just a mental test, but really... don't release buggy products. Don't create buggy products. Firstly, the line between forgivable bugs and unforgivable ones is too thin. Or sometimes N forgivable bugs become one big unforgivable show stopper. Second, you will always have a competitor with more experienced engineers and a better choice of tools that they'll beat you at least at quality if nothing else.

BoorishBears 7y ago
If I had a dollar for every business that was killed by a buggier competitor, I bet I’d have a lot more dollars than if I got one for every time a business was killed by bugs. People will put up with a lot of nonsense for a product that does what they want.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  I dunno, I’ve seen plenty of startups killed by the mentality that calling their shitty product an ‘MVP’ somehow makes up for how shitty it is.
  - randomsearch 7y ago
    It's very unlikely the bugs killed those startups.
    - AmericanChopper 7y ago
      Depends on how you classify bugs. If a bug is anytime your product doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to, then yeah, I’ve seen startups suffer massively from that. I worked with one that had 90% of new customers churn out in their first month (you might be able to guess, that company doesn’t exist any more). If you broaden your definition to include ‘problems with the code base that significantly slow down new features’, then I’ve seen even more startups die trying to release their ‘v2.0’. The thing about the ‘we’ll iterate on it later’ mentality is that your product has to be in pretty good shape to be able to benefit from small incremental improvements. If it’s a garbage fire then making the smallest changes turns into an arduous nightmare, that inevitably just ends up introducing even more bugs to your product. But to be fair, for as many startups as I’ve seen go out of business due to these problems, I’ve seen just as many stagnate into a state where they have just enough revenue to cover their small payroll, and remain in that state for a very long time.
      - BoorishBears 7y ago
        What if I take bug to mean what it means? > A software bug is an error, flaw, failure or fault in a computer program or system that causes it to produce an incorrect or unexpected result, or to behave in unintended ways. 90% churn out rate is not a software bug... If you mean there was a software bug that was causing that, it sounds like they had a bug that was completely preventing them from providing value. It’s a given your product needs to be able to provide some sort of value. My point is people place much more emphasis on provided value and utility over frustration from bugs
        AmericanChopper 7y ago
        But even if the app crashes every time it loads, that would meet your definition of a bug. I’ve never personally seen a single bug so bad that it killed a company, but I’ve seen products so riddled with bugs that they killed companies. An app with chronic stability issues? Those are bugs. Automated processes silently fail some times? Bugs. Interactive processes randomly fail sometimes? Bugs. I’ve seen plenty of companies with ideas that seemed decent fail because they were unable to deliver an adequately functional product, for the sort of reasons I mentioned above. All of which I’d consider bugs.
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        I already addressed an app crashing every time it loads in another comment. My point wasn’t you can deliver an app that does nothing and succeed. My point was bugginess is not what kills most start ups. Lack of bugginess is not a moat. Your competitors will not automatically fail because your app is the most stable one.
  - BoorishBears 7y ago
    There'll always be examples to the contrary, but usually that’s a problem of not providing enough value. Think about how much crappy software there is out there that people use because it does something they need. If “not having bugs” is literally your only moat, there were always bigger problems
    - dustinmr 7y ago
      Examples?
      - BoorishBears 7y ago
        I mean, take it to it’s logical extreme, I make an app that does X, but every time you start it, it crashes. I doubt it’s going to be long before my product fails, bugs are affecting the value users derive from it to an extreme degree, past what they can overlook. I honestly can’t even think of a real-world example off the top of my head though. But that’s probably just a testament to how badly you need to screw up for bugs to be the actual reason a product fails, and not some external factor that’s possibly exacerbated by bugginess
        lifeisstillgood 7y ago
        >>> I make an app that does X, but every time you start it, it crashes. Then it doesn't do X Buggy code is a huge drag on any codebase and any business built on that codebase - absolutely. But if you list all the things you think you MUST fix in a codebase, they are all things that make you as a developers life harder. The bugs that a user sees are the ones that take away the value they get - the ones you see are the ones that make it harder as a developer to work on the code base - they are rarely the same bugs this is the cause of most tension
        BoorishBears 7y ago
        That’s pretty much my point...
xmprt 7y ago
You know what's worse than a buggy product? No product. It's better to launch with a few bugs that you can fix and iterate on the final product design than making the perfect product that no one wants. Also, the question could be reworded to refer to not just bugs but also features since a startup will often pivot in some way even after launching which users will have to deal with.
jasonwen 7y ago
If the pain point you are solving is big enough, people will accept buggy and slow products regardless. Sometimes its better to ship, especially if you are testing product market fit. A bug free, slick, with awesome tech used, is worth nothing if no one is willing to pay for it/solves a big enough problem.
krsrhe 7y ago
Maybe if you are building rocket ships. But even SpaceX is doing pretty well with rockets that explode sometimes.
- mojuba 7y ago
  Because when you build a rocket there are a lot of unknowns for you that you'd be discovering and testing in the field. With software the only unknown is usually the market fit. There are rarely any unknowns in the implementation and there is no reason not to test your software before you release it to the public.
  - mobjack 7y ago
    Bugs get missed in testing because developers can't anticipate all the ways users can break it. That is why beta testing exists. There are also bugs that are rare and take lots of effort to fix. You can first see how often that bug actually occurs in the wild before prioritizing it. Sometimes it never occurs or if it does happen, the user can recover from it easily so it doesn't break your product.
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koonsolo 7y ago
> Second, you will always have a competitor with more experienced engineers and a better choice of tools that they'll beat you at least at quality if nothing else. Software development is always about trade-offs. You can churn out way more features if you don't need to take quality into account. I would welcome any competitor in my field who is super focused on quality, since they will waste a lot of time and money that could better be spent elsewhere. For example, I'm not going to make some code bug-free, when there is a 50% chance that that feature will end up in the wastebasket 2 months later. Besides, you talk about unforgivable bugs, but what are they to your early adopters anyway? I had users lose half a day of work because the save crashed right in the middle of it. They weren't even angry. They said is was inconvenient and just remade the whole thing. When I fixed it they were happy. They are still users now. That's how "unforgivable" these are to early adopters. So yeah, don't forget one of the bigger companies had a "Move fast and break things" policy. In the end it's the market that decides. And according to my experience, early adopters are super forgiving.
- mojuba 7y ago
  >You can churn out way more features if you don't need to take quality into account. Creating quality code should not be at the expense of extra features. Just hire more competent, experienced engineers and there will be no need to sacrifice one for the other. Quality is a function of experience and skill, it is not (or should not be) a function of development time.
  - mobjack 7y ago
    There are still tradeoffs to be made no matter your skill level. Good engineers choose between the minimal acceptable quality vs high quality code. Bad engineers struggle to get create minimal acceptable quality in the first place.
  - koonsolo 7y ago
    I was talking about bug quality, not code quality. Sorry if that was not clear. And as any competent, experienced engineer knows, those two are less related than a junior would think. I agree you have to keep your code clean. But the absence of bugs is an entirely different thing.
vincentmarle 7y ago
I’ve heard this complaint before (and it’s usually from junior engineers who don’t have much experience). Here’s my take: I worked on a project that arguably had the worst code I’ve ever worked on but still made $100 million dollars in annual revenue. And then I worked on an app with terrible UX that became a billion dollar company. In both cases we had terrible reviews and a huge customer support team to process thousands of complaints, but it worked for the majority of the millions of users. And then I realized that terrible design and bugs don’t really matter if you have true product market fit. And vice versa you can have the best design and flawless error logs but still fail if you’re not creating something that people want, especially if it takes you extra time and resources to create that “perfect product” while your competitors bypass you with a shittier product, but with faster iterations.
sah2ed 7y ago
I think the mental test could have been framed better using the IMHO far more intuitive framing used by Don Dodge in his 2008 article about how to assess a fresh batch of YC startups. Is your product a vitamin (nice to have) or a pain killer (a must have to improve quality of life)? https://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2008/03/does-your-start.html https://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2008/03/does...
carapace 7y ago
I hate it but you're wrong. (I agree with you, but I'm wrong too.) I used to work for a small company that made it big (you've heard of them.) We went from ~25k to ~250k users while I was there and the VCs were lining up to pound money up the founders' asses. Limosine rides and $500 steak dinners to woo them, the whole thing. I left, they eventually went public, and last I heard the Walton family owns it now or something. Anyway... The front-end guy "Chris" (not his real name) and the back-end guy were pals, and they would just push any old shit to production. The CEO had no clue, and I wasn't in a position to get them to stop. There was one other guy working remotely who didn't care or also had no clue. So, "Chris" (not his real name) would shit out some PHP, bang on the new feature or whatever for a few seconds, and if it worked even slightly at all he would push it. Shit broke all the time. The poor dumb users would be on the support forums telling each other how the heroic Chris was working furiously to fix it, and I'm sitting there fuming because Chris is the ruthless asshole using them as unpaid QA. That fucker is a millionaire now. Go figure.
- sonnyblarney 7y ago
  This is a very good anecdote, and helps us understand that 'shit' is in the eye of the beholder. If it solves a real problem, and allows companies to do 'xyz' , maybe it doesn't matter if there are bugs and glitches here and there. If there is only 'one kind of car' and that's all anyone knew, nobody would mind that there were always leaky oil issues if the alternative was 'horses'.
  - kyshoc 7y ago
    Indeed. The YC application has a question along the lines of "why is the thing you're building so compelling that customers will tolerate a buggy product?"
  - carapace 7y ago
    It's a terrible anecdote, it's only redeeming quality is that it's based on a true story. We could have fired Chris and replaced him the next day. We should have. We will never be able to know or quantify the loss accrued to Chris's irresponsible behavior. We got lucky. It costs nothing extra to write correct bug-free code if you know how, and bug-free code will always be preferable to buggy code.

codingdave 7y ago

> What would need to be true in 18 months for you to get essentially unlimited cheap capital? I'd first ask, what would need to be true in 18 months to never have needed capital, and to be self-sustaining as a bootstrapped organization. Raising funds should be an option, but not the assumed path of all products.

punnerud 7y ago
Easier and cheaper to raise some capital when you don’t need it (as backup and for scaling) than later.
- codingdave 7y ago
  I've heard that, too. But I've never bought into it. Maybe I'm naive, but it seems to me that giving up any equity when you don't need to is unwise. As far as easier and cheaper, I have not seen costlier terms sheets due to need. Easier... maybe, if you are doing so well that it is a no-brainer to want to be part of it. But then it gets back to the point of giving up equity when there is no need.
  - nikanj 7y ago
    Pay attention to the messenger too. If a VC tells you to raise money ”just in case”, they might mean ”I want in on your explosive growth”. Nothing wrong with that, just be mindful of people’s motives.
  - Arnt 7y ago
    In my experience, VCs are friendly, honest, helpful and understanding — and they absolutely will adjust their offers depending on whether you have time to shop around for better offers before you have to start laying off people or even closing altogether.
  - vchak1 7y ago
    The analogy I give is this - when you fly SF to NY, the pilot does not have exactly the correct amount of fuel to make the trip. That would be foolish. You'd want to have some reserve (say another hour or two of fuel) as insurance. Sure, that costs you equity, but its insurance equity.

lifeisstillgood 7y ago

>>> Why now? What’s true about the world that nobody else figured out yet? I have three ideas I am working on and the one i like best is ... not passing that test :-(

anderspitman 7y ago
Lists like this are models to help frame your thinking, not immutable laws set in stone. Maybe your idea can still work. If you want to do it, do it. Just proceed with caution.

blodovnik 7y ago

There's a school of thought that you must only build things that solve a problem or ease a pain or fix someone's dissatisfaction. This list seems very focused on that and seems to entirely miss asking questions like "is this cool or fun or entertaining"?

ThomPete 7y ago
Thats because thats how you normally get people to give you money. Fun or entertainment is in the hits based genre with no way of knowing if its going to be successful, there is nothing to aim at.
- blodovnik 7y ago
  >> Thats because thats how you normally get people to give you money. That's not right. People spend vast amounts of money and time on fun and entertainment hobbies education pleasure and leisure. It's misguided to focus only on finding problems that need solving and pain that needs alleviation.
  - macspoofing 7y ago
    >That's not right. People spend vast amounts of money and time on fun and entertainment hobbies education pleasure and leisure You'd think so but let me tell you - the hardest thing in the world is to convince someone to give you money for your product. You can easily get lots of compliments, lots of feedback, lots of positivity, but money? Oh boy. Just try and see how easy it is to find customers.
  - ThomPete 7y ago
    If you are making entertainment you aren't a startup in any meaningful term, you are an entertainer who is trying to create a hit that requires a very different way of thinking about things. You are more like a musician.
    - manquer 7y ago

macspoofing 7y ago

Almost every developer at some point will be approached by someone to work for free for some killer idea that that person had. In those cases, I found it useful to have them fill out a checklist list this, or put together a multi-page Executive Summary and a Business Plan. You'd be surprised how quickly you can get someone off your back and them off their idea, if they now have to go and do some actual work. And you never have to say 'no' and get that person offended.

randomsearch 7y ago
That's a great idea. Do you have a specific link you send them to?
- macspoofing 7y ago
  This checklist is actually pretty good. But I usually ask them to put together 30-50 page Business Plan with an Executive Summary. If they don't know how I tell them to look online for examples. In one case I pointed them at a local startup incubator that runs workshops for things like this. All this does is add up to a non-trivial (but not onerous and with little cash outlay) investment of THEIR time. And if this small investment of their time is too much work for them ... well, I guess they weren't that serious to begin with. So far I'm 5 for 5 when asked for a 50/50 partnership (where I do all the dev work and my partner is the 'idea man') and then never hearing again about the idea after I asked they put together this document - all without having to say 'no'. There has not been bitterness on their part, because next steps are on them. In the off-chance they will actually do this (and it hasn't happened yet), I will take it seriously and really consider it. But even if I decide not to pursue it, I feel like the exercise isn't a waste of their time as they will be able to use it when looking for funding or other partners.
  - dopeboy 7y ago
    As someone in your spot (solicited by ~10 or so people in the past couple years), this is an interesting response. On first blush, it seems to set an adversarial tone rather than a collaborative one. On the other hand, it's good due diligence and probably filters out the serious from the not so serious. I mostly agree with your response. I think the only place where it may not work is when the person wants a thought partner to help think through these things. There isn't always a strict dichotomy of duties in the framing of a venture - I think all partners should be involved in that. Different story when it comes to execution, though.

meerita 7y ago

I dislike the idea of the startup for "solving a problem". Problems are very specific, personal and not so broad as other options. In fact: 1. Not everyone has a problem. 2. Not everyone is aware is having a problem. 3. People bear problems. Even the worst ones (ex. health). So, why build your startup around a problem. Why don't you better build it around a "need". A need would be much stronger usage driver than problems.

xmprt 7y ago
A problem is tangible and can have a solution. A "need" isn't something that can easily be put in words unless it's "I need this problem to be solved."
randomsearch 7y ago
One of the biggest mistakes nerds make is to build a project, not a business. Business have to create value. Most businesses do that by solving problems. The difficulty with going for a "need" that is not "I need to solve this problem" is that you have to convince people that they have the need, and that your product best satisfies it. General needs (Maslow hierarchy etc.) tend to be vague and served by many different product types. Sure, there are exceptions, but most businesses solve problems and if you're not explicitly doing that then you're either taking a more difficult road, or you're not building a business.
- meerita 7y ago
  Exactly. Slack people created a new communicational need. There were email, forums, etc. Even chats, but they created a good product that enhanced the need to have better chat system to work better. They weren't solving any major problem. That is my point.
inapis 7y ago
I think this is just words getting interpreted differently. We just can't have strict definitions of words when it comes to contemporary conversations especially when we have to allow for ambiguity and benefit of doubt because everyone's vocabulary varies. Only scientific, technical, legal etc texts (specifically where non-ambiguity is demanded) need a strict definition. I'm building an alternative for Pocket/Instapaper because I find the current tools sorely lacking. No one needs it but it solves a legitimate problem in my life and hopefully those of others. Expanding onwards, no one "needs" a mobile phone, television, reddit or even HN itself but these solve legitimate problems in life. By the strictest definition, no one "needs" anything more than clean air, water, food and shelter. So needs can be approximated to problems for the sake of conversation around startups, ideas, business etc.

xondono 7y ago

Maybe it’s because I’m too negative, maybe it’s the cynical engineer in me, or maybe my ideas aren’t so good to start with, but every time I think I have a ‘good’ business idea, I tend to slaughter it through in a couple of days. Not one of them has passed my test..

inapis 7y ago
As an engineer, that is the biggest disservice you can do to yourself. Business needs a different mindset than engineering. Without actually putting it in the market and letting it stand for itself, you have no idea if it's ACTUALLY good or not. Or if it was just a fluke in your life. Sometimes, what you think are, terrible ideas can be legitimately life changing for other people.
sovande 7y ago
One trait most successful founders have is not being overly analytical. This correlate with higher education as well, the higher, the more analytical. Creating a successful startup is basically a lottery and it almost does not matter what idea you come up with. In this metaphor, smart and analytical people will not buy a lottery ticket because the cost vs the chance to win is just too small. But if you don't buy a lottery ticket you most certainly cannot win the lottery.
- vikramkr 7y ago
  I disagree. The trait needed is being intensely analytical but only with the right data. Its physically impossible to sit in a room, look at an idea or a lottery ticket, and analytically reason your way to knowing it is good or not. The only way to know is to get data on it from the real world, something you can't do with lottery tickets, and unlike lottery tickets, startups are not negative sum and there aren't rules to win and odds that you can't shift - the whole point is shifting odds of success.
  - sovande 7y ago
    I don't disagree, once you have crossed the rubicon. When Julius Caesar _actually_ crossed the Rubicon, the risk was immense and there was no guarantee of a successful outcome. That's what I mean, going all in on a risky adventure is not for everyone and if you analyse and think too much about it, few will want to take the jump. However, once you have crossed and are in the "battle" then of course you will use all the tactical advantages you can and try "shifting odds of success".

allenleein 7y ago

These are questions Michael Seibel mentioned that he likes to ask startups as part of his 2018 “Building Product” Startup School presentation: Problem What problem are you solving? What problem will be solved at the end of what you are doing? What do we expect the result to be? Can you state the problem clearly in two sentences? Have you experienced the problem yourself? Can you define this problem narrowly? Who can you help first? What can we address immediately? How do we get the first indication this thing is working? Is the problem solveable? Customer Who is your customer? Who is the ideal first customer? How will they know if your product has solved the problem? How often (frequency) does your user have the problem? Who is getting the most value out of your product? How intense is the problem? Are they willing to pay? How easy is it for your customer to find your product? Which customers should you run away from? Product Does your product actually solve the problem? Be truthful. How and why not? Which customers should you go after first? How do you find people who are willing to use your “bad” first versions of your product? Who are the most desperate customers as how do you talk to them first? Whose business is going to go out of business without using you? Are you discounting or starting with a super low price? Are you consider this approach? If so, why? Performance What are you using to measure how users are interacting with your product? What 5-10 metrics are you measuring to understand how your product functions? Why those metrics? When you build a new product or feature, what is the metric that will improve because of that feature/product? What number do you track to show how well your company is doing? What is your top level KPI (revenue, usage)? What are the underlying metrics that contribute to achieving your top level KPI (new users, retention of users, content created => DAUs at Social Cam)? Which of these metrics are you trying to move this development cycle? Product Development How long is your product dev cycle? What is causing it to be that long? Who is writing down notes at your product dev meeting? Which category does each of your brainstormed ideas fit: New features/interactions on existing ones; bug fixes/other maintenance; A/B tests? How easy/medium/hard are they to do? How can you restate the hard ideas (disaggregate idea into smaller ideas)? What parts of hard ideas are useless or hard? Are there other options? Which hard idea will improve act the KPI the most? Which medium? Which easy? What is the spec for the product/feature we want to build? Problem What problem are you solving? What problem will be solved at the end of what you are doing? What do we expect the result to be? Can you state the problem clearly in two sentences? Have you experienced the problem yourself? Can you define this problem narrowly? Who can you help first? What can we address immediately? How do we get the first indication this thing is working? Is the problem solveable? Customer Who is your customer? Who is the ideal first customer? How will they know if your product has solved the problem? How often (frequency) does your user have the problem? Who is getting the most value out of your product? How intense is the problem? Are they willing to pay? How easy is it for your customer to find your product? Which customers should you run away from? Product Does your product actually solve the problem? Be truthful. How and why not? Which customers should you go after first? How do you find people who are willing to use your “bad” first versions of your product? Who are the most desperate customers as how do you talk to them first? Whose business is going to go out of business without using you? Are you discounting or starting with a super low price? Are you consider this approach? If so, why? Performance What are you using to measure how users are interacting with your product? What 5-10 metrics are you measuring to understand how your product functions? Why those metrics? When you build a new product or feature, what is the metric that will improve because of that feature/product? What number do you track to show how well your company is doing? What is your top level KPI (revenue, usage)? What are the underlying metrics that contribute to achieving your top level KPI (new users, retention of users, content created => DAUs at Social Cam)? Which of these metrics are you trying to move this development cycle? Product Development How long is your product dev cycle? What is causing it to be that long? Who is writing down notes at your product dev meeting? Which category does each of your brainstormed ideas fit: New features/interactions on existing ones; bug fixes/other maintenance; A/B tests? How easy/medium/hard are they to do? How can you restate the hard ideas (disaggregate idea into smaller ideas)? What parts of hard ideas are useless or hard? Are there other options? Which hard idea will improve act the KPI the most? Which medium? Which easy? What is the spec for the product/feature we want to build? Doc link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ungItAgriaQk_lDI4aEJNigmmn0cSy93NW6rCZvujYM/edit?usp=sharing https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ungItAgriaQk_lDI4aEJNigm...

mlthoughts2018 7y ago

I see a lot of businesses that don’t create value, like Uber, or even destroy value in multiple senses, like Uber, that go relatively unpunished by markets and create huge financial windfalls for executives, investors and some employees. Similar things have happened with some cryptocurrencies. Often a business is run solely to generate enough hype to externalize losses onto an acquirer or public retail traders or unwitting retirement plan holders, while creating space for personal profit for a small set of people.

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randomsearch 7y ago
I see your point, thought I’d say “often” is not fair, we just see a disproportionate amount of coverage for these companies - for the problems you’re alluding to. My post is for those who want to build a solid business (I disagree with the other post above that startup = VC and hockey stick on HN - there’s plenty of overlap between here and indie hackers, for example).
karmakaze 7y ago
When we're talking 'value' here for startups, we mean value to the user. If Uber didn't produce any value for the user people wouldn't be taking them. Or if there was no value for the drivers they wouldn't drive. Whether or not people get windfalls from the process doesn't change what the end-user gets in the transaction.
- mlthoughts2018 7y ago
  > “If Uber didn't produce any value for the user people wouldn't be taking them” At current prices, which are unsustainbly low due to VC subsidy, people find value in the trade of money for the service. At a price that fairly reflects the cost of delivering the service unsubsidized and maintaining driver quality of life at a socially acceptable level, nobody would pay for it. So the game was to lever perceived market value up very high with VC subsidy and hype, all the while knowing that they are selling a dollar for fifty cents, just long enough to be acquired or go public at prices that pay back the original VC subsidizers at a multiple allowing them to profit, while whomever bought in is left holding the bag when the company is left in an unsustainable operating position and there’s no more hype-profit carrot to attract new subsidy investors.

viach 7y ago

Could it be narrowed to a single question "what's your marketing channel?"

rotten 7y ago

Is the only reason to create a startup to experience exponential growth and get really rich and have your own stock symbol? Or, could someone create a lifestyle business and call that a startup? Where the goals might be simply to make a living doing what you love without working for some big company somewhere? Or maybe could someone create a startup that makes the world a better place without concern for getting oneself crazy rich? I am not a fan of the idea that the only driving motivation for establishing a small tech company is to make the VC's happy.

dean177 7y ago
Whenever you see “startup” on hacker news, people are almost always referring to the aim for massive VC funding, exponential growth, get big or die trying types of companies. Paul Graham wrote an essay which differentiated startups from other new businesses based solely on growth: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
- rorykoehler 7y ago
  That essay is incredibly self serving. I think it should be taken with a pinch of salt. At very least any counter point to it shouldn't be immediately shut down with a link back to the essay. It's text book circular logic.
  - JasonFruit 7y ago
    They're not really making an argument here, just pointing out how people who use the word "startup" intend it to be interpreted.
    - jacquesm 7y ago
      > people Some people.
  - dean177 7y ago
    I wasn’t endorsing the essay or advocating for these hyper growth vc fuelled businesses, just pointing out that this checklist doesn’t apply to the kinds of businesses you were talking about if you accept this (common?) distinction between ‘startups’ and other kinds of new businesses.

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vskeleton 7y ago

Great list! Will use it in my lectures

phkahler 7y ago

All those future looking goals, who is going to benefit, how great will it be for them... what's your ticket symbol? I've been sitting on a possibly world changing idea that would be ruined by money. How do we foster those types of things?

rgoldste 7y ago
Potentially relevant article (soft-paywall) https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/technology/start-ups-rejecting-venture-capital.amp.html https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/tech...
kiliantics 7y ago
Build it as a co-operative where all the workers (and maybe even consumers) are also owners of the organisation, and have equal say in how it is run. Combine this with a clear mission and set of principles that all new members are taught so the organisation will stay on track for its initial purpose and keep democratic and equitable control.

karmakaze 7y ago

The ordering of points can be very important: Product 1. What are you building? <= 70 chars From the post I can tell the author is just organizing deeply considered thoughts. For a consumer of this checklist beware about thinking of the product first. By putting this as the first item, one can fall into the trap of shoehorning this answer into all the following points. As I'm sure others here have mentioned, fall in love with a problem not a solution or product. Usually it's best to find a narrow set of users who have this problem and explore around the problem to get a better picture of it. This can often lead to a different product solving a more key problem.

Liron 7y ago
Yes, most founders still get the order of operations wrong and build too much before understanding a problem. I actually think [1] the term "MVP" gives people a misleading idea of a lean startup, because you don't need a "product" per se to serve your first 10 users. [1] https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/the-lean-mvp-flowchart-add48d7bcbae https://medium.com/bloated-mvp/the-lean-mvp-flowchart-add48d...
- levythe 7y ago
  I've heard, "Product," be replaced with, "Prototype," where a prototype is not a pre-product but more a thing that can be offered that will give information about what needs you should be addressing, how the product might solve them, and help you identify who your most satisfied customers will be (among other things). While you still have the agility you can only get from zero operational overhead, worry more about finding something people want, who wants it, and why they want it. Scaling is less than worthless if what you're scaling is worthless.
  - karmakaze 7y ago
    This is great--I'm using "Minimal Viable Prototype" from now on. "Product" brings along so much expectation baggage. I also chose "Minimal" over "Minimum"--one being desirable with purpose and the other perceivable as deficient.
7y ago

EGordon 7y ago

This checklist will be great for the eternal entrepreneurs, looking for the perfect idea. You know who I'm talking about, those who never actually start something!

paul7986 7y ago

Id keep your ideas to yourself! Especially if they are novel!

hartator 7y ago

> Who is it for? I hate this question. I think it’s from the marketing from the past. Now you have one to one relationship with your customers. Who cares what marketing group they belongs to? At SerpApi.com, we have this issue constantly from industry outsiders. If you have the need, you’ll use us. If not, you don’t and that’s fine.

djstein 7y ago
hey this is actually a really interesting product. thanks for posting it
davidivadavid 7y ago
"Who is it for" can be answered through needs-based segmentation, i.e. exactly what you said. Who is it for? It's for people who need x,y,z. You still need to have a clear definition of that if you want to e.g. evaluate market size, or do any sort of marketing/sales afterwards.
maxlamb 7y ago
Why do you assume this question related to marketing at all? A company founder should always have an idea of what kind of people would most benefit/need the product, and target that audience first.

z3t4 7y ago

Ask yourself what do I need to do right now. If you can foresee the future start trading instead.

riantogo 7y ago

I would like to suggest a section called constraints. And to me that is the most important section to answer: Are you going to go at it full time or part time? How many hours in a week can you dedicate to it without wrecking relationships (kids, partner, friends etc.)? Do you see a path to raising funds or are you thinking of bootstrapping? If going all in, how much runway do you have if no funding came through? Did you know that the path to startup hell is paved with "but everyone told me it was a great idea"?

Waterluvian 7y ago

It's amazing to me how effective it is just to write down these things. I'm planning to rebuild my deck and I've been thinking and brainstorming for days. But just the act of writing down the step by step order of what is already in my head made me discover all kinds of holes in my plan. There's a magic there. You can be convinced you know something intimately but if you write it all down I almost guarantee you'll find holes.

aaronm14 7y ago
You (and others) may enjoy Adam Savage's new book. He was one of the Mythbusters guys. In one of the first chapters he writes about his love of lists and checklists, and the impact it makes on the process of "making." I'm only a few chapters in so far but it's been a fun read so far. It looks like there is an article talking about this specifically here on Wired if you want to dip your toes in: https://www.wired.com/story/adam-savage-lists-more-lists-power-checkboxes/ https://www.wired.com/story/adam-savage-lists-more-lists-pow...
- m33k44 7y ago
  Also there is Dr. Atul Gawande's "The Checklist Manifesto".
amorphous 7y ago
Somewhat related but it is amazing how clear things become to me when I draw a diagram about something I have to learn or build. Make visual connections leads to an immediate deeper understanding. It has become second nature for me to start up my diagramming app the moment I don't understand something

chiefalchemist 7y ago

Really good stuff, even for small and/or personal side projects. Under Bonus I'd like to add: Exit - What might that look like? If nothing else, I think it helps vet the previous assumptions.

galaxyLogic 7y ago

The article ... sorry wrong topic

hutch120 7y ago

Your questions are interesting, but I think are for MUCH later than an idea. My new idea list starts something like this: 1. Does this product/service exist and pretty much solve my problem? Then use that. 2. If not... I am the first customer... I am building it for myself because I want to use it. (If it's a network product, then find a partner for the idea.) 3. Evaluate MVP do I find it useful, am I using it regularly? Does it solve the problem for me? 4. Introduce someone else to your product/service maybe a friend or family and get them hooked. 5. Evaluate engagement is my friend still using it ... am I still using it? 6. Build features for you and them. 7. Evaluate ... do you guys both love it? 8. Get some more friends using it... if it's great maybe you even start to get strangers. Now get to your questions... how can I grow... how can I make money.

grogenaut 7y ago

The top section of the document is similar to amazon's PR/FAQ process, which having been forced to use to speak to amazon folks, I've found to be pretty good for getting your thoughts and end customer defined. It's actually pretty good for junior to mid level engineers as well: it keeps them from focusing on the pure tech they want to deliver and focus more on the why. I find a lot of people get stuck on what/how they want to deliver, thus delivering the wrong solution. I know it helped me out personally.

idoubtit 7y ago

In many cases, customer ≠ user. The customer that buys the product may not be the one that uses it. The OP makes no distinction. For example, hardware and software that help teaching are usually chosen by the school or the university. Teachers may have a word on this, but in my experience they rarely decide. Another example is products for children: some of them (e.g. educational games) clearly target the parents or relatives. Others (e.g. food) focus on the children, hoping they will persuade their parents.

wanderingstan 7y ago
Yes, and likewise all ad-supported business models like Google or Facebook, where the paying customer is the advertiser.

dandare 7y ago

These kinds of checklists may work for a product like Airbnb but will hardly work for something like Twitter or Instagram where the entrepreneur is rewarded for fulfilling a need that never existed before.

lelima 7y ago
>> fulfilling a need that never existed before. Phone text messages existed before, Messenger in desktop, even forums that work very similar to twitter. I might be wrong but I think the need was there, they improve a similar product with more features and Voila!
welfare 7y ago
You've been able to find properties to rent through craigslist since the beginning of the internet. Airbnb is not a new concept, but it's a revolutionizing UX.

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netdur 7y ago