I am a veteran of the market leader in a section of our industry that sees a lot of start-up competition. Perhaps the most start-up competition. I had a number

I am a veteran of the market leader in a section of our industry that sees a lot of start-up competition. Perhaps the most start-up competition. I had a number of roles over the course of my stay. One of them was to watch for threats on the horizon, estimate how far they will go, and figure out how to stay ahead of them if they were to become any real threat. I reported directly to senior management. I have an unusual (and hopefully elucidating) perspective on this topic. In my experience, MVP products go one of two ways: Either they never grow, and eventually disappear; or they grow too quickly, drop in quality, and disappear. Either way, they disappear. In my section of the market, you get very little attention unless you're swinging for the fences. Not that swinging for the fences is a recipe for success, but it's certainly an ingredient. I mainly watch for three things (this list is hugely oversimplified): - Do they understand our audience? If my interaction with their product is fatiguing, they don't understand our audience. If their copy or humor or interface isn't equally accessible to a 46 year old mother of two in Nebraska and a 28 year old lawyer in New York City, they don't understand our audience. If they haven't convinced me that they have all of the information they need to serve me informed results, they don't understand our audience. If, after one session, I feel I've seen everything there is to see; they don't understand our audience. - Do they have the technological ability to produce magic? If they can do more in a timely fashion (under 130ms per page load) with limited hardware than we can with our huge budget, they are capable of magic. If their results are good I can't figure out how they do what they do, they are capable of producing magic. If I am seeing something I haven't seen before (and it's good), they are capable of producing magic. - Are they passionate enough to stick around? Production quality shows me passion. A tight and intuitive flow shows me passion. Well written help/tutorials shows me passion. What I saw most was MVP products, and none of them survived long enough to warrant planning a fight. My section of the market might be different than yours. The lessons learned during the MVP V1 may have been enough to show our new friends that they don't want to be a part of our game. I don't know. Some companies make it, and they get acquired. We acquired a number of them.