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Hi, Got it on Kindle. Going through it. I will definitely be reading it with great interest. I have a question: What would you say are your top 3 learning/'key

Hi, Got it on Kindle. Going through it. I will definitely be reading it with great interest. I have a question: What would you say are your top 3 learning/'key insight' from writing this book? [These need not be just top 3 things to do to get traction. But anything that you realized/gained from the whole experience/time that you spent researching/writing/thinking this book.] Edit: corrected typo

justinmares 12y ago
Awesome! Top 3 learnings are hard to pull out, but roughly: 1. Most startups fail because they can't get traction, not because they can't build a product. 2. Many startups focus too exclusively on product and ignore traction until they launch. This leads to this situation where a startup will spend 3-6 months building something, launch, and then realize they need to start marketing in order to hit profitability or raise their next round of funding. However, they're starting from square one again and with half the money they started with gone. We talk about companies that focus on traction and product in parallel. This leads to a dynamic where companies are testing acquisition channels early on and launch to a group of beta customers. Additionally, they have a better understanding of which acquisition channels are effective, which means they can scale those channels up as after they have a more fleshed out product. 3. We found that founders and marketers have a bias towards using channels they know. Many founders never consider channels outside those they have experience with - usually Facebook/Adwords/content marketing - which means they don't acquire customers in unique ways their competition isn't. Thinking holistically about each of the 19 channels is a much better approach, and allows you to potentially acquire customers in a more cost-effective way than your competitors. Dropbox is a great example of this. There were many file storage companies around before Dropbox, but none that used referral marketing as their main acquisition channel.

justinmares 12y ago

Awesome! Top 3 learnings are hard to pull out, but roughly: 1. Most startups fail because they can't get traction, not because they can't build a product. 2. Many startups focus too exclusively on product and ignore traction until they launch. This leads to this situation where a startup will spend 3-6 months building something, launch, and then realize they need to start marketing in order to hit profitability or raise their next round of funding. However, they're starting from square one again and with half the money they started with gone. We talk about companies that focus on traction and product in parallel. This leads to a dynamic where companies are testing acquisition channels early on and launch to a group of beta customers. Additionally, they have a better understanding of which acquisition channels are effective, which means they can scale those channels up as after they have a more fleshed out product. 3. We found that founders and marketers have a bias towards using channels they know. Many founders never consider channels outside those they have experience with - usually Facebook/Adwords/content marketing - which means they don't acquire customers in unique ways their competition isn't. Thinking holistically about each of the 19 channels is a much better approach, and allows you to potentially acquire customers in a more cost-effective way than your competitors. Dropbox is a great example of this. There were many file storage companies around before Dropbox, but none that used referral marketing as their main acquisition channel.