If you’re looking to name a new company or product, it can be tricky to know how to go about it. Arielle Jackson of First Round Capital shared a great process for coming up with a name on Lenny’s Podcast. 1. Figure Out Your Positioning “For (target customer) Who (statement of need or Read more…
The idea of product-led growth is an appealing one to many company leaders. But is it really viable for your product? Elena Verna, an expert on product-led growth shared some great insights into this question in this episode of Lenny Rachitsky’s podcast. Here’s a quick run-down of some of the Read more…
How do you feel about your company’s product vision, product strategy and product roadmap? These are high-leverage areas where many companies could sharpen their thinking and ways of working to become more effective. One of my favourite product management experts, Marty Cagan (author of Inspired), was recently interviewed on the ‘This Is Product Read more…
One of the interesting things about online marketplaces is their inherent network effects. They’re hard to get going (not least because of the chicken-and-egg problem) but — if successful — can become very valuable as it’s hard for other businesses to compete. As a result of this defensibility, online marketplaces Read more…
Solving the chicken-and-egg problem is a key one for any marketplace business. Here’s one hack that uses scarcity to help with solving it. What is the marketplace chicken-and-egg problem? When you’re starting a marketplace, you typically have no customers and no suppliers. With no customers, it’s hard to get suppliers Read more…
How do you find and hire a CTO for your business? As a business owner you might be looking to find a CTO for a number of reasons: You have an established business and are looking for someone with the experience to help you use technology more effectively and strategically. Read more…
If you’re interested in how to start a successful marketplace, Matt Mickiewicz is a man to study. Matt has previously started two successful marketplaces: Flippa and 99designs. His latest business, Hired.com, is a job marketplace which — after just three years — is doing tens of millions of dollars in annual sales and has raised Read more…
What makes some online marketplaces billion dollar successes and others costly failures? Uber and Airbnb are forging ahead relentlessly. Yet Homejoy, having raised $40 million in funding, ended up shutting down. Why? How much is down to execution and luck, and how much to fundamental differences between the industries they chose to play in or Read more…
How do you build an online marketplace from scratch? Thumbtack, an online marketplace for local services, yesterday announced a $100M funding round led by Google Ventures. Building a local services marketplace is a notoriously difficult problem that has beaten many entrepreneurs. So how did Thumbtack get where they are? What tactics are behind Read more…
What churn rate can you expect for your subscription box business? What’s a good churn rate? What’s a bad churn rate? If you haven’t yet launched, what number should you put in your business plan? I wrote in a previous post about typical subscription e-commerce retention rates and how, when considering launching a subscription Read more…