skmurphy

Dave Stubenvoll Guest for “Origin & Evolution of New Business” Oct-26-2011

Books, skmurphy / By /

Our “Book Club For Business Impact” promises actionable insights for entrepreneurs and change agents, drawn from the panelist’s experience and informed by the book’s content. Dave Stubenvoll, CEO of Wowza Media, joins the discussion of Amar Bhide‘s “Origin and Evolution of New Business” this Wednesday October 26 at Noon PDT.  Click  http://skmbhide111026.eventbrite.com/?discount=WowzaMedia to attend at […]

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What Happens When The “Come As You Are Party” is Over

1 Idea Stage, 2 Open for Business Stage, skmurphy / By /

“Nobody makes a video game about the quartermaster division, but armies win and lose on logistics and supply, and politics and diplomacy, and the work people do on the homefront.” Mike O’Malley in “History-ness and Video Games“ The first stage of a bootstrapped startup is a “come as you are” party. The founders are living

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Malcolm Gladwell Suggests Appreciative Inquiry Into Inner-City Schools

Customer Development, skmurphy / By /

From a Time Magazine December 2009 interview with Malcolm Gladwell I’ve always been fascinated by the idea that in inner-city schools, the thing they do best is sports. They do really, really well in sports. It’s not correct to say these schools are dysfunctional; they’re highly functional in certain areas. So I’ve always wondered about

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Appreciative Inquiry Mindset Essential to Customer Discovery

3 Early Customer Stage, Customer Development, skmurphy / By /

Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a mindset that is essential in customer discovery. It encourages you to look for what’s working in an potential customer’s organization and “work with the grain of the wood.” It enables you to build on demonstrated strengths and accomplishments in framing your solution to a critical business problem.

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Customer Development Conversations With Busy Prospects

3 Early Customer Stage, Customer Development, skmurphy / By /

Question from an entrepreneur in the midst of customer discovery for a new product. Q: We are preparing to launch our first product in a few months. Next week there is a conference sponsored by a professional society that represents one of our potential target markets.  We have already done about a dozen customer discovery

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Selling to a Business Requires Conversations that Build Trust

3 Early Customer Stage, Customer Development, Demos, skmurphy / By /

I am always interested in having a conversation with a prospect. If you are hoping to infer needs from seeing them press a menu button with an icon or one or two words on it I think that’s a poor substitute for a conversation. I know that people cannot always predict what they need or

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Learning From Netflix’s 2011 Pricing Strategy Mistakes

skmurphy / By /

“Never mistake a clear view for a short distance.” Paul Saffo “We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.” Roy Amara Netflix increased prices by 60% for streaming media and DVD combinations and threatened to split their website into two halves–DVD and

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Real Clear Technology Aggregates Mainstream Media on Technology

skmurphy / By /

I like Hacker News for early information and insights on technology.  But I find the newly launched Real Clear Technology site useful to understand mainstream perception of the impact of technology innovation. It’s a branch off the Real Clear Politics site, my hope is that they build it out to match the same feature set.

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The Risk of General Purpose Toolkits as a First Product

2 Open for Business Stage, skmurphy / By /

I will sometimes encounter an entrepreneur or team who is developing “a general purpose toolkit for X.” This may be at a Bootstrapper Breakfast or other networking event. They have often developed a core of a promising technology and see applications for it everywhere. Here is what I normally suggest: Write up a few examples

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