Yesterday Epicenter, in conjunction with Fenwick and West, hosted an all day marathon for startups looking for funding.  This was the 3rd round and so those companies presenting, by and large, had interesting products and services, robust business models, and an average founder age of at least 10 or 15 years older than most of the Web 2.0 conferences I attend.  Draw your own conclusions, but remember correlation is the tool of the devil.

I was asked to serve on the "Getting Market Traction" panel; I am replaying some of my thoughts here. The important thing in my mind is to be clear as to what has changed and what has not.  More important is to pay attention to both, which I think often gets lost as markets heat up.

What Has Changed: Viral marketing is a must with I think two primary drivers.  The first is ad saturation.  Most of us are up to you-know-where with traditional ads (except for a few very clever exceptions) and will do our best to bypass them - think Tivo fastforward and popup blockers.  So "word-of-mouth" is more effective as it at least appears to come from a trusted source.

The second is the fact that network effects have become greatly amplified and you can therefore reach a greater number of people in a much shorter time frame.  Back in the olden days (2000) I was on the board of a startup.  Our marketing strategy was primarily viral, but back then it was slow and limited.  Today the number of people regularly participating on the net, not just observing the net, has changed those dynamics.  Web sites launched on Monday can have 200,000 unique visitors by Wednesday.

What Hasn't Changed: Understanding and paying attention to the real fundamentals of market behavior (people and how they behave) is critical.  And that hasn't changed nor do I expect it ever will. In other words, how do you keep the 200,000 visitors you received after 2 days?  At the end of the day people buy or use products and services that help them get something important done.  All the whizbang features in the world pale next to that important concept.  And if you can find a task that currently is not easily achieved, for example people cobbling together two or three disparate solutions to achieve one task of importance (landlines, cell lines, internet and VOIP to stay connected), and can replace them with one easy-to-use solution, you can create the holy grail of hypergrowth for your company.

Understanding and paying attention to how and why people are actually using what you offer can be a real eye opener - one to which technology companies often give short shrift.  One of my favorite stories is that of a clever fast food franchisee.  Answer this question: if I am selling milkshakes, against what am I competing?  Most people answer desserts, sweets, ice cream, snacks.  I have yet to hear the correct answer in this case which is breakfast foods - breakfast burritos, mcmuffins, and even our beloved latte and muffin.  Usually the reaction is one of surprise or disbelief.

 So listen to this.  A very clever owner of a fast food restaurant noticed that his sales of milkshakes were not limited to between the hours of  lunch to closing, but that in fact a significant number were sold between 7 -10 a.m.  Being somewhat bemused he decided to undertake finding out why; this is what he discovered.

Commuters have a need for something that will provide them a few things in one package: they can consume it with one hand without making a mess, they can get it without spending too much time, it will be filling enough to last them until their next food break, and it will provide something to do while they drive to help break the boredom.  Milkshakes provide all four with the added benefit of feeling like a treat. 

But knowing isn't the same as addressing or gaining leverage from the information, so this clever man took action.  He changed the product and the way he distributed it to maximize the experience his customers were attempting to fulfill.  First he made the shakes thicker so they would last longer, providing longer distraction during the commute and longer time until the next belly growl.  Next he pulled the milkshake machine out in front of the counter, enabling customers to avoid standing in line behind burrito lovers (both in the store and the drive through lane).  Further, he let customers buy prepaid shake swipe cards so they could self-serve and be in and out of the store as quickly as possible.

What's the lesson here?  Never assume you understand how people will use your product or service, and make sure you do take time to find out what job it is they are really trying to accomplish.  Milkshake: dessert or the perfect breakfast for commuters?

 

One day of DEMO07 and a couple of things became clear – the I’s definitely have it. For those of you who may not have heard of DEMO, it is a conference which brings together some of the hottest startups and venture capital. Each startup has 6 minutes to demo (hence the name) their product or service in addition to a very active pavilion floor. This year yielded 68 startups with 68 different and yet not so different offerings. Click here to see videos of the demos.

The I’s have it. Imagination, innovation and, of course, the shift to Individualizing content. Late in 2005 I was part of a trends workshop where one trend we identified we labeled “individual inc.” The shift from top down, one size fits all to completely customizable by the end user. The ability to do this has spawned new businesses now able to succeed by going after the long tail or meganiche

We see this happening for consumers; we see this happening in the enterprise. And the direction has reversed. Where the latest technology used to flow from business to consumer, we now see it flow from consumer to business. Marketers have even tried to name the hybrid professional and consumer – prosumer.

But let’s talk about what makes this conference so unique, so special: coolness abounds.  These are only a few - will add more tomorrow.

Inkless printers that you carry in your pocket or integrated with your cell phone using technology that the founder labels “magic.” Video messaging that is easy and seamless, enabling a kind of face-to-face communication that has been missing from our technology laden world – and of course I would be remiss if I didn’t point out it is running on top of java and java .

Video discovery and search, creating and embedding multimedia channels in your social networking page (pick any or all of them), creating personalized stories with diverse embedded content from multiple sources, all of which leverage 2.0 abilities to change dynamically without page reloading and create composites easily – no engineering degree needed.

Individuals. But individuals participating in communities that fit their interests, sharing their thoughts, lives and creativity with others in those communities. Human communities where the whole truly is greater than the sum.

I have been tagged more than once, so I have finally succumbed to posting 5 things people don't know about me.

 
1.  I used to be a professional chef with my own catering company, even have my name in the forward of an early East meets West cookbook.  In order to ensure my rent was paid, I waited tables part-time at Gulliver's near the SFO airport (which probably qualifies as #2, but wouldn't want to be accused of cheating).  Waiting tables is both fun and thankless; I learned a lot about human nature without losing my enjoyment of  people.  Still love to cook, especially for other people.

2. I turned down a job at Southwest back before they were known; it's one of the few decisions that I actually regret.  I was made the offer while doing #1, by Herb himself.  He was having a business lunch, apparently noticed my repartee (he was not "my table"), called me over and pitched taking a job with them because I was exactly the kind of person they were recruiting.  I did not want to move to Texas and turned him down.  Probably would have had a blast and done well.  Sigh...

 
3.  I was the first single mother in the Stanford Business School phd program.  They weren't set up for someone like me and yes it was difficult. I needed more money than the other students and also time to be a mom.  So between research, TA/RA for the MBA and Exec programs, and spending time with my daughter, my student years were anything but social and carefree. Professors across all fields knew I would grade anything. If you were in the MBA program at Stanford between 1992 and 1998, I probably graded your exams.

 
4.  I turned down a professorship at Cranfield School of Management, but only in part because the prospect of not much sun and living in the midst of Milton Keynes roundabouts was just not appealing.  I have never regretted that decision.

 
5. I used to run 35 miles a week, mostly on trails in the hills (PG&E most every weekend - those in the Bay Area will be able to attribute meaning and awe).  Then I started to work for a tech company...  nuff said.

 
So that's 5 - there are so many more, but then, that would be telling... 

Tagging: Terry M., Annette W., Rich G., Matthias M-P., and Jeremy B.

 

 

 

As you all must know by now, Sun has open sourced Java. Many others have written about it; for example check out Jonathan's and Rich Green's blogs for perspectives from slightly different angles. Rather than repeat what others have said about the wisdom of communities, network effects and innovation happening everywhere, I though I would go a different route.

I am here in Second Life (SL) awaiting the open Java launch event at the Sun Pavilion in Second Life. For those of you who do not know about Second Life, or who think of it as a place for gamers, it is truly so much more than that. SL represents a type of future which will need to be addressed on a broader level - and soon I think. It is a virtual world complete with real $$ commerce, thriving and evolving communities and the ability to determine your own destiny. You can take part in communities spanning a myriad of interests (and yes some of us may be offended by some of them, but that's what it means to have communities and to choose where you participate) or blaze your own trail. The tools within the SL world are simple enough that you can design and build just about anything of your choosing. It is a world with very few rules and premised on community tolerance of diversity, creativity and exploration.

It is therefore entirely appropriate, in my mind, that this next phase of Java's life be launched here also. By opening Java to the community at large, Sun is giving Java its second life. Broadly adopted across the planet, Java's second life promises to drive that breadth further, enabling uses of the technology that today even the smartest of us could not predict. Similarly SL is in a constant state of evolution - unpredictable, exciting and fun.  Not being able to predict exactly how Java will evolve and change over time is the most exciting part of this. 

The launch here had a slightly different tone than this morning's. While this morning focused on the whats and whys – with some fun look at the code launching into the community and Duke himself/itself(?) stepping into the time machine as he/it (?) was open sourced - the SL event was clearly developer focused.  Questions about forking the code, mixing code from Apache-based communities, innovating and so forth were more the focus.  The Pavilion is open all the time - here you can see videos and check out what else Sun offers.  The communities themselves are hosted on java.net.

The reaction here was positive.  It seemed to echo what we have been seeing in the press, in particular from the free software movement.  This is a good thing for the community, for Java and for Sun. 

And it is.                                       

 




One of our more esteemed Java ME developers, Stuart Marks, has made a point of differentiating the blogging that goes on here, Sun's external blogging site, from our internal blogging site.  The external site, he says, is part of the greater Blogosphere, while the internal site is dubbed, somewhat pejoratively, the Blogoprovinces.  Not wanting to be thought of as "provincial" has been enough of a motivator for me to shift my blog, albeit rather nascent, to the external site.  So, congratulations Stuart; you have enticed another colleague out from under the covers and into the great unbounded blogosphere.

Funny.  While I associate blogging with the whole movement toward open source and communities, my blogging is beginning exactly as I am shifting from out of software to a new role - no longer developing business models, business cases and ROIs for client software, I am off to discover a new way of looking at our customers, both current and future.  For all of Sun.  Not just software.  Just when I was finally getting the hang of it.

My bookshelf is already reverting its balance to more books focused on strategy, markets, innovation and predictive analytics, while relegating my recently burgeoning agile software development, software metrics and open source collection to a decreasing minority position.  Not that I'm a geek or anything - well not the kind you are likely thinking of anyway. 

I will continue to stay fascinated with the mobile market though - it is fast moving (read hard to predict and therefore interesting) and besides, the gadgets are so cool.  OK.  Perhaps buying unlocked phones from overseas on a somewhat regular basis qualifies me as a geek of sorts, but the American version of my phone (when it releases) won't have wifi - what's up with that?  It would appear that after seeing mine, a bunch of people seem to be ordering the E61 from the same place.  And maybe I like that - being the first on my block with something new and cool. 

So stay tuned.  I'm hoping to figure out this customer thing in a new and cool way - and I might just actually figure it out.

Moving my internal blog to the external site - copy and paste of entry 1 [Read More]