Blog Analysis

Blog Analysis

The introduction

You want to start a new business venture when you come up with an idea or just when you are interested in a new thing, while startup is always a complicated process, you should have a clear mind before starting your new venture. As a first-time entrepreneur, you may not have enough experience to do your own business, but do not be afraid to try and fail, failure is the mother of success. There are several cases of failed startup to help us know more about what to do or not to do when we start our own business, and we could find some common points in these cases. What’s more, their stories and experience can help us develop our own venture ideas.

Five important insights from my analysis of the blog plots about the process of new venture creation

1. Create value for customers

Good idea is not a product. Various ideas can be accepted, but it must be converted to suit the market demand of the product or service, that is the root of the business.

Any products have a common characteristic, which is to satisfy a certain demand of customer. Entrepreneurs should first consider whether their products can meet this feature. That is what the value proposition, creating significant value for customers by solving a significant problem or filling a significant unmet need for which they are willing to pay a premium. In the case of Lumos, founders did not do the due diligence on the idea before they started building their product, so they were not sure whether that customer was looking for the value that they were providing. Same with the case of Kolos, although the writer did not mention that clearly, I think he also ignored this very important point. He did not really know how customers think about his product, when he was reminded of how important talking to customers actually is, he just put up an online survey and started sending it out to all their subscribers, he still could not know what customers really want, and whether his product satisfies a customer need. So we really need to do a complete and detailed market research before we put our ideas into products.

2. Have a clear objective

As a startup, you are constrained in time and resources, so you need to identify the target market and customers of your product or service. The founders of Lumos said they were trying to do everything for everybody, the result is that made the product and the pitch very complicated. Your time and energy are limited, so it is always better to identify and solve one problem very well instead of solving n problems in a so-so way. “Try to be a drug for your customer instead of being a vitamin.”

3. A good financial planning is necessary

Nearly all of the blogs mentioned the importance of capital in their process of startup. We need to think about two main issues in financing new ventures, how much money you will need for start-up, and where you will get the money from. The founder of BitShuva Radio said that money is just business, it’s not insulting to ask for a lot of money. When he acquired his first client, he had no idea how much to charge, he just kept charging more and more. I do not agree what he said, indeed, we need to ask for enough money when we start the new venture, but we should have a clear mind about how much money we really need and set a standard. In addition, do not underestimate the difficulty of raising money. Adam overestimated the likelihood that he successfully raised money and he used a wrong way to evaluate the chances he raised money. Finally, you need to spend your funding carefully. The founder of Kolos thought the money would never end, so he used more of money for many things until he realized he was going broke.