The Art & Science of Building World Class Tech Products

12 Lessons from the Startup Trenches

Amit Ranjan

My Background


'It takes a combination of art & science to build world class products.

Creating something from nothing requires an instinctive, artistic flair but scaling it massively requires a disciplined scientific approach'


Startup - From First Principles

• 'A startup is a temporary organization searching for a repeatable & scalable business model -Steve Blank'

Create → Repeat → Scale

Startup Life Cycle


Minimum Viable Product

MVP is an early version of the product that gives maximum learning about customers with least effort.


Rationale for MVP: Startups ≠ Perfect

'If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you've launched too late -Reid Hoffman'

Product Market Fit (PMF)

PMF is the degree to which a product satisfies a strong market demand.


How do you know you have PMF?

Consumer PMF looks like*

• ❖ Organic growth - 1000s of signups/day
• ❖ Returning users - 100s of users returning 3 days/week
• ❖ Clear path to 100K users

Enterprise/SAAS PMF looks like*

• ❖ Freemium-to-paid conversion rate 5%
• ❖ LTV/ CAC ratio > 3
• ❖ Monthly churn rate < 2%
• ❖ Clear path to $100K MRR
Startup Funnel Metrics

Funnel metrics is visualizing the product's key workflow in terms of a conversion funnel.


Simplified Funnel Metrics

Stripped down version of Funnel Metrics

• ❖ Acquisition
• ❖ Retention
• ❖ Revenue

SlideShare version of Funnel Metrics*

• ❖ Distribution (Team 'distro')
• ❖ Engagement (Team 'engage')
• ❖ Monetization (Team 'biz')
Speed Now. Scale Later.


• ❖ Speed is a startup's secret weapon
• ❖ Done > Perfect
Virality = Focusing on Width (v/s Depth)


• ❖ Virality is ability of an object to self replicate
• ❖ Single minded focus on new user acquisition
• ❖ Optimize viral loops
• ❖ Viral CoEfficient* > 1
3 Point Thumb Rule for Product Prioritization

Product Features (prioritizing for a product)

• ❖ Metrics movers
• ❖ Satisfiers
• ❖ Delighters

Product Roadmap (prioritizing overall product plan)

• ❖ Core
• ❖ Strategic
• ❖ Venture
Prioritizing Product Feedback

• ❖ One person's opinion (OPO) / Highest paid person's opinion ( HiPPO)
• ❖ Strong suggestion
• ❖ Vocal minority phenomenon
• ❖ Mandate

The context for feedback as imp as feedback itself!

Focus on your core, Outsource non-core complexity


• ❖

Cloud: AWS, Azure

• ❖
• Hosting: Digital Ocean, Softlayer
• ❖

Billing: Braintree, Razorpay

• ❖
• Analytics: Mixpanel, Clevertap
• ❖ Voice: Twilio

Don't Reinvent the Wheel! Engineers (by default) like building new shiny tech toys:)

Consumer v/s SAAS User Values & Functionality



Manage the Holy Grail -Failure, Risk, Ambiguity



Risk Taking

Ambiguity

MVP, Lean, Agile are all ways to manage risk!



Let's



https://twitter.com/amitranjan


• https://twitter.com/amitranjan
• in http://in.linkedin.com/in/amitranjanprofile

Thank You

References