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The Pivot

dilbert.com

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Re: The Pivot

#31

Post by wdewind »

wlievens wrote: post #23
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

The big question is: how do you discover and identify a good b2b problem that needs solving in the first place.

A lot of the "throw it up there and see what happens" movement comes from young engineers who literally lack the life experience to know what problems to solve. Given that scenario, and the intense pressure that comes from SV for young people to succeed, the approach makes sense, but there is a longer term, more considered approach to things. Especially for B2B startups, the best way to come up with an idea is to work at larger businesses and see what problems they are facing. Of course, if you are a young person who knows they want to start a startup, this seems like a roundabout approach, and one that requires a lot of faith. It's hard, and I see why people are attracted to "release, iterate, release," but I don't think it's the best approach.

This doesn't mean you don't iterate. A lot of the lean startup stuff is still useful to us (a/b testing for more focused UI etc.). But generally speaking, we know where the product is going, and our customers' needs, often better than them.

Re: The Pivot

#32

Post by DirtyAndy »

wlievens wrote: post #23
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

The big question is: how do you discover and identify a good b2b problem that needs solving in the first place.

Two ways I can think of. 1. You do a real job for a while. Work in a large organisation, see what pain points they have, which ones are probably similar to other businesses and which ones probably don't involve terabytes of proprietary data that they would never be able to shift to an SaaS solution (by never I mean politically not technically). And I don't mean working for tech firm. Be on an IT team for a pharmaceutical company, a food company, packaging company, logistics etc. Be open and offer to help people (outside of IT) and you'll be amazed what ideas they give you.

Way 2. Mix with people in the real world that work in the companies above. Listen to their problems, offer solutions, offer to pop in after work one day or on a weekend and look at their problems.

Re: The Pivot

#33

Post by wdewind »

bjelkeman-again wrote: post #27
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

Some days I just think my world, B2B but governments and multilaterals rather than businesses, is just too slow moving. Other days I think that it is really quite interesting to see that quite simple tech can be hard to implement in organisations that haven't understood tech to be important until recently. It is nice though to move people from paper processes to mobile/SaaS/cloud and near-real time data collection an…

> Feels decidedly light-side.

Possibly, but doesn't quite have the ring to it :)

Re: The Pivot

#34

Post by dueprocess »

It doesn't sound like a psychology experiment Scott is talking about, but a "stumble-upon" strategy. Psychology is a little more elegant than just pivot, pivot, pivot.

Re: The Pivot

#35

Post by crawshaw »

This notion of commodity technology doesn't apply to every startup. Boston Dynamics was not a company slapping together commodity technology and testing user behavior.

But it does apply to a lot of startups. And that's why I work for a big company, because I'm here for long-term big change, not fashion and profit.

Re: The Pivot

#36

Post by AndrewKemendo »

wlievens wrote: post #23
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

The big question is: how do you discover and identify a good b2b problem that needs solving in the first place.

You probably have to have actually done the job to know where the pain points are. B2B problems (that aren't also consumer problems) are not something you can easily find in my experience.

Re: The Pivot

#37

Post by TeMPOraL »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #2

The internet is a psychology experiment? Well, maybe a tiny fraction of it. You know, those spammy pages where they promise something amazing if only you'll enter your email address. I'm not sure we need more of that. Its like someone pretending to sell brushes wanting in your house, who keeps glancing around casing the joint while blathering some spiel. As a model for qualifying internet product plans, its going to…

> You know, those spammy pages where they promise something amazing if only you'll enter your email address.

You mean, like most of the startups nowdays?

Re: The Pivot

#38

Post by natural219 »

This is a great blog post, but I want to point out that this is not a new idea, just a way to express an old idea using new terms ("pivot", "startups", etc.)

What Scott is trying to express is that, in a capitalist economy, money is the goal. The process of getting money, once technical innovation is subtracted, is called Marketing. The process of doing Marketing is to understand psychology -- given a set of craftable stimuli, how can you influence the ape to swipe her credit card.

Re: The Pivot

#39

Post by lifeisstillgood »

wlievens wrote: post #23
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

The big question is: how do you discover and identify a good b2b problem that needs solving in the first place.

Speak to upper-mid-level managers in every enterprise who will go for coffee. Start narrowing down on the problems you hear. Be industry specific, rather than "generic" (a solution to a regulatory requirement beats "a calendar app"

In a month you will know which problems stand out

Start marketing around that problem, build an audience, evangelise something valuable.

Take your own good advice :-)

Re: The Pivot

#40

Post by freshhawk »

wlievens wrote: post #23
wdewind wrote: post #12

For those of us not working on cat photo sharing products for the ever shifting consumer market there is considerably less luck, throwing random stuff at the wall, and pivoting involved. B2B SaaS is pretty nice. Join us on the dark side :)

The big question is: how do you discover and identify a good b2b problem that needs solving in the first place.

Got some great pithy advice about this a while ago: find something still being done with paper and fax machines.

There are a ridiculous number of them out there.

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