Bury dead unicorns

In the world of IT business there are a huge number of different kind of blockbusters, but the products that have been ordered to live even longer. Many people think that the worst thing that can happen to a product or company is death, but it’s not. In fact, it is much worse when the product turns into a zombie .



Such a strange form of being when a startup did not become successful and did not finally merge. It seems to be nothing, some users are available, a relatively stable, but insignificant flow of funds, allowing the project to stay afloat, and absolutely no development, like a traffic flow after a heavy snowfall on the Moscow Ring Road from Schelkovskogo highway to the 22nd kilometer.



Zombies take time and resources and slow down their team. “Zombies” services require security updates, need to be monitored, and of course, updates when the APIs of third-party products are changed. Mobile zombies products need to be updated to work with new form factors and must be compatible with new versions of mobile operating systems. But the most important thing is that the "zombies" have a significant psychological burden on the development team.



Technological developers are mostly fairly pragmatic people, and almost always realize when they are working in the interests of a zombie product. Any "undead" always has certain characteristics and traits. A small number of customers, the absence or extremely low number of new customer registrations, slow or absent growth in traffic, zero effectiveness of marketing activities and the lack of new sales, and these are just some of the most pronounced signs of a zombie.

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Some people may think, “well, that at least I have at least some work,” and I would not say that such a position is fundamentally wrong. No wonder Bill Gates said that "frying burgers in McDuck is not below dignity and our great-grandfathers would call any - even this - work, a very good chance . " Although today qualified professionals and so do not have problems with obtaining decent work. Work on the product of "zombies" in the current environment - the surest way to crush the morale of the team and the loss of its best members. Now there are a large number of successful products and companies that right now desperately need intelligent specialists.



Successful products acquire new customers, are subject to new requirements and demands, and, importantly, eliminate new inevitable errors discovered by enthusiasts. In this case, the only criterion that really matters, both in the initial stages of project development and in the future, is the dynamics of development or in English traction . For any investor, this is the primary parameter of a startup, which indicates the feasibility of investments. If there are no dynamics, dry the oars, your project is rapidly becoming a “zombie”, and the best thing you can do for yourself is to stop wasting resources on product support and improvement. In such a situation, it is useful to recall one ancient Indian proverb: “the horse is dead - get down!”

Of course, you need to take all possible steps to provide alternatives for your customers, even if your competitors do it, but efforts in this direction will not be in vain, because they will leave a good impression about you that you may need in the future.



Most often, traction is measured in the number of active users, the number of closed sales or the volume of transactions. Usually, if after 12 months of functioning of the product traction does not grow, the current situation indicates an inevitable and sad end.



Google, as you know, closes the products, which in their opinion are moving into a "zombie" state. Many users of Google services have been upset by this state of affairs when a corporation buried products with tens of thousands of users, including myself, but the company’s courage in the ability to “pull the trigger” in such situations deserves great respect. I believe that everyone should remember this example. Business - the territory of pragmatics and romantic experiences are inappropriate here.



“Zombies” always hold back development and slow down progress, and sometimes they can lead to the collapse of teams and the care of the best specialists to competing companies. Do you need it?