How to stir up a startup: webdwanolera manual (part 1).
So. Discard doubt. Set a portrait of Bryn in a frame. We stock up on "Doshirak" for six months ahead and start a startup. What topic? Do not care - billions of dollars call us ahead. Those who are ready, but for what - do not know, this manual is dedicated.
The strategic goals of a startup can be three:
All sorts of altruistic motives are not considered here, since they, as a rule, are well disguised by the same strategic objectives indicated. Depending on the strategy, the idea of ​​a startup is generated.
In the first case, the idea should be tracing paper from an existing successful project. We take the description of such a project and change the adjectives in it for words from the list. The list of words is made taking into account the interests of our sponsor: in no case should the words fall within the scope of his immediate interests, in which he is well versed, otherwise the startup will be covered with a basin even before the main amount has been cut. However, the words should not be abstruse and incomprehensible. The easiest way is to hold a conversation with the sponsor on abstract topics for a glass of tea and to insert these keywords into your speech from time to time, watching his vasomotor reactions. The words for which the maximum conditioned reflex is obtained are entered into the list. An example of the resulting idea:
Description of the original project:
Idea options:
Or easier:
Although, it is to blame, this has already happened ... Very well, if the resulting idea somehow correlates with your interests and knowledge, although this is not necessary for the implementation of the first strategic task. For lovers of a scientific approach, I can recommend brain storming , focal objects , and synectics to create a list of words, but in this case a better method than analyzing the expression of the sponsor’s eyes is hard to come up with.
In order to realize the second strategic goal, it is necessary to select and stake out in the open spaces of the Network, which has not yet been occupied, but a very warm place. There are two ways to do this:
The network is developing so fast that it is one big dissatisfaction. Therefore, to find an unmet need easier than ever. You need to look for problems in stages: first, within the life of your Network Society, then within the life of the Network as a whole, and finally, in real life. Search methods may be different. The simplest method is the synectics method in the form of a fantastic analogy. In other words, you contrast the elements of your real-life programmer, user, just a good person, with your ideal ideas about how it should be. It is likely that another group of people shares your views on the problem. They are your potential clientele.
A simple example: you write a lot or copy-paste on Habré or other blogs, but their functionality does not suit your creative needs anymore. In addition to YouTube videos, you want to embed other active content in your posts, such as profiles, microapplets, etc. But you don't agree with learning and mastering JavaScript, ActionScript and others like them. Now, if there was a service that allowed a couple of mouse movements to create, albeit somewhat primitive, but arbitrary active content and insert it into all existing blog aggregators. The idea on the surface: to base Flex (or non-Flex), to make a user-friendly RAD-service with hosting the generated active content and to give users a mesh-up.
A more complex, but also more productive method for generating a startup idea is the method of morphological analysis in combination with the method of focal objects. The method of morphological analysis is based on dividing the structure of the problem (in our case, the problem of implementing an effective web 2.0 service) into parts, determining possible implementations of these parts and generating a new idea, by combining these realizations. Sounds harder than done ...
The first part of our problem will be the motive. Any Web 2.0 project exploits some elemental human passions:
These components rarely act separately. For example, creative motives and the desire to join society create various kinds of social networks, such as Habr. Laziness (or more politically correct - rational distribution of efforts) in combination with freebies provides popularity to any kind of network services, such as Google Docs. The most successful will be the idea that combines all of these motives.
The second component of the problem is the startup application object. Here we must choose a certain area of ​​human relations, for example, financial relations, collecting, art, sports, etc. For example, I heard the opinion that in the States, any project related to baseball or weight loss is doomed to success. In drawing up the list of alternatives, it is better to focus on those industries where the mass of the middle-income people is spinning, since there is nothing to take from the poor, and the rich themselves will not give anything (therefore they are rich).
The third part of the problem is innovation. What - in general, all the same. The main objectives of the innovation are:
Now there are a lot of proven innovative technologies to choose from: folxonomy , fuzzy sets , Bayesian networks , peer-to-peer networks , applied cryptography methods , neural networks , genetic algorithms , etc. For example, on Habré, such an innovation is the system of karma. Believe me, all these technologies are not as complex as their names imply. Of course, you can do without innovation, but this will significantly reduce the advantages of your project over its competitors.
After dividing the problem into component parts and creating a list of alternatives for their implementation, we need to generate several ideas, among which we should choose the only one, on the basis of which our startup will be built. Let's look at an example:
The idea of ​​a service emerges - a social network, for easy creation of flash-cartoons, exchange of characters, ratings, votes for cartoons. To make it easier to create and animate characters, we can use fuzzy sets: let the character be controlled not by dragging anchors with the mouse, but by linguistic commands like “go faster”, “smile”, etc.
After the generation of the idea, it must be brought to its logical end, capturing, in the future, all possible aspects of its implementation. So, for our example, why not create a virtual animated world, like SecondLife, with its own currency (thirst for profit), in which users could trade in the most successful characters, cartoon objects, etc. It would be nice to make a mesh-like YouTube, but maybe an active type in which the user can influence the cartoon script. And so on...
The last and most difficult step is competitive analysis. Why difficult? Because psychologically it is very difficult to make yourself convinced that your unique and brilliant idea has long been realized by others. Here we need to recall the requirements of Dzerzhinsky to the employees of the bodies, soberly analyze the competitors and decide on the revision and implementation of the idea or return to the starting point.
The continuation follows. Further:
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Strategy
The strategic goals of a startup can be three:
- take off the foam (from a circled idea, from an investor, from your family) and dump;
- To earn a modest amount on a lakeside house and a modest bank account that would ensure our modest life until the end of days;
- become the head of a mega-super-duper corporation, and so that Gates, Ballmer, Bryn and Paige were on our packages.
All sorts of altruistic motives are not considered here, since they, as a rule, are well disguised by the same strategic objectives indicated. Depending on the strategy, the idea of ​​a startup is generated.
Idea
In the first case, the idea should be tracing paper from an existing successful project. We take the description of such a project and change the adjectives in it for words from the list. The list of words is made taking into account the interests of our sponsor: in no case should the words fall within the scope of his immediate interests, in which he is well versed, otherwise the startup will be covered with a basin even before the main amount has been cut. However, the words should not be abstruse and incomprehensible. The easiest way is to hold a conversation with the sponsor on abstract topics for a glass of tea and to insert these keywords into your speech from time to time, watching his vasomotor reactions. The words for which the maximum conditioned reflex is obtained are entered into the list. An example of the resulting idea:
Description of the original project:
Digg is a social news site with a focus on technology, science, politics and entertainment. It combines social bookmarking, blogging and syndication, as well as democratic moderation of content by users.
Idea options:
Bratan is a social news site with a focus on financial and lohotron topics , as well as dealing with the problem of cutting dough and lowering suckers at the entrances . It combines social bookmarking, blogging and syndication, as well as moderating content by concepts .
Or easier:
Rbah is a social news site with a focus on IT , as well as affecting the psychological and social problems of programmers . It combines social bookmarks, blogs and syndication, as well as, as it were, democratic moderation of content by users on concepts .
Although, it is to blame, this has already happened ... Very well, if the resulting idea somehow correlates with your interests and knowledge, although this is not necessary for the implementation of the first strategic task. For lovers of a scientific approach, I can recommend brain storming , focal objects , and synectics to create a list of words, but in this case a better method than analyzing the expression of the sponsor’s eyes is hard to come up with.
In order to realize the second strategic goal, it is necessary to select and stake out in the open spaces of the Network, which has not yet been occupied, but a very warm place. There are two ways to do this:
- identify the unmet need of a relatively large group of web users and satisfy it;
- create a previously missing user need and allow them to meet it.
The network is developing so fast that it is one big dissatisfaction. Therefore, to find an unmet need easier than ever. You need to look for problems in stages: first, within the life of your Network Society, then within the life of the Network as a whole, and finally, in real life. Search methods may be different. The simplest method is the synectics method in the form of a fantastic analogy. In other words, you contrast the elements of your real-life programmer, user, just a good person, with your ideal ideas about how it should be. It is likely that another group of people shares your views on the problem. They are your potential clientele.
A simple example: you write a lot or copy-paste on Habré or other blogs, but their functionality does not suit your creative needs anymore. In addition to YouTube videos, you want to embed other active content in your posts, such as profiles, microapplets, etc. But you don't agree with learning and mastering JavaScript, ActionScript and others like them. Now, if there was a service that allowed a couple of mouse movements to create, albeit somewhat primitive, but arbitrary active content and insert it into all existing blog aggregators. The idea on the surface: to base Flex (or non-Flex), to make a user-friendly RAD-service with hosting the generated active content and to give users a mesh-up.
A more complex, but also more productive method for generating a startup idea is the method of morphological analysis in combination with the method of focal objects. The method of morphological analysis is based on dividing the structure of the problem (in our case, the problem of implementing an effective web 2.0 service) into parts, determining possible implementations of these parts and generating a new idea, by combining these realizations. Sounds harder than done ...
The first part of our problem will be the motive. Any Web 2.0 project exploits some elemental human passions:
- greed, as an option - just freebies;
- the desire for their greatness, manifested in the Web, as a rule, in one form or another creative forms;
- trivial laziness, which is known to be the engine of progress;
- a sense of belonging to the pack, society, giving some inner comfort;
- curiosity, the need to take something brains, relieve stress, etc.
These components rarely act separately. For example, creative motives and the desire to join society create various kinds of social networks, such as Habr. Laziness (or more politically correct - rational distribution of efforts) in combination with freebies provides popularity to any kind of network services, such as Google Docs. The most successful will be the idea that combines all of these motives.
The second component of the problem is the startup application object. Here we must choose a certain area of ​​human relations, for example, financial relations, collecting, art, sports, etc. For example, I heard the opinion that in the States, any project related to baseball or weight loss is doomed to success. In drawing up the list of alternatives, it is better to focus on those industries where the mass of the middle-income people is spinning, since there is nothing to take from the poor, and the rich themselves will not give anything (therefore they are rich).
The third part of the problem is innovation. What - in general, all the same. The main objectives of the innovation are:
- reducing your expenses
- providing functional advantages to your startup over competitors
- improving the performance of your startup business model
Now there are a lot of proven innovative technologies to choose from: folxonomy , fuzzy sets , Bayesian networks , peer-to-peer networks , applied cryptography methods , neural networks , genetic algorithms , etc. For example, on Habré, such an innovation is the system of karma. Believe me, all these technologies are not as complex as their names imply. Of course, you can do without innovation, but this will significantly reduce the advantages of your project over its competitors.
After dividing the problem into component parts and creating a list of alternatives for their implementation, we need to generate several ideas, among which we should choose the only one, on the basis of which our startup will be built. Let's look at an example:
- motives: laziness, sociality, curiosity, creativity;
- application: entertainment, animation;
- innovation: folksonomy, fuzzy sets.
The idea of ​​a service emerges - a social network, for easy creation of flash-cartoons, exchange of characters, ratings, votes for cartoons. To make it easier to create and animate characters, we can use fuzzy sets: let the character be controlled not by dragging anchors with the mouse, but by linguistic commands like “go faster”, “smile”, etc.
After the generation of the idea, it must be brought to its logical end, capturing, in the future, all possible aspects of its implementation. So, for our example, why not create a virtual animated world, like SecondLife, with its own currency (thirst for profit), in which users could trade in the most successful characters, cartoon objects, etc. It would be nice to make a mesh-like YouTube, but maybe an active type in which the user can influence the cartoon script. And so on...
The last and most difficult step is competitive analysis. Why difficult? Because psychologically it is very difficult to make yourself convinced that your unique and brilliant idea has long been realized by others. Here we need to recall the requirements of Dzerzhinsky to the employees of the bodies, soberly analyze the competitors and decide on the revision and implementation of the idea or return to the starting point.
The continuation follows. Further:
- features of startups for corporate employees;
- ideas for mega-super-duper corporations;
- features of the implementation of business models 2.0 for different strategic objectives.
Basil naivel
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Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/9487/
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