IMPROVING THE SUCCESS OF STARTUP'S OR NEW PRODUCT

LAUNCHES

By,Ashis Lamba

What are the statistics saying? 10-15% of all start-up businesses succeed 15-20% of all venture-backed start-ups succeed 25-35% of new products from existing companies succeed

So what causes this?Technology, Accounting, Manufacturing, Operations….

Why is the success rate so low? What is the root cause? Is there a solution available?

The least we can do is reduce the probability of failure. But how?

First, lets see the top 20 causes for a startup or new product launch to fail

https://www.cbinsights.com

Top 20 reasons for Startup failures

Other Probable Reasons- Premature Scaling Raising little or more funds Embarrassed to talk about failures and not getting your hands dirty Getting acquired or the founders moving on to new projects. Retreating to a cave. Markets are conversations and Dialogue is key Incompetence or Lack of Experience in Management or line of goods Caving into Investors First mover fallacy – launching too early or even too slowly Choosing the wrong platform and being rigid

So, can we really skip or avoid these issues?

These are part and parcel of the journey of making a startup or a new product launch successful.

Hence what are the options available?

Market Validation

READY AIM FIRE

Domain knowledge Market size Growth rate Lifecycles and trends Competitive analysis Outside data sources

Primary market research

Who to interview Interpreting the data Analyzing the results Using outside firms Getting the market

ready for your product

Market Orientation Product specifications

and schedules Design Partner

Programs, Advisory Board Programs

Launch Sustained sales

Porter 5-Forces Model – Flank the Industry (Micro-Environmental Analysis) PESTLE (Macro-Environmental Analysis) SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity & Threat) RBV (Resource Based View) as basis for Competitive Advantage

Switch to Lean Startup Framework – Business Model Canvas Customer Development Agile Development

Strategic Analysis

SOURCE: WWW.BUSINESSMODELGENERATION.COM/CANVAS

What More Can We Do? Focus on Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) and Life Time Value (LTV) Have a Minimum Viable Product Using Net Promoter Score Good skilled hiring and Leadership practices Financial Management Non-Traditional Marketing Techniques Be ready for Changes and Pivoting Have a Web Interface Beta and Concept Testing Understand Diffusion of Innovation Know the Growth Phase Share Best Practices

Startup Ecosystem Using 5 –Why Technique Pragmatic Marketing (Another Framework) Use Data Analytics, Crowdsourcing, Text Mining and

Sentimental Analysis to get a real hold of customer sentiments about your product

Some New Initiatives

Eg. Pragmatic Marketing Framework

ConclusionIt is all about Risk Management and one needs to use the available frameworks and techniques effectively and innovatively as per the situation and hedge its risk of product or startup failure

Using the frameworks and suggestion do not guarantee a sure shot success but it does reduces the probability of failure, after all -

‘FAILURES ARE STEPPING STONES TO SUCCESS’

References http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10000872396390443720204578004980476429190 http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericwagner/2013/09/12/five-reasons-8-out-of-10-businesses-fail/ http://www.statisticbrain.com/startup-failure-by-industry/ http://www.pragmaticmarketing.com/about-us/framework https://hbr.org/2013/05/why-the-lean-start-up-changes-everything http://www.isixsigma.com/tools-templates/cause-effect/determine-root-cause-5-whys/ http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/76364 http://theleanstartup.com

THANK YOU