Startup Advice
sari and
Startup Advice
On building “Flavored” startups
Enterprise software is (mostly) not flavor-based. Sure, there are enterprise fads like the metaverse, but generally speaking, large companies only sign contracts when it feels like there is an obvious commercial advantage to doing so.
Networks are (mostly) not flavor-based. If you’re using an app because of the content created by its other users, it’s not necessarily a guarantee for success, but at least if it fails it probably won’t be because it hit a flavor-based asymptote. For instance, BeReal leveraged a unique flavor of photo sharing to build a network, but people are still using it because they like the way it helps them stay in touch with their friends. If it were just a single-player utility, it would not have scaled in the same way. Another historical example is Instagram versus Hipstamatic. Both had a cool new flavor called “photo filters,” but one had a network and the other did not. Here’s a more recent example: the network is what sets Substack stands apart from its flavor-based competition.
Tech-enabled services are not flavor-based. If you act like a tech company but really do grocery delivery, banking, education, housing, healthcare, or any other real-world service, your competition is mostly not flavor-based because starting this type of business involves a lot of cost and complexity. (Also, some, like ride hailing and delivery, are networks.) The downside is that your cost structure is probably not as great as pure tech companies, but the upside is that you have less competition.
All of these types of products can involve some flavoring to help them get off the ground. The point is not that flavoring is bad. It’s good! But it has a very specific role. Flavor provides an initial product wedge. It’s helpful for standing out initially but doesn’t provide long-term differentiation or durable advantage.
Finding Undiscovered Talent
joincolossus.comBuild: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making - The New York Times bestseller
Tony Fadell • 10 highlights
goodreads.com
I even pretend that my client’s business isn’t a business at all. Instead, I pretend it’s a book.
Whether you realize it or not, your business is indeed a lot like a book.
Like a book, it has a main idea. It’s “about” something. That main idea may be sharp and distinct, or it may be broad and commoditized. It may be easy for people to talk about, or... See more
Whether you realize it or not, your business is indeed a lot like a book.
Like a book, it has a main idea. It’s “about” something. That main idea may be sharp and distinct, or it may be broad and commoditized. It may be easy for people to talk about, or... See more
Look At Your Business As If It Were a Book – LEVY INNOVATION
How can I maintain my creativity, optimism, intellectual vitality, and sense of agency in the face of the stress that comes from building a company and the endless forces luring towards conformity?
We start raw, then our hearts and minds get boiled by constraints, pressure, feedback, and challenges. How do we keep our head up and maintain our... See more
We start raw, then our hearts and minds get boiled by constraints, pressure, feedback, and challenges. How do we keep our head up and maintain our... See more
sari azout • My Favorite Questions
Simply put, an ICP must be a single market segment :a group of people for whom the value of solving a problem is roughly the same, and who can be reached in roughly the same way. “People who use Excel” is not a market segment, because it says nothing about either the value of their problem or how to reach them. “Marketers who use Excel to build... See more
