Lean Coffee: Vizualize.Me Case Study

The summer has been busy, and I didn't think I'd be able to get back into Lean Coffee before September, but this session's topic was too good to pass up.

Eugene Woo from Vizualize.Me presented an amazing case study for the group.

Here are a some key notes from the discussion:

• Won StartupWeekend, 2000 signups on the first day
• Thousands of signups per day -- now over 100,000
• After a month, decided to pursue it full-time
• Did a "press push" about winning StatupWeekend, etc. but didn't really take
• Made an Ashton Kutcher sample and pushed to blogs
• Didn't really get much on the blogs
• But major press picked up on it somehow
• Led to articles on FastCompany and Mashable
• "You don't learn when you're building"
• No mockups, built a working prototype quickly
• Important for learning -- wouldn't learn the same things with a mockup
• Customer development can be depressing, but is also exciting
• Priorities are not clear, but at least you know the problems
• 1-3 months away from "true" MVP
• So far 100% equity, seeking a seed round
• 10 or so competitors have emerged
• So far they have a huge branding head start
• 50% conversion rate from signup list, 15-20% fill rate for Wufoo survey
• Lots of wrong assumptions and learning: eg. Thought people wouldn't need to edit inline
• At least 5 phone calls per week, lots of email and surveys
• Use MixPanel for data collection
• Started out collecting everything, but now focusing on a few key metrics at a time
• Biggest potential competition: If LinkedIn builds similar capability
• Jobs market is ripe for disruption
• Best source of leads/signups: LaunchRock, Twitter

Thanks again Eugene for sharing, and looking forward to see Vizualize.me continue to grow and evolve!

PMRobot Project Management Survey #1 Results

Back in March, I put together a survey with two very simple statements:

1. When managing a project, I often feel like a glorified secretary

The results for this question surprised me. Only about half of the 32 respondents felt this way.

2. Communication between clients and programmers is poor or non-existent

This question turned out more like I expected. Most people agreed that client-programmer communication could be improved.

There were also some great insights from the free form comments:

• Programmers: "Often they are not engaged early enough in the project.  Therefore they are missing information that has already been covered."
• "If your programmers just aren't client-safe, then you are doomed to be, or to rely upon, 'Systems Analysts' of the sort you see in the movie 'Office Space'."
• "It's important to engage with clients and programmers. When you wait for them to come to you and don't engage proactively, then communication suffers."

Thanks again to all who responded!

I've already used this feedback to help prioritize the communication aspect of PMRobot over the automation features.

P.S. I'm running a new survey about existing tools. I'd love to hear your feedback at http://bit.ly/ifX4SV