Don Dodge blogs seven rules for software start-ups that Ajit Nazare of Kleiner Perkins presented at a recent conference.
I won’t repeat the list here, but it’s well worth checking out–even if you have no interest in pursuing VC funding. For the most part (at least the first six rules), good software has followed these rules for a long time, although the rules might have been expressed a little differently. For instance Rule #3: “Minimum IT footprint, preferably none. Hosted SaaS is best,” might have been listed as “Simple deployment and minimum management.”
One reason rules like these are so practical is that they minimize resources on both the customer and the start-up sides. The benefits are probably obvious for the customer side–reduced costs, increased value. They are, however, just as important on the start-up side.
When you’re a small company you don’t have the resources to visit each and every potential customer site, perform a full-day installation, spend the afternoon training the IT person, and so on. It costs too much. And even if you did have the money, you probably don’t have the personnel, nor the time. You’re a start-up after all with maybe five or less people. When you’re deploying your 1.0 creation you want to be as efficient as possible when servicing customers (most without any pay, which is tough early on when there’s little cash flow), because you must have time to work on 1.1 or better yet 2.0. Without that you’re a sitting duck.