Aaron Batalion, LivingSocial, Lean Startup SXSW

CHECK YO-SELF BEFORE U WRECK YO-SELF: Pivots Aaron Batalion Co-Founder & CTO LivingSocial @abatalion

What is a startup? "a search for a scalable, repeatable business model" - Steve Blank, Four Steps to the Ephiphany 2

If a startup is a search.... then your first idea... is probably wrong! 3

So what’s a pivot? "The idea that successful startups change direction but stay grounded in what theyve learned" - Eric Ries, The Lean Startup 4

PivotsOur search for a scalable business 5

07/2007Social Application Consulting 6

Visual Bookshelf 9

PivotsScalable? Need a new idea... 10

10X more reviews than Amazon!31,161 vs 2,921 13

* 10 employees @ $85k = $1M* $12.50 * 8% = $1* 1% of purchase conversion* 100M visitors = $1M 15

* 10 employees @ $85k = $1M * $12.50 * 8% = $1 * 1% of purchase conversion * 100M visitors = $1MHave to be top 200 site in US! 16

Full Site Takeovers 17

Not enough! More than Books? 18

More than Books! 19

Doubled Traffic! Not Enough! 20

Google = Document Graph Facebook = People Graph LivingSocial = Stuff Graph 21

Targeted Ad Platform 22

Need Traffic!!#1 app on MySpace the first day! Uhhh... 23

This Stinks! 25

Pick Your Five! 26

If we nail this... Facebook will buy us!! 27

03/09 ~300k PV/day 29

3/21 10M PV/day 30

4 engineers6B PVs/month35M in 3 weeks no sleep. 32

Seriously guys?? 38

Solved a real problem Screw it... Lets just sell to Facebook.. 39

Facebook didnt buy us... 40

Careful building “features”...The bigger guy might just build it too. 41

Fucking Farmville! Took #1 Spot! Took user’s CCs! Reinvested profits for growth! 43

PivotsScalable Revenue? Need a new idea... 44

3 cities Small sales team 45

07/21/092 week prototype 46

Scale Users + Scale Merchants = Scale Revenue 47

Thousands of field sales 49

Thousands of field salesInternational Growth 50

Thousands of Purchases Hundreds of Cities 51

National Deals 52

80 purchases/sec 2 largest social commerce deals ever 53

Escapes - Travellargest flash travel site in first week 55

Premium LivingSocial Events 56

High End Restaurants 57

White Glove Delivery? 58

What about regular delivery? 59

Lessons Learned 62

Our Core DNA = Products & Techology 63

Consumer Internet Hard Part = TRACTION 64

Learn as fast as possible find traction pour gas on the fire! 65

Success not pretty code not infinite scale It’s SUCCESSFUL Products! 66

Measure EVERYTHING! 67

Does it work? 68

Rails? Node.js? .NET? Which test framework?Is my domain model correct? Heroku? Amazon Web Services? Shut up and build stuff! 69

Dont Hate... Iterate! 70

J.S.I.O.use what you know “Good enough is ok” 71

each developer deploys dozens of times per day 72

Only work with amazing peopleDefault to “no” Culture! 73

“12 startups in a startup” 74

Execution Matters Most 75

PivotsThanks! 77

http://us-w1.rockmelt.com	41
http://www.twylah.com	15
http://tweetedtimes.com	12
http://paper.li	3
https://si0.twimg.com	2
http://www.fandrop.com	1

Aaron Batalion, LivingSocial, Lean Startup SXSW

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Aaron Batalion, LivingSocial, Lean Startup SXSW Presentation Transcript