SlideShare a Scribd company logo
1 of 70
Download to read offline
CONTENTCUBE
143 interviews
Niche Entrant
A smart way to
personalize news texts
Helping journalists find product-
market fit
Kaveh
PhD in Econ
Janel
B.S. Computer
Science
Michael
Creative Dir. at SF
Business Times
Titus
Investigative
journalist
Michelle
B.S. Computer
Science
The Team
News organizations haven’t been doing so well.
Advertising & subscription revenue
for U.S. newspapers (in billions)
60
50
40
30
20
10
Advertising & subscription revenue
for U.S. newspapers (in billions)
We wanted to do something about this.
CS 206: Computational
Journalism
60
50
40
30
20
10
Original MVP screenshots/gif here
News organizations
(e.g., NYT, WaPo)
Software
development
Reader-side platform
User data
Writer-side platform
Help news
organizations
attract new readers
and better engage
existing ones
Make the news more
informative and
enjoyable for
readers
KEEP: Customer
support
GET: Free testing
Direct / Sales Team
Software development Customer acquisition
Customer support
Annual licensing fee
Tech companies
with large amounts
of demographic data
(e.g., facebook)
Customer support
Help readers
understand different
perspectives
Direct / Internet
GROW: Upsell to
higher-end license
Original Business Model Canvas
News organizations
Readers
News organizations
(e.g., McClatchy,
NYT, WaPo)
UX design, learning
archetype engagement
User data collection
Writer-side platform
KEEP: Customer
support
Direct / Sales Team
News organizations
Annual licensing
fee structure
News agencies
Integrating with existing
news CMS
Direct / Internet
GROW: Upsell to
higher-end license
Predict archetypes
(branches) who
should get a different
version of the story
Provide framework
and structure to make
archetyping easy for
every story
Identify archetypes by
leveraging/clustering
user data already
collected by news orgs
Advertising, PR, and
marketing agencies
Parsing data, collecting
engagement stats
Analytics platforms
Ad server platforms
Publisher onboarding
Suite:
Premium features
Versioning for
other industries
Advertisers, PR, and
Marketing agencies
143 Interviews Later... Current Business Model Canvas
Software development Customer acquisition
Customer support
A Hero’s Journey.
Journalist’s
A Hero’s Journey.
Journalist’s
0 interviews
Experiment:
Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
Experiment:
Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
Experiment:
Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
Experiment:
Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
Experiment:
Do readers enjoy personalized news texts? Nope.
“That detail doesn’t
belong in this
article.”
“All this one
has is more
numbers.”
“Meh. This one
doesn’t flow well.”
“That statistic
doesn’t fit in.”
The First Pivot.
36
interviews
Did we
personalize the
wrong way?
Is personalized
text the wrong
solution?
Did we
personalize the
wrong way?
Is personalized
text the wrong
solution?
Did we
personalize the
wrong way?
Is personalized
text the wrong
solution?
Let’s understand one
customer segment really
well and personalize the
right way this time.
Who would be our early evangelists?
People who are...
1. Hungry for news
1. Dissatisfied with mainstream news
1. Making the extra effort to fill appetite
Who would be our early evangelists?
People who are...
1. Hungry for news
1. Dissatisfied with mainstream news
1. Making the extra effort to fill appetite
Piecing together a picture of our customers
The Innovators: Coin Founders, Early Investors
“I’ve figured out my news
sources already.”
The Early Adopters: Experienced Investors
“I get my crypto news from
word of mouth. I have people
I trust.”
Early Majority: The Finance & Crypto Novice
“It’s so hard to find
credible sources.”
We listened to their pain points.
(41 interviews)
But something felt wrong.
DO YOU BELIEVE IN YOUR
PRODUCT ?
Do any of you even
own a coin?!
Do you believe in
your product?
Lesson Learned:
It’s cheesy, but passion really does matter.
Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018
A Passionate Pivot.
94
interviews
We went back to our vision, but with a twist.
This was from our Week 1 Presentation.
Then we took our MVP to news agencies, who said...
Irene Chang
Product Manager,
Text & Multimedia
It’s not a super huge need.
Maybe it’ll be more useful to
publishers?
Then we took our MVP to news agencies, who said...
“Meh.”
A solution for news agencies is a small market.
$600 millionSubscriptions cost
$10k to $1-2 million
We estimated our annual revenue to be $15 million.
Revenue of Top 3 in U.S.
With nothing to lose, we asked news executives
for thoughts on all our previous MVP iterations.
VS
MVP 1:
Personalize news texts
MVP 3:
Augment wire text
VS
MVP 2:
Automate style & standards
MVP 1:
Personalize news texts
…and they jumped out of their seats
for our very first iteration.
…and they jumped out of their seats
for our very first iteration.
Wait, what?
MVP 1:
Personalize news texts
Localization is really valuable, but at
the community level.
Daniel Schaub
Corporate Director of
Audience Development
We want our journalists to write
with a specific person in mind.
But there’s no structure in place
to suggest
that right now.
Tim Grieve
VP of News
What got them so excited?
Journalists & editors felt the same way.
Andre Taylor
Desk Editor
“If a story gets clicks or blows up, we
want to know how to do that again.
When something spikes,
it’s like Christmas.”
“People care about things you may not
suspect they’d click on.
Most of the time, the editor or reporter
thinks they know what people like.”
Arlene Washington
Digital Editor
Key Insight:
There’s a gap between the way journalists write
and the way publishers wish they would write.
To journalists and publishers, our original MVP
looked like a bridge between this gap.
Back to our Origins,
But Wiser this time
116
interviews
A Hunch
The original MVP tweaked sentences.
What really moves people is stories.
We need to inform writers about readers earlier
in the story writing process.
We changed how we pictured our readers
Demographic data → Archetypes, Occupations, Interests
(Consider the reader as a whole)
We changed how we personalized to our readers
Statistics & Detail → Tone, Structure, Anecdotes
(Consider the narrative as a whole)
Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy
personalized news narratives?
Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy
personalized news narratives?
Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy
personalized news narratives?
Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy
personalized news narratives? YES! “It helped me imagine the
actual product and made it
sound cool.”
(Tech)
“I like that it sounds like it is written
in a viewpoint of not needing to
advertise but to just write the facts
about the researchers' work.”
(Biology)
“I liked that it gave some
background on the condition
and some facts/figures...this
could very well be an issue of
interest though.”
(Biology) “It provided me the
opportunity to learn
more.”
(Tech)
“I liked it more because it had a
quote from Apple.”
(Tech)
Lesson Learned:
Be suspicious of your assumptions,
but don’t abandon your vision too quickly either.
143 interviews
The Grand Finale.
Our idea:
We help journalists find
product-market fit for their stories.
Our idea:
We help journalists find
product-market fit for their stories.
How?
A writing tool that informs the writer
about their target audience during the
writing process.
Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018
Advertising & subscription revenue
for U.S. newspapers (in billions)
We wanted to do something about this.
60
50
40
30
20
10
Advertising & subscription revenue
for U.S. newspapers (in billions)
We will do something about this.
60
50
40
30
20
10
Three of us will be continuing!
Janel
B.S. Computer
Science
Michael
Creative Dir. at SF
Business Times
Michelle
B.S. Computer
Science
The End.
CONTENTCUBE
143 interviews
Niche
Helping journalists find product-market fit
Q & A
Appendix
Now our customers are news organizations.
$28 billionannual revenue (ads + subscription)
Pains: Subscriber model in a digital age.
Gains: Segment readers to drive subs and better target ads.
If we can address even 3% of this pool, that’s a $1B market.
Lesson 1: Good startups run like efficient code
while (product_market_fit==0) {
# define experiment;
# define threshold for
success;
if (result < threshold) {
next_step =
next_step_fail;
}
else {
next_step = next_step_pass;
}
}
Week Experiment Result
1 The Value of
Personalized News
Fail (18%)
3 Is There Unmet Need
for Crypto News?
Fail (67%)
4 The Value of
Personalized Crypto
News
Fail (44%)
... ... …
8 The Value of
Personalized News,
Part II
PASS!
(80%)
KD
Lesson 2: Like journalists, startups need key sources
Michelle Park
Interview Request from Stanford University Team
To: Schaub, Daniel (McClatchy)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Hi Mr. Schaub,
I’m an engineering student at Stanford
working on a class project. I was hoping to
talk with you about how news agencies
could better serve readers.
...
Titus Plattner
Interview Request from Tamedia News
To: Johansen, Ed (MU)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Hi Mr. Johansen,
I’m a journalist at Tamedia writing a story
on offshore tax havens. I would like to
talk with you about your company based in
the Cayman Islands.
...
KD
We pieced together every step of the wire editing workflow.
Tone: Excitement about new product
Structure: Surface tech-related information to the top
Anecdote: Incorporate quotes from leading technologists
Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy
personalized news narratives?
Lesson 3: Passion is necessary (but not sufficient)
Crypto News
(MVP 2)
Social News
Personalized News Texts
(MVP 1)
KD
Content
Cube
Vox
NYT
ProPublica
RobbReader
NYT
WP
nevalabshq
Pyze.com
SalesForce
vhcl.co
Facebook
Twitter
Google News
Alexa
Cortana
Siri
Competitor
Leaf Diagram
Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018
Kaveh Danesh Jihyeon Janel Lee Michael Grant Titus Plattner Michelle Park
MG
Econ PhD,
former Duke
Trustee, writer for
Obama, RA for Raj
Chetty, NCAA
Division I soccer
coach
CS Major,
Section Leader,
KPCB Engineering
Fellow, RA at
Stanford AI Lab,
Theater gal who
likes corgis
Knight Fellow,
Creative director
at the SF Business
Times, Lead SF
Chronicle, digital
incubator training
ground
Knight Fellow,
Investigative
reporter, created a
tool to share
terabytes of data
in newsrooms,
Swiss
CS Major,
CS Course Asst,
created platform
to crowdsource
education content,
intern at Apple,
Google, and NASA
Small market:
The three big wire agencies:
$600M per year for text in the US
(Subscriptions based on feeds + total readers, news orgs pay
btw. a few 10k to a 1-2 M. per year)
Content Cube max. revenue: 15M per year
=> “This is a hobby” said Steve W.
Interesting market:
Revenue of US newspapers ($28B in 2017)
If we even can address 3% of this market by driving more
subscriptions or better targeting ads, we would have a
$1B market.
1. For news orgs, getting more online subscriptions is key.
2. Better targeting online ads would allow news orgs to
compete again with the internet giants.
TAM:
Revenue of US newspapers in 2017:
Ads: $18B
Subscriptions: $10B
Total: $28B
SAM:
Bigger US newspapers revenue in 2017: $14B
Target:
Address about one fifth of this market: >$2B
Content Cube
helps on both
markets
}

More Related Content

Similar to Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018

Uc.6.fragment[1]
Uc.6.fragment[1]Uc.6.fragment[1]
Uc.6.fragment[1]tcallinan
 
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Final
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 FinalWng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Final
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Finalrdeigh
 
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013Now What? Conference
 
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly London
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly LondonUS PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly London
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly LondonLeslie Campisi
 
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda Eloff
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda EloffA picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda Eloff
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda EloffMathilda Eloff
 
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017Lori Miller
 
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)Dave LaFontaine
 
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in Optimization
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in OptimizationConversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in Optimization
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in OptimizationFutureNow Inc.
 
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup  Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup Maryam Mazraei
 
Signal Media on why metrics matter
Signal Media on why metrics matterSignal Media on why metrics matter
Signal Media on why metrics matterMaryam Mazraei
 
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?What Content Do Consumers Really Want?
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?Visually
 
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18Jose Katab
 
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenue
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenueOSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenue
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenueThe Splice Newsroom
 
Your Customer's Journey in the Social Era
Your Customer's Journey in the Social EraYour Customer's Journey in the Social Era
Your Customer's Journey in the Social EraTara Hunt
 
AMP SXSW Presentation
AMP SXSW PresentationAMP SXSW Presentation
AMP SXSW PresentationNick Bamber
 

Similar to Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018 (20)

Uc.6.fragment[1]
Uc.6.fragment[1]Uc.6.fragment[1]
Uc.6.fragment[1]
 
DeepFakes H4D Stanford 2019
DeepFakes H4D Stanford 2019DeepFakes H4D Stanford 2019
DeepFakes H4D Stanford 2019
 
Winning on Data
Winning on DataWinning on Data
Winning on Data
 
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Final
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 FinalWng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Final
Wng R Deigh Ppt Presentation Sept 24 Final
 
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013
"The Emperor Has No News" - Deane Barker, Now What? Conference 2013
 
Amplification: Content Marketing That Works
Amplification: Content Marketing That WorksAmplification: Content Marketing That Works
Amplification: Content Marketing That Works
 
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly London
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly LondonUS PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly London
US PR Tactics / Course from General Assembly London
 
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda Eloff
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda EloffA picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda Eloff
A picture is worth a thousand words_Mathilda Eloff
 
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017
Are You Newsworthy? Nonprofit University June 22, 2017
 
AI voor KMO's
AI voor KMO'sAI voor KMO's
AI voor KMO's
 
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)
What is a Creative Date Scientist (and why the $@%! do we need one?)
 
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in Optimization
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in OptimizationConversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in Optimization
Conversion Conference SF March 2011 - Using Personas in Optimization
 
Open Source PR
Open Source PROpen Source PR
Open Source PR
 
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup  Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup
Why Metrics Matter by Signal Media at London SaaS Meetup
 
Signal Media on why metrics matter
Signal Media on why metrics matterSignal Media on why metrics matter
Signal Media on why metrics matter
 
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?What Content Do Consumers Really Want?
What Content Do Consumers Really Want?
 
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18
Case Analysis Paper. EssaysChief. 2019-01-18
 
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenue
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenueOSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenue
OSF x Highway Africa: New forms of storytelling, distribution and revenue
 
Your Customer's Journey in the Social Era
Your Customer's Journey in the Social EraYour Customer's Journey in the Social Era
Your Customer's Journey in the Social Era
 
AMP SXSW Presentation
AMP SXSW PresentationAMP SXSW Presentation
AMP SXSW Presentation
 

More from Stanford University

Team Networks - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Networks  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Networks  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Networks - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team LiOn Batteries - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team LiOn Batteries  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam LiOn Batteries  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team LiOn Batteries - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Quantum - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Quantum  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Quantum  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Quantum - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Disinformation - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Disinformation  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Disinformation  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Disinformation - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Wargames - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Wargames  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Wargames  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Wargames - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Acquistion - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Acquistion  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Team Acquistion  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Acquistion - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Stanford University
 
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Stanford University
 
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedAltuna Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedStanford University
 
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedInvisa Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedStanford University
 
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learnedānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedStanford University
 
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef Stanford University
 
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Stanford University
 
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Stanford University
 
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionStanford University
 
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...Stanford University
 
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - Cyber
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - CyberLecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - Cyber
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - CyberStanford University
 

More from Stanford University (20)

Team Networks - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Networks  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Networks  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Networks - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team LiOn Batteries - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team LiOn Batteries  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam LiOn Batteries  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team LiOn Batteries - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Quantum - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Quantum  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Quantum  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Quantum - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Disinformation - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Disinformation  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Disinformation  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Disinformation - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Wargames - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Wargames  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Wargames  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Wargames - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Acquistion - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Acquistion  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Team Acquistion  - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Acquistion - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Climate Change - 2022 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedAltuna Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Altuna Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
 
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons LearnedInvisa Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
Invisa Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
 
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learnedānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
ānanda Engr245 2022 Lessons Learned
 
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef
Gordian Knot Center Roundtable w/Depty SecDef
 
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
 
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
Team Army venture capital - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competi...
 
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Catena - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Apollo - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Drone - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Short Circuit - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power CompetitionTeam Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
Team Aurora - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Competition
 
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...
Team Conflicted Capital Team - 2021 Technology, Innovation & Great Power Comp...
 
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - Cyber
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - CyberLecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - Cyber
Lecture 8 - Technology, Innovation and Great Power Competition - Cyber
 

Recently uploaded

Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptx
Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptxPatterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptx
Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptxMYDA ANGELICA SUAN
 
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024UKCGE
 
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptx
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptxAUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptx
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptxiammrhaywood
 
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptx
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptxPISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptx
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptxEduSkills OECD
 
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive Education
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive EducationBenefits & Challenges of Inclusive Education
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive EducationMJDuyan
 
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRA
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRADUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRA
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRATanmoy Mishra
 
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17Celine George
 
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?TechSoup
 
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George Wells
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George WellsThe Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George Wells
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George WellsEugene Lysak
 
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICEQuality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICESayali Powar
 
How to Solve Singleton Error in the Odoo 17
How to Solve Singleton Error in the  Odoo 17How to Solve Singleton Error in the  Odoo 17
How to Solve Singleton Error in the Odoo 17Celine George
 
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming Classes
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming ClassesHuman-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming Classes
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming ClassesMohammad Hassany
 
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptx
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptxM-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptx
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptxDr. Santhosh Kumar. N
 
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdf
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdfHED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdf
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdfMohonDas
 
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptx
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptxPrescribed medication order and communication skills.pptx
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptxraviapr7
 
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptx
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptxCAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptx
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptxSaurabhParmar42
 
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptx
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptxIn - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptx
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptxAditiChauhan701637
 
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...raviapr7
 
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdf
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdfDiploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdf
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdfMohonDas
 

Recently uploaded (20)

Finals of Kant get Marx 2.0 : a general politics quiz
Finals of Kant get Marx 2.0 : a general politics quizFinals of Kant get Marx 2.0 : a general politics quiz
Finals of Kant get Marx 2.0 : a general politics quiz
 
Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptx
Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptxPatterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptx
Patterns of Written Texts Across Disciplines.pptx
 
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024
UKCGE Parental Leave Discussion March 2024
 
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptx
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptxAUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptx
AUDIENCE THEORY -- FANDOM -- JENKINS.pptx
 
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptx
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptxPISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptx
PISA-VET launch_El Iza Mohamedou_19 March 2024.pptx
 
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive Education
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive EducationBenefits & Challenges of Inclusive Education
Benefits & Challenges of Inclusive Education
 
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRA
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRADUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRA
DUST OF SNOW_BY ROBERT FROST_EDITED BY_ TANMOY MISHRA
 
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
 
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?
What is the Future of QuickBooks DeskTop?
 
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George Wells
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George WellsThe Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George Wells
The Stolen Bacillus by Herbert George Wells
 
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICEQuality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE
Quality Assurance_GOOD LABORATORY PRACTICE
 
How to Solve Singleton Error in the Odoo 17
How to Solve Singleton Error in the  Odoo 17How to Solve Singleton Error in the  Odoo 17
How to Solve Singleton Error in the Odoo 17
 
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming Classes
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming ClassesHuman-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming Classes
Human-AI Co-Creation of Worked Examples for Programming Classes
 
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptx
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptxM-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptx
M-2- General Reactions of amino acids.pptx
 
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdf
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdfHED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdf
HED Office Sohayok Exam Question Solution 2023.pdf
 
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptx
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptxPrescribed medication order and communication skills.pptx
Prescribed medication order and communication skills.pptx
 
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptx
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptxCAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptx
CAULIFLOWER BREEDING 1 Parmar pptx
 
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptx
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptxIn - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptx
In - Vivo and In - Vitro Correlation.pptx
 
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...
Patient Counselling. Definition of patient counseling; steps involved in pati...
 
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdf
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdfDiploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdf
Diploma in Nursing Admission Test Question Solution 2023.pdf
 

Content Cube ENGR 245 Lean LaunchPad Stanford 2018

  • 1. CONTENTCUBE 143 interviews Niche Entrant A smart way to personalize news texts Helping journalists find product- market fit
  • 2. Kaveh PhD in Econ Janel B.S. Computer Science Michael Creative Dir. at SF Business Times Titus Investigative journalist Michelle B.S. Computer Science The Team
  • 3. News organizations haven’t been doing so well. Advertising & subscription revenue for U.S. newspapers (in billions) 60 50 40 30 20 10
  • 4. Advertising & subscription revenue for U.S. newspapers (in billions) We wanted to do something about this. CS 206: Computational Journalism 60 50 40 30 20 10
  • 6. News organizations (e.g., NYT, WaPo) Software development Reader-side platform User data Writer-side platform Help news organizations attract new readers and better engage existing ones Make the news more informative and enjoyable for readers KEEP: Customer support GET: Free testing Direct / Sales Team Software development Customer acquisition Customer support Annual licensing fee Tech companies with large amounts of demographic data (e.g., facebook) Customer support Help readers understand different perspectives Direct / Internet GROW: Upsell to higher-end license Original Business Model Canvas News organizations Readers
  • 7. News organizations (e.g., McClatchy, NYT, WaPo) UX design, learning archetype engagement User data collection Writer-side platform KEEP: Customer support Direct / Sales Team News organizations Annual licensing fee structure News agencies Integrating with existing news CMS Direct / Internet GROW: Upsell to higher-end license Predict archetypes (branches) who should get a different version of the story Provide framework and structure to make archetyping easy for every story Identify archetypes by leveraging/clustering user data already collected by news orgs Advertising, PR, and marketing agencies Parsing data, collecting engagement stats Analytics platforms Ad server platforms Publisher onboarding Suite: Premium features Versioning for other industries Advertisers, PR, and Marketing agencies 143 Interviews Later... Current Business Model Canvas Software development Customer acquisition Customer support
  • 10. Experiment: Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
  • 11. Experiment: Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
  • 12. Experiment: Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
  • 13. Experiment: Do readers enjoy personalized news texts?
  • 14. Experiment: Do readers enjoy personalized news texts? Nope. “That detail doesn’t belong in this article.” “All this one has is more numbers.” “Meh. This one doesn’t flow well.” “That statistic doesn’t fit in.”
  • 16. Did we personalize the wrong way? Is personalized text the wrong solution?
  • 17. Did we personalize the wrong way? Is personalized text the wrong solution?
  • 18. Did we personalize the wrong way? Is personalized text the wrong solution? Let’s understand one customer segment really well and personalize the right way this time.
  • 19. Who would be our early evangelists? People who are... 1. Hungry for news 1. Dissatisfied with mainstream news 1. Making the extra effort to fill appetite
  • 20. Who would be our early evangelists? People who are... 1. Hungry for news 1. Dissatisfied with mainstream news 1. Making the extra effort to fill appetite
  • 21. Piecing together a picture of our customers
  • 22. The Innovators: Coin Founders, Early Investors “I’ve figured out my news sources already.”
  • 23. The Early Adopters: Experienced Investors “I get my crypto news from word of mouth. I have people I trust.”
  • 24. Early Majority: The Finance & Crypto Novice “It’s so hard to find credible sources.”
  • 25. We listened to their pain points. (41 interviews)
  • 27. DO YOU BELIEVE IN YOUR PRODUCT ? Do any of you even own a coin?! Do you believe in your product?
  • 28. Lesson Learned: It’s cheesy, but passion really does matter.
  • 31. We went back to our vision, but with a twist. This was from our Week 1 Presentation.
  • 32. Then we took our MVP to news agencies, who said...
  • 33. Irene Chang Product Manager, Text & Multimedia It’s not a super huge need. Maybe it’ll be more useful to publishers? Then we took our MVP to news agencies, who said... “Meh.”
  • 34. A solution for news agencies is a small market. $600 millionSubscriptions cost $10k to $1-2 million We estimated our annual revenue to be $15 million. Revenue of Top 3 in U.S.
  • 35. With nothing to lose, we asked news executives for thoughts on all our previous MVP iterations. VS MVP 1: Personalize news texts MVP 3: Augment wire text VS MVP 2: Automate style & standards
  • 36. MVP 1: Personalize news texts …and they jumped out of their seats for our very first iteration.
  • 37. …and they jumped out of their seats for our very first iteration. Wait, what? MVP 1: Personalize news texts
  • 38. Localization is really valuable, but at the community level. Daniel Schaub Corporate Director of Audience Development We want our journalists to write with a specific person in mind. But there’s no structure in place to suggest that right now. Tim Grieve VP of News What got them so excited?
  • 39. Journalists & editors felt the same way. Andre Taylor Desk Editor “If a story gets clicks or blows up, we want to know how to do that again. When something spikes, it’s like Christmas.” “People care about things you may not suspect they’d click on. Most of the time, the editor or reporter thinks they know what people like.” Arlene Washington Digital Editor
  • 40. Key Insight: There’s a gap between the way journalists write and the way publishers wish they would write. To journalists and publishers, our original MVP looked like a bridge between this gap.
  • 41. Back to our Origins, But Wiser this time 116 interviews
  • 42. A Hunch The original MVP tweaked sentences. What really moves people is stories. We need to inform writers about readers earlier in the story writing process.
  • 43. We changed how we pictured our readers Demographic data → Archetypes, Occupations, Interests (Consider the reader as a whole) We changed how we personalized to our readers Statistics & Detail → Tone, Structure, Anecdotes (Consider the narrative as a whole)
  • 44. Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy personalized news narratives?
  • 45. Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy personalized news narratives?
  • 46. Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy personalized news narratives?
  • 47. Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy personalized news narratives? YES! “It helped me imagine the actual product and made it sound cool.” (Tech) “I like that it sounds like it is written in a viewpoint of not needing to advertise but to just write the facts about the researchers' work.” (Biology) “I liked that it gave some background on the condition and some facts/figures...this could very well be an issue of interest though.” (Biology) “It provided me the opportunity to learn more.” (Tech) “I liked it more because it had a quote from Apple.” (Tech)
  • 48. Lesson Learned: Be suspicious of your assumptions, but don’t abandon your vision too quickly either.
  • 50. Our idea: We help journalists find product-market fit for their stories.
  • 51. Our idea: We help journalists find product-market fit for their stories. How? A writing tool that informs the writer about their target audience during the writing process.
  • 53. Advertising & subscription revenue for U.S. newspapers (in billions) We wanted to do something about this. 60 50 40 30 20 10
  • 54. Advertising & subscription revenue for U.S. newspapers (in billions) We will do something about this. 60 50 40 30 20 10
  • 55. Three of us will be continuing! Janel B.S. Computer Science Michael Creative Dir. at SF Business Times Michelle B.S. Computer Science
  • 59. Now our customers are news organizations. $28 billionannual revenue (ads + subscription) Pains: Subscriber model in a digital age. Gains: Segment readers to drive subs and better target ads. If we can address even 3% of this pool, that’s a $1B market.
  • 60. Lesson 1: Good startups run like efficient code while (product_market_fit==0) { # define experiment; # define threshold for success; if (result < threshold) { next_step = next_step_fail; } else { next_step = next_step_pass; } } Week Experiment Result 1 The Value of Personalized News Fail (18%) 3 Is There Unmet Need for Crypto News? Fail (67%) 4 The Value of Personalized Crypto News Fail (44%) ... ... … 8 The Value of Personalized News, Part II PASS! (80%) KD
  • 61. Lesson 2: Like journalists, startups need key sources Michelle Park Interview Request from Stanford University Team To: Schaub, Daniel (McClatchy) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Mr. Schaub, I’m an engineering student at Stanford working on a class project. I was hoping to talk with you about how news agencies could better serve readers. ... Titus Plattner Interview Request from Tamedia News To: Johansen, Ed (MU) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Mr. Johansen, I’m a journalist at Tamedia writing a story on offshore tax havens. I would like to talk with you about your company based in the Cayman Islands. ... KD
  • 62. We pieced together every step of the wire editing workflow.
  • 63. Tone: Excitement about new product Structure: Surface tech-related information to the top Anecdote: Incorporate quotes from leading technologists Experiment: Do readers segmented by archetype enjoy personalized news narratives?
  • 64. Lesson 3: Passion is necessary (but not sufficient) Crypto News (MVP 2) Social News Personalized News Texts (MVP 1) KD
  • 67. Kaveh Danesh Jihyeon Janel Lee Michael Grant Titus Plattner Michelle Park MG Econ PhD, former Duke Trustee, writer for Obama, RA for Raj Chetty, NCAA Division I soccer coach CS Major, Section Leader, KPCB Engineering Fellow, RA at Stanford AI Lab, Theater gal who likes corgis Knight Fellow, Creative director at the SF Business Times, Lead SF Chronicle, digital incubator training ground Knight Fellow, Investigative reporter, created a tool to share terabytes of data in newsrooms, Swiss CS Major, CS Course Asst, created platform to crowdsource education content, intern at Apple, Google, and NASA
  • 68. Small market: The three big wire agencies: $600M per year for text in the US (Subscriptions based on feeds + total readers, news orgs pay btw. a few 10k to a 1-2 M. per year) Content Cube max. revenue: 15M per year => “This is a hobby” said Steve W.
  • 69. Interesting market: Revenue of US newspapers ($28B in 2017) If we even can address 3% of this market by driving more subscriptions or better targeting ads, we would have a $1B market. 1. For news orgs, getting more online subscriptions is key. 2. Better targeting online ads would allow news orgs to compete again with the internet giants.
  • 70. TAM: Revenue of US newspapers in 2017: Ads: $18B Subscriptions: $10B Total: $28B SAM: Bigger US newspapers revenue in 2017: $14B Target: Address about one fifth of this market: >$2B Content Cube helps on both markets }

Editor's Notes

  1. add a hero’s journey slide
  2. Once upon a time... And every day... Until one day... Because of that... Because of that... Because of that... Until, finally... And, ever since then… Put learnings on a timeline What parts should be well illustrated Overlay the storytelling
  3. The plummeting curve Journalism class Naive but hopeful Carried out with us a shining MVP
  4. The plummeting curve Journalism class Naive but hopeful Carried out with us a shining MVP
  5. We created a writing tool that allows journalists to personalize sentences to different readers based on their demographics.
  6. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  7. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  8. And so our journey began. The first thing we did was test our assumptions about our original idea. Would readers even enjoy personalized news texts?
  9. So we ran an experiment. We took the breast cancer article shown in our tool and personalized it to two different demographics.
  10. YAF and OWM. We asked them to read both the standard and personalized versions.
  11. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  12. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  13. Not only did they not like it, they really hated it. They did
  14. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  15. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  16. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  17. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  18. People who have a high information diet but aren’t getting satisfied from mainstream news.
  19. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  20. This time, we wanted to really understand our customers. We talked to many cryptocurrency investors and found a natural grouping amongst them
  21. We had the coin founders and the early investors
  22. Then we had the experienced investors, who had hopped over from the finance space.
  23. And finally, the finance and crypto novices who started investing because of the hype. They were having a really hard time finding credible news sources, and told us the learning curve for crypto was uncomfortably high.
  24. We spent a lot of time listening to their pain points and started mocking up solutions for the biggest pains.
  25. But in the midst of this, something felt wrong.
  26. This unease came together during one of our weekly presentations. Steve Blank asked us how much we would charge for our product, and we nervously said “ummm, $20 a month?” He immediately asked us: “Do you even believe in your product?” “Do any of you care enough about this space to buy a coin?” And he was completely right. We sat down afterwards and realized that none of us were passionate about crypto, and it was eating us alive.
  27. After all, as our instructors say, “If we aren’t excited about our idea, how will we convince other people to love it?”
  28. And thus ended our brilliant but short-lived dive into cryptocurrency.
  29. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  30. It takes a long time for publishers to take content from news agencies and customize it to their own style and standards. After talking to a lot of wire editors, we found a lot of this could be automated, and it would enable news agencies to offer more value to their clients.
  31. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  32. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  33. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  34. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  35. We were confused because we thought readers hated it. But somehow, news organizations seemed to love it.
  36. For example, executives at McClatchy were already thinking about personalization But it wasn’t tweaking statistics. It was about creating stories that resonate with specific people. Tax plan change, you would tell the entire narrative differently to blah
  37. So we talked to journalists and editors too, and they also wanted to know more about who they should write too. But like Tim said, they were only taking a guess at
  38. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  39. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  40. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  41. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  42. tried occupation because thought of biggest things that shape people as a whole
  43. We took an article about a collaboration between Apple watch and Stanford medicine & personalized it two ways.
  44. And again 3 people liked it
  45. This time, they were in the majority. They mentioned they strongly preferred the personalized version because of tone and anecdotes, confirming our hunch.
  46. We also learned not to make broad assumptions about our experiment results.
  47. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  48. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  49. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  50. The plummeting curve Journalism class Naive but hopeful Carried out with us a shining MVP
  51. The plummeting curve Journalism class Naive but hopeful Carried out with us a shining MVP
  52. Because of that, thought deeply about it Because of that, made pivot
  53. add a hero’s journey slide
  54. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  55. One key lesson from the course has been the importance of a scientific mindset to finding product-market fit. It took us many tries to pass an experiment, which was difficult and frustrating. But we stuck to the script and continued working in an almost code-like way: define the experiment that tests the key assumption, define the threshold for success, define next steps conditional on success and failure. And eventually we got results that did not reject our hypotheses.
  56. Another key lesson was the importance of finding good sources. In the beginning of the semester, we were mostly interviewing friends or friends of friends, but by the end we were sending cold emails or LinkedIn messages to people we never would have thought to contact. What’s funny is that this is exactly what journalists do. They don’t settle for interviews with people who don’t understand the subject of the story. They make bold calls and send bold emails in order to dig up the truth. And that is what we started learning to do over the course of the semester.
  57. This is what we asked ourselves. Saying yes to the question on the right broke our hearts, so we decided to take a guess at the question on the left. Maybe we didn’t know how people wanted their articles personalized.
  58. key learnings included x, y, and z added a lot more yellow boxes -completely revised value prop, customer segment and customer relationship -detail -clarity of what you’ve learned -we started by not knowing much, now we know a lot -put green around stuff you were right about, yellow around stuff that changed after 143 interviews.
  59. Finally, we learned that while passion, ability to contribute, and economic viability are all important components for a successful startup, none of them is sufficient on its own. We started the semester with a tool that personalized news texts, and we were pretty confident that we execute that as well as anyone. But when we heard that people didn’t seem to want that, we thought about making news more social—something we were passionate about—before pivoting to where we thought the money was (and you all know how that went). We feel our current idea strikes a nice balance between all three elements, in a way that sets us up to take this curve -- *next slide* -- and try to flip it upside-down -- *next slide.*
  60. Once upon a time... Every day... But, one day... Because of that... Because of that... Because of that... Until, finally... And, ever since then...
  61. Once upon a time... Every day... But, one day... Because of that... Because of that... Because of that... Until, finally... And, ever since then...
  62. http://www.journalism.org/fact-sheet/newspapers/ Ads in 2017: 18B + circulation 10B
  63. Ads in 2017: 18B + circulation 10B