The document presents an overview of the Lean Startup methodology, emphasizing its iterative process to achieve successful business solutions by minimizing waste, validating learning, and focusing on essential features. Examples such as Dropbox and Peernuts illustrate key principles like minimum viable products (MVPs) and the importance of customer feedback. Ultimately, the Lean Startup approach allows entrepreneurs to test their business ideas effectively while refining their market positioning.

1. Lean Startup
Presented by Quang Nguyen (Sebastian) ,
MBA, PMP, TESOL

2. Bio
• Co-founder of Passed Pawns LLC, a startup
consulting firm
• Business Advisory of Contemi, an insurance
software from Norway
• Instructor of Business Admin at Saigon Tech
• Instructor of Project Management at FMIT
• www.facebook.com/qtheboss

3. Agenda
• What
• Why
• Where
• When
• Who
• How

4. Warning
• I am here to learn, not to teach
• I do not like good words. I love hear you says
“No, you’re wrong.”
• I have no credit for Lean Startup
• I have no credit for any intelligent work on this
slides, including images, terminologies,
processes, philosophies …
• The context is web startup

5. So who got the credit for
Lean Startup?
Eric Ries
Steve Blank
• Co-founder and CTO of IMVU
• Retired serial entrepreneur
• Entrepreneur-in-Residence at
• Built 8 startups in 21 years
Harvard Business school, 2010
including MIPS Computers
• Best Young Entrepreneur of Tech,
• Now teaching Entrepreneurship at
2007
Berkeley, Stanford, and Columbia
• Startup advisory

6. What is lean?
LEAN = NOT FAT

7. And lean is everywhere

8. The key is to eliminate waste

9. So what is lean startup
• Lean startup is a rigorous process for iterating
from plan A to a plan that works.
• Speed
– Startups that succeed are those that manage to
iterate enough times before running out of resources
– Eric Ries
• Validated Learning
– Get out of the building – Steve Blank
• Focus
– Right Action, Right Time – Bijoy Goswami

10. Why should we care?

11. Where on earth do people use Lean?

12. Who actually used Lean Startup?
• Dropbox (www.dropbox.com)
• Peernuts (www.peernuts.com)
– Peernuts is a sharing platform for cultural goods. You
just have to log in, list your library, connect with your
friends and get access to the hundreds of films, books,
video games, comics they want to share with you.
– Right now, Peernuts is in beta mode, available in
French and just for DVDs.
• And a lot more: IMVU, Votizen, KISSMetric,
Aarkvard, Groupon, Hearsay, Epic Scale, Food on
the Table, Pbworks, …

13. Dropbox homepage

14. Dropbox - 1st Launch

15. Dropbox - 2nd Launch

16. Dropbox - 3rd Launch

17. Dropbox - Key Lessons
• Public launch in Sep 2008
• Ignored mainstream PR
• Did not focus on building lots of features
• Successfully used survey, split tests, landing
page, signup flow optimization, sharing
encouragement …
• Invested heavily in analytics

18. Peernuts homepage

19. Peernuts – Blogging before Coding
• Step #1:
– A short blog post
– 10-question poll
– No code AT ALL

20. Peernuts – Market shrinking
• Step #2:
– Is your market really big and totally bullish? If yes,
you’re missing the point. If it’s big that’s too big.
Start shrinking your market!
– Started with DVD

21. Peernuts – Feature Burner
• Test #3:
– Ask yourself if you have more than 3 features. If yes,
you’re too fat.
– 3 features:
• a movie listing powered by an external movie database
• a loan dashboard
• a friend system coupled with Facebook connect and a basic
mail invitation
– No rating system, no wish list, no recommendation, no
notification, no privacy setting … NOOOOO!!!

22. Peernuts – No designer
• Step #4:
– First product ship objective is to learn, learn, and
learn.
– Don’t depress if you don’t have a wonderful logo.
It looks weird but if you don’t care, it will just be
fine!
– Remember: you don’t need the perfect product
but a working prototype.

23. Peernuts – Procrastination
• Did you postpone
product ship for the
3rd time? If yes, stop
messing around.
Release it!
• Learn with your
customers > Refine
useless aspects of
your product

24. Peernuts - Conclusion
• Right now: Peernuts doesn’t work.
• But: we have a great feedback on the service we are
building
• Will we add features? NO
– Increase customer performance
• Will we start massive communication? NO
– Wait until the virality rate > 1
• Will we work on our market? YES
– We don’t have the correct positioning yet.
• Is it okay to not consider any business model for the
moment?

25. How to use Lean Startup?
• Lean Canvas
• MVP (Minimum Viable Product)
• Build – Measure – Learn loop
• Customer Development
• Key Metrics

26. Lean Canvas

30. Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
• MVP is the product with just the necessary
features to get money and/or feedback from
early adopters.
• Do MVPs seem abstract to you?

31. MVP examples
1. “If Apple can launch a smartphone without Find or Cut-and-Paste, what can you
cut out of your product requirements?” – Sramana Mitra
2. USV-backed foursquare uses Google Docs to collect customer feedback. No code,
no maintenance.
3. Fliggo sells it before they build it.
4. Grockit puts up a notify-me-when-you-release form on steroids.
5. Auto e-commerce site uses manualation and flintstoning for their backend.
6. Semiconductor company uses 5 people and FPGAs to build a $100M
semiconductor product line.
7. Consumer company uses fake screenshots to sell their product.
8. Allicator uses Facebook ads: “Ditch Digger? Feeling spread thin? Click here to
complete a survey and tell us about it.”
9. ManyWheels uses Microsoft Visio to build clickable web demos for prospective
customers.
10. Cloudfire uses a classic customer development problem presentation.

32. Build – Measure – Learn loop

34. Customer Development (cont)

35. Customer Development (cont)

36. Key Metrics - AARRR

37. Before Product / Market Fit

38. After Product / Market Fit

39. Customer Lifecycle /
Conversion Behavior

40. Conclusion
• Lean Startup is a method of testing the
assumptions and hypothesis of a business idea
in an iterative manner while validating your
product/market fit before you ship a
complete product.
• It’s new. So be skeptical.

41. Q&A