Agile & Lean Lessons from a Dating Startup's Development

AGILE & LEAN STARTUP:
LESSONS FROM MINIDATES STARTUP DEVELOPMENT

Beverly May
y y
LEAN UX, STRATEGY & PRODUCT DEV. CONSULTING
Founder MiniDates, Oxford Technology Ventures, & the User Experience Awards

AGILE 2012 8/16/2012

cautionary inspiration

We thought we should get
“

a gold star just for
ld t j t f
listening to our customers.
customers
Except our customers still didn’t like the product.
didn t
They would look at us and say,
‘Listen, old man, you don’t understand’...”
(Eric Ries, Lean Startup)

© 2012, All Rights Reserved. More Info: MiniDates.com & OxfordTechnologyVentures.com slide 2

have a “startup”/ new tech project?

DO AS I SAY,
NOT AS I DID!
I’m abo t to confess to you the
about o
unvarnished truth.


MiniDates.com

Online dating is broken: no dating!
- not evolved 15 yrs: “people search”
- inefficient, frustrating, time-consuming
- BAD UX

MiniDates: First REAL Dating Service
- sends you offline date proposals
to review & accept
- based on who you seek & when +
where you’re free in the future
you re
- a personalized mobile dating assistant
- easy, fun, fast, convenient, efficient


background

WE BELIEVED WE COULD DO IT
• FOUNDER, OXFORD TECHNOLOGY VENTURES
BOUTIQUE UX & PRODUCT STRATEGY

• UX Awards; NYC-CHI

• 16 YRS EXP IN INTERNET/ SOFTWARE

• Helped launch/create 100+ sites & products
• startups; agencies; development; every role!

• MBA OXFORD; MS INFO. SYSTEMS NYU


the truth you won’t hear

launching a startup is
STILL Really Hard
R ll H d
• RISKS & UNKNOWNS
• COMPETITION & SATURATION
• COSTS & COMPLEXITY
• TECH & UX
• PEOPLE

It takes extraordinary
ff t
effort, perseverance,
passion, smarts, luck &
a lot of fast learning


top benefits for YOU


Key Takeaway

THE PROCESS (INCLUDING AGILE)
DOES *NOT* GUARANTEE SUCCESS!!!

ONLY ACTUAL USER ADOPTION,
ENGAGEMENT & SATISFACTION
MATTERS FOR BUSINESS SUCCESS.


outline

a. Agile, UX & Lean 101
b. Chutes & Ladders: 15 months of MiniDates
c. It’s Not Over! Where we are now
d. Top 5 Recommendations + Benefits


Agile 101

AGILE.
Scrum. Sprints. Test driven development. User Stories. Iterative and
Change driven. Collaborative. Working products > Process.

UX.
User centric product development. User Stories. Personas. User testing.
User research (ethnography). Wires & prototypes & flows.
( g p y) p yp

LEAN (STARTUP).
S
Search f viable b i
h for i bl business. V lid t d b i
Validated business model. GOOB MVP
d l GOOB. MVP.
Customer Development. Revenue.


Lean = Business Validation

• products customers will use & pay for

• validated learning: build > measure > learn

• UX+AGILE Best Practices for Business
GOOTB (ETHNOGRAPHY),
USER RESEARCH (SURVEYS, INTERVIEWS,
OBSERVATION, FEEDBACK),
TESTING,
PROTOTYPING & WIREFRAMING,
PERSONAS & ARCHETYPES,
USER STORY & SCENARIO-DRIVEN DEV
ITERATIVE LEARNING


Chutes & Ladders


chutes: highlights


chutes: UX & product development


chutes: tech decisions


chutes: team & process


chute: USER TESTING!


where we are now

80% Business
•Product/ Market fit
•Branding/ Message
• Cust. Acquisition costs 20% Tech/ Product
C ii
•Competition S l bl
•Scalable
•Market Niche/ Segment •MVT & A/B - ongoing
•Pricing •Reg. conversion
•CTO, CMO
, g
•Usage
•Partnerships •Metrics
•Feature not Business? •Social Marketing
•Press/ PR •(Apps, payments, features)
•Social Media
•Evangelism & Visibility
•New Investment


It’s Not Over!

ALI G “ICE CREAM GLOVE”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48TR0vUPQCs
http://www youtube com/watch?v 48TR0vUPQCs


summary

DID RIGHT HALFWAY LAME
•user interviews •incomplete wires & specs •late customer validation
•GOOB •project / product mgmt •concierge MVP
•landing page •market validation •hiring/ firing/ cofounders
•initial wires
i iti l i •tech decisions
t hd i i •$ marketing vs. dev
$ k ti d
•dev environments •backup, documentation


and now....

TOP 5 RECOMMENDATIONS!

#1. Beware Fads & Advice

“Yours is a death march project.

You ill
Y will never launch.”
l h
( )
(2 weeks before launch)

• AGILE & LEAN PROCESSES
• STAFFING
• FUNDRAISING
• LEAN: SEM & LANDING PAGES

By the time you get advice,
it’s too late!


2. UX *IS* essential

NOT JUST DESIGN OR “UI”
• clickable prototypes
• experience videos
• user stories & flow
• product value proposition!
d t l iti !

what matters: business drivers
• effective
• useful
• engaging
Skip UX concepting, wires &
planning at your peril.
peril


3. Understand Technology Choices

• RISKS
• COSTS
• TIME
• EFFORT
• SCALE
• COMPLEXITY

NOT
• Products/ Process
• Latest/ Coolest
Evaluate technology based on business & user p
gy priorities


4. Team & Process

VCs: 10 Things That Cause Startups to Fail
= Team + team + team...

• FIRE FAST
• HIRE PRACTICALLY & MINIMALLY
• BE SKEPTICAL & SELECTIVE
• TEAM ALIGNMENT
• TRUST IS #1


the formula for success


5. Test!

Concept > Prototype > MVP > Usage

WHAT MATTERS IS WHAT PEOPLE ULTIMATELY DO.


what will happen

If you skip testing & validation: burn your $$.
$$


Back to the Key Takeaway

THE PROCESS (INCLUDING AGILE)
DOES *NOT* GUARANTEE SUCCESS!!!

ONLY ACTUAL USER ADOPTION,
ENGAGEMENT & SATISFACTION
MATTERS.

YOU GET THERE THROUGH “TESTING”


remember

in 100,000
1 i 100 000
It’s DEFINITELY PARTLY LUCK

but being skeptical (testing), optimizing team process
(testing), ux best practices (testing), validated learning
(testing), & real feedback (testing) DO help a lot


don’t let this be you.

TIME TO LAUNCH!
“It turned out our fears [of shipping a rough product too early]
It
were unfounded, because

nobody even
tried
t i d our product.
d t
At first I was relieved because at least nobody was finding out how
bad the product was, but soon that gave way to serious
frustration. After all the hours we had spent...”
(Eric Ries, Lean Startup p. 42)


Closing

EVERYTHING
WITH REAL USERS
EARLY + OFTEN

Shameless Plug!

GO TO MINIDATES.COM TO TRY IT FREE!

Lean UX, UX Strategy + Product Dev.

BEVERLY MAY
@MINIDATES | @OXFORDTECH
BEVERLY@MINIDATES.COM | BEVERLY.MAY@OXFORDTECHNOLOGYVENTURES.COM
OXFORDTECHNOLOGYVENTURES.COM


Agile & Lean Lessons from a Dating Startup's Development

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (9)

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (6)

Similar to Agile & Lean Lessons from a Dating Startup's Development

Similar to Agile & Lean Lessons from a Dating Startup's Development (20)

More from drewz lin

More from drewz lin (20)

Agile & Lean Lessons from a Dating Startup's Development