#Lean CoffeeKL - 36 - The Chicken and the Egg
Details
Hi all,
The "chicken and the egg" dilemma requires no introduction. As someone in the community that works with startups as well as being a founder of some, I see this scenario raise it's ugly head constantly.
At this week's #LeanCoffeeKL, we'll dig deep to identify what works best to build traction in the early days when you need but lack both users and content. Part of our discussion will flow from popular examples that we're all familiar with; but if anyone has any learnings from their own experiences, be ready to share.
Questions to cover:
How can you leverage your unfair advantage? e.g. Consider how Google+ is able to access a massive existing user base to seamlessly integrate the + experience and easily on board new users to avoid the "lame party" syndrome that crippled earlier social products. Is it realistic to not have a monetization strategy unless your product gets millions of users? Can good marketing make up for limited customer development? Is it ethical to "poach" / seed your own platform or spam others the way Airbnb did by spamming craigslist? Does anyone care or is all fair in startup and war?
Resources
Chris Dixon's Blog - Six Strategies for overcoming "Chicken and Egg Problems" Quora - What are the best examples and what are the worst examples of startups who tried to solve the chicken and the egg problem? (http://www.quora.com/What-are-the-best-examples-and-what-are-the-worst-examples-of-startups-who-tried-to-solve-the-chicken-and-the-egg-problem) Kevin Rose (Slideshare) - 1 to 1 million (http://www.slideshare.net/carsonified/taking-your-site-from-one-to-one-million-users-by-kevin-rose)
See you in the morning,
Brent