

Small before big - dawie
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/07/small-before-bi.html

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staunch
Just like focusing on a tiny idea is immensely difficult (and powerful), so is
trying to focus on a few users. The temptation in both cases is to hedge your
bets by concentrating on more.

This applies perfectly to my soon-to-launch project. My partner and I have
made a conscious decision to shut ourselves up about taking over the world and
just concentrate on getting a few core users that are in love with our
product. Stage 1.

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startupper
Extrapolating these little nuggets of wisdom to every situation is
meaningless. For instance it simply does not apply to a startup that is
looking to build something complex. And in that case you absolutely need to
scale before someone else does and pushes you out of the game. Small before
big does not make sense, unless small is a meaningful and reasonable number.

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nostrademons
I thought that Godin's point was that you need to make something _one_ person
will want before you can make something _lots_ of people will want. If you
don't have a useful product, it doesn't matter how much advertising or PR or
scalability you throw at it, nobody will use it.

You need to scale before others push you out of the game, true; but before you
need to scale, you need to have something worth scaling. A complex system that
does everything for everybody and can stand up to a million users isn't worth
anything until _somebody_ finds it useful.

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startupper
"and can stand up to a million users isn't worth anything until somebody finds
it useful."

Often times it takes a team and not an individual to build something somebody
wants. The complexity lies in its functionality and it does not have to do
everything for everybody.

If I am not mistaken you are referring to scaling production and marketing and
possibly premature diversification while I am referring to scaling development
to meet the needs of that initial customer base.

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nostrademons
Agreed, then. But I don't think Godin's talking about what you're talking
about. He's a marketer: his point is about trying to get a million customers
before you've built something that one customer will use.

