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" Products are sold because they solve a problem or fill a need. Understanding problems and needs involves understanding customers and what makes them tick. "

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" For Customer Development to succeed, everyone on the team - from investor or parent company to engineers, marketers and founders - needs to understand and agree that the Customer Development process is different to its core. "

" Describing something as the 'Woodstock of...' has taken to mean a one-of-a-kind historic gathering. "

" If you've never founded a company, rest assured it never happens as elegantly and smoothly as articles in 'Inc.' and other business magazines or case studies suggest. "

" Startups have finite time and resources to find product/market fit before they run out of money. Therefore startups trade off certainty for speed, adopting 'good enough decision making' and iterating and pivoting as they fail, learn, and discover their business model. "

" Companies that acquire startups for their intellectual property, teams, or product lines are acquiring startups that are searching for a business model. If they acquire later stage companies who already have users/customers and/or a predictable revenue stream, they are acquiring companies that are executing. "

" In a web/mobile startup, coding is not an outsourced activity. It's an integral part of the company's DNA. "

" Long hours don't necessarily mean success. "

" Visionary CEOs are not 'just' great at assuring world-class execution of a tested and successful business model: they are also world-class innovators. "

" Founders have continually struggled with and adapted the 'big business' tools, rules, and processes taught in business schools when startups failed to execute 'the plan,' never admitting to the entrepreneurs that no startup executes to its business plan. "

" The goal of listening to customers is not to please every one of them. It's to figure out which customer segments serve your needs - both short and long term. "

" First and deadliest of all is a founder's unwavering belief that he or she understands who the customers will be, what they need, and how to sell it to them. "

" As I've gotten older, I've come to grips that the unexamined life is what works for most people. Most take what they learned in school, get a job, marry, buy a house, have a family, become a great parent, serve their god, community and country, hang with friends, and live a good life. And for them that's great. "

" In winning companies, everybody pulls in the same direction. "

" In corporations, the penalty for repeated failure on known tasks is being reassigned to other tasks or asked to leave the company. "

" If you think the job of a CEO is to increase sales, then Ballmer did a spectacular job. "

" Not all new ventures are at the same stage of maturity. "

" Any dispassionate observer would recognize that on Day One, a start-up has no customers, and unless the founder is a true domain expert, he or she can only guess about the customer, problem, and business model. "

" While 'The Owner's Manual' is not a formula for guaranteed success by any means, we're confident it will help reduce the failure rate of most startups that use our Customer Development process. "

" Great entrepreneurial DNA is comprised of leadership, technological vision, frugality, and the desire to succeed. "

" Understand that VCs are simply a sophisticated form of financial investors who, in turn, need to satisfy their own investors. "

" Startups are companies that are still in the process of searching for a business model. Ventures that are further along and executing their business models are no longer startups; they are early-stage companies. "

" At the end of the day, VCs have to provide their limited partners with great returns, or they aren't going to be able to raise another fund. "

" One can make the case that the New York venture capital industry is rooted in the 21st century, not the 20th. "

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" Market type determines the startup's customer feedback and acquisition activities and spending. It changes customer needs, adoption rates, product features, and positioning as well as its launch strategies, channels and activities. "

" Companies that get started and built in New York City tend to be applied technology. "

" Failure will happen. It's a normal part of the startup process. "

" History has shown that time and market forces provide equilibrium in balancing interests, whether the new technology is a video recorder, a personal computer, an MP3 player, or now the Net. "

" For busy young adults, the lure of meal substitutes is simple - it's all about convenience - the level of effort to open a bottle or package is minimal, and the time from thinking you're hungry to eating is almost zero. "

" Visionary CEOs don't need someone else to demo the company's key products for them. They deeply understand products, and they have their own coherent and consistent vision of where the industry/business models and customers are today, and where they need to take the company. "

" My imagination ran 24/7, and to me, every problem was a challenge to solve and new product to create. It wasn't until I started teaching that I realized that not everyone's head worked the same way. "