RABBOT

Find a way

[rabbotblog]

8 stages every Startup goes through and how to survive them

One of the greatest fears that people have to face when starting a new business is the statistics on failure. Knowing that 90% of all companies fail, and the 30% of US companies will fail in the first three years and 75% of Mexican companies in the first two years, isn’t exactly encouraging when you’re thinking about starting a company. But it’s not about being optimistic or pessimistic, it’s about being realistic.

Paul Graham, founder of YCombinator, developed “The Start Up Curve,” a process that absolutely all Startups and new businesses go through. If you want to start a business and not end up being part of the statistics, knowing and understanding these steps is a must.

1. Day Dream. It all starts with that million-dollar idea. Your initial enthusiasm gives you the fuel you need to get started and dream about putting your product in everyone’s hands. You come up with an initial concept for the characteristics of your product and the reasons why everyone is going to to buy it from you, and then, you build it. You’re literally in the clouds. 

2. Ugly Truth. The big moment has arrived! You launch your product and... your mom is the only person who likes what you’ve made. That’s reality slapping you in the face. Not only does no one buy you product, no one is even interested in it. Suddenly, the clouds part and you’re in a free fall. If you didn’t validate before building the product, the fall will be higher and harder. 

3. Depression. After the fall comes depression. Everything you dreamed of, and the million-dollar idea you had, have left you with nothing but debt and doubts about why it didn’t work. Most companies will give up at this stage and fail, because they don’t do anything new or different.

4. Test Lab. The remaining businesses will pivot and test based on market research. They will get close to their costumers and get to know them better and will develop a product that is based on their research findings. 

5. Deep Hole. So, you relaunched your product after implementing the improvements recommended by your costumers, and just when you thought that you couldn’t sink any lower, you do. It seems like all your efforts and investments were thrown away on a pipe dream, and this is when even more companies call it quits. 

6. False Hope. The companies that keep fighting for their dream, and continue making efforts, improvements, and changes needed to achieve it, will start to see a glimmer of hope, just before taking another dive. More changes, more pitfalls. You go up and down, like a roller-coaster ride. 

7. Product Market Fit. The promise land! All of the pivoting has given you the Product Market Fit, which basically means that you have let your costumers mold your product to their exact needs. Remember that kids’ game where you have to put different shaped objects into the corresponding holes? Your product was a square peg that you were trying to fit in a round hole, and its edges needed to be rounded off in order for it to fit.

8. GLORY! You have built the perfect product for your costumers. Now it’s time to scale up your business and take your product to potential costumers around the world. At this point, you can start designing your marketing and expansion plan. If you had done this earlier, you would only have been wasting resources, since you didn’t have the Product Market Fit, and no one would have bought it. 

All successful companies and Startups have gone through these eight stages. Time is not a factor. Everything depends on finding the Product Market Fit. it takes some companies days; others, years. Check out the 10 steps to launching a strong product so that you can get through these stages as quickly as possible. 

Statistics are made up of those who fail and give up. 

Want to see more cool illustrations? Follow Phox and be amazed! 

[rabbotblog]

10 steps to launching a strong product

To be successful at any project is not a matter of luck, nor is it a rocket science. What it comes down, I believe, is a series of well-executed steps and patience; not trying to run before crawling or walking first.

At Rabbot we have followed these 10 steps for all the projects we have carried out, and they have always given us the desired results.

1. BIG Problems. The very first mistake is to cling to the idea of creating the next Facebook or the next Uber. You mustn’t think about creating the next big thing, but rather in addressing the next big problem. All great success starts out this way: Facebook with communications at Harvard; Uber with transportation; the GoPro cameras with surfers wanting to take photos of themselves.

2. Segment, segment, segment. The first thing is to address a problem, and then to identify which market niche has that problem. The smaller your initial market, the more you will able to control it and build something which that initial group is really passionate about; therefore, segment as much as you can. Returning to #1, Facebook was initially designed for Harvard students, GoPro for surfers, Uber for tech employees, even the Beeper was for doctors. By selecting a small segment, you will be able to reach them in a simpler and more economical way, thereby expanding at an organic growth rate, and from there you’ll be able to leap to other markets. 

3. The first costumer: YOU. If you find a solution to a problem that you have, life will be much simpler for you; you won’t waste time on carrying out surveys to understand the market. Airbnb came about because the founders wanted to rent out their apartment to earn money, and likewise for those companies mentioned above. Just make sure that it is in fact a problem that many other people share, and that you’re not the only one. 

4. Before anything else: Validate. Many people make an unnecessary initial investment. First you must validate the niche market, and see if your solution to the problem is in fact the best one for them. You may discover that the identified problem is not such a big deal for them after all, or that they have other simpler and more economical solutions. 

5. Partners for live. Having business partners in the company because they are your friends or simply because he was there when the idea was born is a big and common mistake. A business partner is a marriage for life, and you ought to think objectively whether that person is the right one. You’re better off alone than with bad company.

6. Value it at its worth. All too often we want the whole world and everything in it, and we take any chances we get without giving much thought to the future. When seeking out an initial investment project, take care of every percentage as if it were your baby, you just won’t let your baby with anyone. Make a proper valuation of your company at whatever stage you are at, and look for what it is worth, nothing more and nothing less. There will be several “no’s” but all you need is one “yes” - have patience. 

7. The costumer comes second. The costumer is indispensable, but not the most fundamental. In order to have costumers, you must first have a good product, and to have a good product it is vital to have a good team. Check what should you be building before building the product. Place more importance on your employee, and they will give much more importance to the costumer.

8. Have allies, not suppliers. Convert your suppliers into strategic allies, get them involved in your company. To do this, a Win-Win relationship is essential - paying the right amount and paying on time is a good start. The quality of your product will wholly depend upon your suppliers.

9. Competitors. Your competitors are beyond those of your same product or service category, they are every company that offers the same employee positions as you do. Give your employees the same or more attention than you give your product; spoil them and respect them so as to keep the talent with you and avoid them absconding. Talking about competitors in the same category: know how they are and what they do, but don’t waste too much time on it. Focus on your own thing.

10. Intellectual Property. Invest time and money in this point, don’t cut back. At the end of the day, it is the intellectual property of any company that in many cases gives it its worth. Research this throughly, and have everything well planned out so as to be fully protected.

To put it more simply and direct, there is no simpler formula than:

A good solution to a specific problem for a group of people + the right people to execute it = success.

The key is in finding the value in every word within this equation. 

Follow Phox on Instagram for more cool illustrations : )

[rabbotblog]

What should you be building before building a product?

To build a product, you only need money. To build a great product, money is the last thing you need. 

We started Rabbot as a digital agency for different reasons, but our goal was always to be a Startup with our own product. The main reason for being a digital agency was that we needed money to build a product before looking for investment, but we soon realized that for the year in which we were a digital agency, we had built an amazing team with a great culture, which was more important than the money we saved. 

In that year, when we built products for others, I can say that a very big and common mistake was people focusing too much energy and money on the product, and forgetting about the rest. It didn’t matter how many times I told them to build an MVP (minimum valuable product), test it to get feedback, then build it again, and so on. They wanted to have a luxurious product from the beginning. The end results were a failure, because they didn’t have a team to pivot. Like Reid Hoffman said, “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched it too late”.

With these, I can say, based on my short experience, that hiring an agency or freelancers to build your product will more certainly fail, and if not, it will be extremely expensive. It is vital to have a team; a great team if you want to build a great product and succeed. In order to have the best team, a great culture is a must. 

We didn’t realize how we managed to have an amazing culture with the best people out there, but after digging and looking back, I can say that these 8 points helped us get the best talent and the greatest culture:

1) True to yourself. Don’t try to be someone you are not; your StartUp should be a vivid image of your personality. If you are not noisy or outgoing, don’t try to force this, as you will only make a fool of yourself. The team will notice this, and you will end up with a fake an weak culture.

2) A good salary. This might sound stupid as it is obvious, but in Latin America, designers and developers are one of the worst paid professionals, resulting in a migration of talent to other countries. To get started on aspiring to have the best product, it is essential to have the best people, and the best are expensive. I can’t say that we are the highest paying Startup, because we are not, but we do have a growth plan for each member, and they also have stocks in the company. If you can’t afford to have the best, it is better to find a good technical Co-Founder to help you get the first mile of the product. 

3) Moral salary. One of the most significant actions, although one of the most ignored. A moral salary consists of how the talent is treated inside the office. This goes from the way they are talked to, up to the equipment they have. If you demand an amazing UX design, you’d better give them the best software and hardware available. A moral salary also consists of enhancing that talent with challenges and with new knowledge. If they are not challenged every day, they will get bored. If they get bored, they will leave. If you don’t provide any new knowledge to them, they will also leave. Therefore, at least you’d better facilitate online courses.

4) Values. Most of Startups want to have the best IOS developer or Illustrator. When I say that we have the best, I mean that we have the best person, not only the best professional. You can modify or increase a person’s technical knowledge, but you can’t modify his values. Look for the people like you, those with whom you can go out and have a beer. A person you can trust is more valuable than having a very good technical person with no trust. Besides, if you are starting to build a team, you want a person who then will hire dozens of people below him and all of them will be like him.

5) To be in love. Find people who are in love with what that they do, and find out why they do it. Being on a Startup is very different from being in a regular company. Things move a lot faster. You want lovers who think in the same way as you 24 hours a day, those who look at their job and instantly find ways to improve and not excuses. If they are in love with what they do, they will find new ways to do it better and faster, all on their own. 

6) Transparency. Being on a Startup is not easy; everyone is investing something. The people are investing and relying upon you as a founder to make things right and to go on. Nobody wants to stop having a job. It is your responsibility and you owe them transparency on every step, if they are good or even bad news. Plus, to move things faster, transparency is the best way.

7) Integrate them. We are all in this together. Make them feel like they belong to the company. Make them part of any decision, no matter how stupid or small it is, like asking what colours the wall should be painted, or what coffee brand to buy. There is nothing better that integrating by giving stocks to the early employees.

8) Shared long term vision. This is the most important point, as it combines all of the above. They MUST share the same vision as you. If they don’t, they will build a product at their own vision. Tell them all of your plans, don’t be a fool and don’t be afraid not to do so. If you have doubts on telling them your plans, then you don’t have the right person. They need to know and dream big in order to be motivated and to build the same product that you have in mind. It is vital to let them know what they will be building for the next five to twenty years, and beyond.

As a digital agency, our main goal was to save enough money to start building our product. But we spent every single dollar throughout that year remodelling the office, ranging from buying better computers, online courses, trips, T-shirts, to a ridiculous giant Rabbot logo. While we didn’t save the money that we wanted, we instead built the most amazing team and culture ever, which is our biggest asset. Thanks to this we receive our first round of investment. 

When we started Rabbot, we wanted to build a place where we could go happy and excited every morning, share time with interesting and fun people, and most importantly, to transcend and make a difference. Unaware that these plans were to become the pillars of our culture. 

Start by building a kick ass team, like we did, and you’ll be unstoppable.  : ) 

[rabbotblog]

Our products will help retailers and e-commerces to have a closer relationship with their customers. We will be posting more about each of our solutions in the coming days, but for now this are our logos :) . Happy Weekend!

[rabbotblog]

It was a great experience to be part of Facebook´s F8 2015 event in San Francisco, Ca. Lots of brilliant people, great atmosphere and a beautiful city.  We will be back for sure :) #f8 #facebook #rabbot