Re:Ask HN: Best business advice for software developers
by awinter-py on Wednesday April 19, 2017 @11:10AM
(#14148246)
I'm a dev who's starting a business and running up against some of this -- for me 'understand the entire market' resonated.
In my case that means knowing the major datapoints about competitors in my space (public vs private companies, who's making/losing money, appannie stats), knowing everything available about cost of user acquisition, and looking at psych studies on user motivations.
These are things I would have benefited from knowing on day 0 but instead only learned after building a prototype that I had to scrap.
If your business is enterprise focused rather than consumer focused, understanding one or two customers is probably good enough for a start.
In my case that means knowing the major datapoints about competitors in my space (public vs private companies, who's making/losing money, appannie stats), knowing everything available about cost of user acquisition, and looking at psych studies on user motivations.
These are things I would have benefited from knowing on day 0 but instead only learned after building a prototype that I had to scrap.
If your business is enterprise focused rather than consumer focused, understanding one or two customers is probably good enough for a start.