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9 Lessons Learned Going from 0 to 50,000 Customers In 3 Years
How does a single blog post on UI prototyping become an MVP built in 3 hours, and later a product used by over 50,000 designers, entrepreneurs, product managers, and teachers in more than 80 countries? Is it enough to create a product and "just launch it" to get that...
Corporate Designer vs. Startup Designer
In 2007, after four years of serving time in a large organization, I decided to work with startups. Here are some memorable conversations I’ve had in both environments.
What I Wish Someone Had Told Me About Startups 4 Years Ago
The year is 2007, and I had just left Microsoft to dive into the startup world. Like many first time entrepreneurs, I was very excited about the adventure. And like many first time entrepreneurs, I didn’t know where to start. So I attended events, meetups,...
How I launched a profitable product in 3 hours
Today, Keynotopia is two months old. What started as a single blog post in June of 2010 became a product that got over 1,500 customers in the first 60 days. Before jumping into the story and lessons learned, here are some quick stats: Total time spent creating the...
How to create interactive iPad app prototypes in 30 minutes Using Keynote or PowerPoint
How long would it take to go from idea for an iPhone or iPad app to a prototype that you can test with users? A month? A week? Few days? How about 30 minutes? What if you can prototype your next idea quickly and cheaply without learning any new tools or programming...
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9 Lessons Learned Going from 0 to 50,000 Customers In 3 Years
How does a single blog post on UI prototyping become an MVP built in 3 hours, and later a product used by over 50,000 designers, entrepreneurs, product managers, and teachers in more than 80 countries? Is it enough to create a product and "just...
Hacking The Ultimatum Game
Ever heard about the ultimatum game? It’s probably one of the most important concepts related to entrepreneurship, and one that had profound impact on my business.
Here’s how it works:
How to Turn Failures Into A Lifetime of Success
Every one fails at some point or another. However, very few can survive so many failures, and fewer would take one hit after another, and turn them into a lifetime of accomplishments. The following is the true story of a man who did exactly so......
How To Die With No Regrets
It all happened too fast... The raft entered the rapid, heading directly toward the rock wall, and bouncing up and down through the waves. I heard the guide yelling something about leaning in and holding on. The side of the raft hit the rocks and...
Should you quit your job to work on your startup idea?
Over the years, I've heard mixed opinions about this topic. Some people say keep your job and work on your idea on the side, because you need the income and you never know if your idea is good enough. Others say having a job will prevent you from...
Escape Velocity
I recently learned an interesting fact: Most of the fuel in a space shuttle is burnt in the first few minutes of launch, in order to bring the shuttle to enough speed and altitude to escape Earth's gravity without falling back. That speed is called...
What We’re Really Afraid Of
I recently had a very interesting conversation with a friend who recently launched an online business, and it surprised me how our fears are never what they seem to be It went something like this: B.: I need your help. I launched my product a few...
Corporate Designer vs. Startup Designer
In 2007, after four years of serving time in a large organization, I decided to work with startups. Here are some memorable conversations I’ve had in both environments.
Hackers vs. Coders
Photo Credit: Pranav Mistry Being a good hacker is an invaluable skill. But is being a coder the same as being a hacker? Is it possible that coders are at a creative disadvantage to hackers who don't know how to code? Here's a story that helped me...
Hacking The Status Game
Last year, I played a game that changed my life. I was taking an improv class, and the instructor gave us a game to play before getting on stage, so that we can turn off our over-rationalizing minds and get into the flow. The game was called...
Having The Best Tools Doesn’t Really Matter
Several people asked why I chose Wordpress as a platform to launch Keynotopia. Before answering, I’d like to share a short story: When I was at Microsoft, I worked with great developers. But one of them stood out: He was extremely productive, his...
How I Launched A Profitable Product in 3 Hours – Part 2: The Nuts And Bolts
When my earlier post on how I launched a profitable product in 3 hours with a $47.50 budget made it to the homepage of hacker news, the most voted comments requested that I'd go through the specifics of how I did the launch and which tools I used....
Why A Launched Product Beats A Perfect Idea
Which one would you rather have: A finished perfect product that you spend a year or two creating and optimizing before launch? or a half-baked product that you launch in a couple of weeks, and that people start to use right away? I was lucky...
What I Wish Someone Had Told Me About Startups 4 Years Ago
The year is 2007, and I had just left Microsoft to dive into the startup world. Like many first time entrepreneurs, I was very excited about the adventure. And like many first time entrepreneurs, I didn’t know where to start. So I attended...
How To Choose Your Startup Idea
Ideas can be paralyzing, and it seems like the more ideas we get, the less likely we are to pick one and act on it. When the paradox of choice kicks in, some of us opt for postponing the choice, others choose one idea and feel guilty about...
How I launched a profitable product in 3 hours
Today, Keynotopia is two months old. What started as a single blog post in June of 2010 became a product that got over 1,500 customers in the first 60 days. Before jumping into the story and lessons learned, here are some quick stats: Total time...
Prototyping iPhone apps with Apple Keynote in 30 minutes or less
How to create an iPhone app prototype in 13 minutes using Apple Keynote [Video Tutorial]
After posting the previous tutorial on prototyping an iPad app in 30 minutes , I was asked by several peeps to put together a video tutorial on how I'd create an iPhone app prototype using the same technique: No design tools Zero lines of code...
How to create interactive iPad app prototypes in 30 minutes Using Keynote or PowerPoint
How long would it take to go from idea for an iPhone or iPad app to a prototype that you can test with users? A month? A week? Few days? How about 30 minutes? What if you can prototype your next idea quickly and cheaply without learning any new...
The Elephant in the Dark: A Story
Once upon a time, there existed a village that was completely inhabited by blind people. One day, an elephant came to the village. Since none of them had ever seen an elephant before, they all gathered around the animal to figure out how it...
Customer Development Hacked: How to find and interview 10,000 customers in one day
If you’re creating a new product, a question might be lingering in your mind: How do you find the right customers to interview? Here is one of the traditional methods for conducting customer interviews: 1. Make an educated guess about your target...
My four steps to the epiphany: Lessons learned from creating a minimally viable research product
In the summer of 2004, I had my first entrepreneurship experience in an unlikely place. I was still working on my PhD, when I received an invitation to spend the summer at Microsoft Research. Some of the finest researchers there have been working...
THE MON(K)EY TRAP
There is a popular method used in the East to capture monkeys: A hunter places a banana in a bowl with a narrow opening at the top, and fixes the bowl somewhere in the jungle. A monkey passes by and notices the smell of banana coming from the bowl....