This edition begins with some general
"lessons learned" over the past three months and then
briefly covers our progress to date and our priority goals.
Future editions will not be this long...we just felt like
we had a lot to share this time around.
Lessons
Learned
"When your product or service
is to existing products or services what toilet paper
is to crumbled leaves, it's time to ship. S - h - i -
p, ship" (Guy Kawasaki) If you think that you have a great
product or service, it's best to get it out to customers
and let them determine the success of the product rather
than attempting to develop the perfect product/service.
We spent over three months trying to perfect the initial
MouseDriver design. Regardless of how good each design
sample looked, we always managed to find something wrong
with the size, weight, color, etc. Finally, around mid-July,
we realized that any more design changes would result
in missing part of the '99 Holiday sales season. So, we
decided to manufacture a product that we knew needed a
number of improvements. The result: the response to MouseDriver
has been very positive and we've received a ton of feedback
on how to better improve the product...much better feedback
that what the two of us working together could provide.
Don't be paranoid about sharing
your idea with others. Early on, we were afraid to even
mention the MouseDriver name to distributors and suppliers,
much less what the product actually looked like. We were
convinced that someone was going to steal the idea, become
an entrepreneur, find a manufacturer overseas, raise the
money to design the product and find a distribution network
before we even had a chance to get off the ground. Needless
to say, we couldn't have been more naïve. Once we started
sharing the idea with people in the promotional products
industry, we found ourselves learning more and more about
how to bring MouseDriver to market. In fact, for a few
weeks, our strategy was changing on a daily basis. Following
our conversations with suppliers and distributors, we'd
reserve a conference room (corner table) at Starbuck's
and hash out another distribution strategy. Our advice:
share your idea with as many people as possible. You'll
learn a lot more. Caveat: this advice may not apply in
hyper-competitive industries such as e-commerce.
Take your initial time estimates
on when you think things will start to happen and multiply
by at least 4. Unless you've had a similar entrepreneurial
experience in the past, chances are, you will miss every
date and milestone that you have set for the company.
Fortunately, in many situations, you are not the one to
blame for screwing things up. As a start-up (with no major
funding or strategic partners), you will find that larger
companies do not share the same sense of urgency as you
do. You will also find that, despite how great your idea
is and how strong your background may be, you have NO
LEVERAGE. You will want to move at 200 mph, but because
you are in a constant state of waiting, you're forced
to move at around 50 mph. This period is extremely frustrating
and leads to periods of boredom and second-guessing (second-guessing
is based on the amount of time available to research the
progress of all the Internet opportunities you passed
up in order to sell novelty computer mice). One suggestion:
keep plugging away and laughing at the situation. At some
point in time, everything comes together at once and the
speedometer quickly hits 500 mph...and then you become
frustrated for other reasons.
If you have a family (i.e. spouse/kids),
make sure that they fully understand the ramifications
of you're new situation. We are working constantly and
because we are working out of our apartment, we feel compelled
to work every hour of the day. We definitely manage to
get out a couple of nights a week, but most nights are
spent working until 1AM. Neither one of us can fathom
doing this gig with 1) a wife or 2) with kids. In fact,
we don't see how someone could pull this off without putting
some sort of strain on the family relationship. Our utmost
respect and admiration goes out to those entrepreneurs
who are starting their own companies with a significant
other and family in tow. Our advice (like either one of
us is qualified to give relationship advice): make sure
that you're family understands that you may be MIA (missing
in action) for a certain period of time and make sure
that the family is extremely supportive of what you are
about to get yourself into.
What
We've Done
- Sent out MouseDriver samples to contacts/distributors/customers
and gathered feedback on how the product might fare
in the promotional products and the consumer retail
industries.
- Finally committed to a large inventory
investment. In an effort to keep our equity "in-house,"
we both borrowed money against our personal assets to
make this investment.
- Started to personally sell MouseDriver's
to the corporate market (mainly financial services firms)
and began establishing an independent sales representative
network for the '99 Holiday Season.
- Learned a ton about the promotional
products industry by meeting with a number of distributors,
suppliers and corporate marketing managers.
