In Lei Jun's view, to make products is to return to simplicity, but simplicity is not just to erase messy things, but to explore complex depths. This is regular and feasible. Control products and make them obey you. The following is what I shared with J.L. The simpler the company, the easier it is for people to succeed. Please continue to visit (www.oh 100.com/chuangye) for more popular entrepreneurial projects.
1 Keep it simple.
I have a friend who has been doing software research and development in a big software company for ten years. He wanted to start a business and asked me what I should pay attention to. I joked that if you want to succeed, the first rule is "wielding a knife from the palace."
Large software companies have a lot of resources, good research and development capabilities and excellent promotion resources, but rarely develop excellent Internet products. At first glance, there are many reasons, such as it is difficult to mobilize the enthusiasm of individuals and it is difficult to coordinate internal management.
I think there is another important reason, that is, the method is inappropriate. Big companies have a lot of resources. After an Internet innovation project has invested a lot of resources, the company's expectations are high. Naturally, there are many issues to consider, but it is not easy to do well.
At the beginning of Xiaomi's business, I stressed that it must be kept secret and low-key. This has two advantages. First, it lowers everyone's expectations, and second, it will make us more focused on making products. Imagine, everyone looked at Lei Jun's actions and had high expectations for this thing. If we were made by Zhang San and Wang Wu and didn't even have a name, users' psychological expectations might not be so high.
When our first product came out, we only posted a few posts in several forums, and then it was passed on by word of mouth by "rice noodles" and even spread abroad because they didn't have high expectations. If they have high expectations, you can't meet them, so it is difficult for users to actively promote your products.
Therefore, to leave a big company to start a business, we must first "throw a knife at ourselves", stifle the practices of big companies, control costs, spend as little as possible, and concentrate our energy and resources on solving one or two core problems.
Don't think too much, don't plan too long, especially the plan can't be too complicated! Success in starting a business requires the ability to find opportunities and make rapid breakthroughs, plus a little luck. Large companies have too much work experience and sometimes limit their own practices.
Internet entrepreneurship, the simpler, the easier it is to succeed!
2 "seven-character formula"
In 2000, I led the establishment of Joyo. In 2004, Joyo was sold to Amazon. After selling Joyo, I have been thinking about what the Internet is.
What was the great pressure I faced at that time? Jinshan only has a growth rate of 20% to 30%, while Joyo.com can achieve a growth rate of 100%. I'm thinking, this doesn't seem right. Only 20% to 30% of the things I spend 80% of my time growing. What's the problem? How can we grow faster? What is the Internet like?
It took me more than half a year to feel a little bit about the Internet. What is this doorway? In fact, it is very simple: the Internet is an idea! Internet is not a technology, but an idea. Internet is a methodology, and you can use this methodology to grasp the essence of the Internet. In order to make it easier for you to understand the Internet, I summarized it into seven words, namely "focus", "extreme", "speed" and "word of mouth", which is the so-called "seven-word formula". What's so powerful about this "seven-character formula"? As long as you do this, you will get twice the result with half the effort.
1), the key point: to solve an urgent need of users, the solved problem can be clearly stated in one sentence.
It is easy to find a clear user group for a clear product that users urgently need. In this way, after the product is developed, it is not easy to go astray;
The selected user needs should be universal, which determines the future market prospect of this product;
Less problems are solved, the development speed is fast, and it is easy to control the cost and risk of early research and development;
Products that solve clear problems are easy to explain to users, and the promotion will be relatively simple;
2) Extreme: To achieve the extreme of all similar products at this function point, the best can win.
Extreme is the core of Internet products. As long as it is extreme, it can surpass users' word of mouth and form a word-of-mouth effect, which will bring great convenience to later promotion.
Focus can achieve the ultimate, and achieve the ultimate to defeat competitors;
3) Fast: The development cycle must be controlled within three to six months, and it must be fast.
In the Internet era, users' needs change rapidly and the competition is fierce. Rapid development, easy to adapt to the rhythm of the whole market, saving costs.
During the user's trial, if problems are found, the response speed should be fast, and improvements and updates should be made as soon as possible. At the beginning, I thought we should keep the update speed for a week or two.
4) Word of mouth: Only by insisting on spending less or even no money in the initial marketing can we see the real appeal of the product to users.
After the product is finished, don't worry, try it out in a small range of users and listen to user feedback.
If large-scale promotion will bring these two problems. First of all, after investing a lot of market expenses, users' expectations are high. If the product is not perfect, it is easy to cause negative word of mouth and leave hidden dangers for future promotion. Secondly, the test results obtained by large-scale marketing are inaccurate. If the product is not perfect, even if there is a problem with demand selection, it will be covered up by numbers. The promotion fee has stopped, and the number of users has not increased or even decreased. It will be too late to change it. Successful Internet startups in the past few years have actually spent little money on marketing, but these companies have spent a lot of energy on marketing.
At first, the most important promotion skills were search engine optimization and viral marketing.
A perfect Internet venture, it is best to have two or three experts in technology and products to start a business together, complete the product in three to six months, test and improve the product in six months to one year, reach the threshold of initial success, seek financing, explore a successful business model, and then invest a lot of market resources to promote and form a large-scale business.
For different business requirements, the criteria for initial success are different.
I have a simple standard for your reference, that is, after the product is launched for six months to one year, the website page exceeds one million PV, or the daily net installation of client products increases by 10000 times, and the number of users continues to increase. After achieving this goal, what needs to be pondered is how to explore a good business model while maintaining the growth rate.
What did Jobs give me?
I'll share with you another story about Jobs.
At that time, the prototype of Segway scooter came out and Jobs stayed up all night after the test drive. The next day, he attended a product seminar. Jobs asked four very good questions, which I think are of great reference value to many entrepreneurs:
The first question: product positioning
At that time, Segway took out two models, which were aimed at the personal and commercial markets.
Jobs asked them why they offered two models. Why not release a regular version for several thousand dollars first, which is really hot, and then release an enhanced version with twice the price, aiming at the industrial and military fields?
He began to talk about his experience as an iMac. Why did he wait seven months after releasing the first iMac before launching other colors? He wants his designers, salespeople and public relations to be 100% dedicated. That is to say, he closed his retreat as soon as he came up.
There is no doubt that making two products at the same time, no matter which one will have some luck, even if this one is not good, that one will be successful enough. It is easy for people to persuade themselves to give up their enthusiasm for a single product. But Jobs's way of thinking will make the whole company put all your eggs in one basket forever, which is often said by the outside world that his employees will be oppressed by him and explode their potential.
The second question: product design
Jobs asked Segway what you thought of your product, and then commented that the prototype product was shit. Jobs instantly said three criteria: the shape is not innovative, elegant and impersonal. ? You have an incredibly innovative machine, but the shape looks very traditional. ? Finally, he gave advice: Go to the best design company, and be sure to make great products that make you pull your pants after reading them!
This paragraph is also full of information, because it concisely summarizes Jobs' three design criteria: whether the design is amazing, elegant and humanized enough.
The third question: product production.
At that time, Segway was worried that the technology would be copied and wanted to set up its own factory for production.
Jobs asked, why build a factory? He is firmly opposed. Jobs's idea is to use time and money to find other barriers. Just like the accompaniment of iPod and iTunes, in the iPhone era, the moat of application development platform and appstore was built by the low price of mobile phone subsidies, and the iPhone was carefully cared for.
The fourth question: product marketing.
How much is this product?
Jobs first gave a conservative plan: to promote this machine in a small scale in a first-class university like Stanford and a theme park like Disney. But he immediately added that the risk is not small. If an unlucky child accidentally falls down at Stanford and scolds Scooter online, the company will be finished. If it is a large-scale sale, a little trouble will not fundamentally hurt the company. Old Joe said, "I am a big exploiter." After that, he was happy. The risk of holding high and fighting high is that you expose yourself to the enemy and you need a lot of money to fight imitators. ?
Segway coached by old Joe is really cool! In old Joe's view, only concentration can do everything to the extreme. In this way, every product is a rock-breaking and sweeping market.
4 Google Ten Commandments
In my opinion, the key factor for the success of Internet products is user reputation.
Resources are always limited, especially startups. When I was in Jinshan, I promoted a movement to learn from Google in order to promote the Internet transformation in Jinshan and let colleagues in Jinshan better understand the nature of the Internet. One of them is to ask everyone to recite the Ten Commandments of Google.
Today, I can recite it easily. Among these ten items, I am most impressed by "doing one thing to the extreme" and "Excellence alone is not enough". If you think about it carefully, you can understand why every product of Google makes users crazy, because it is extreme. Every product made by Google is really the ultimate!
The reason why Google and Apple are great is that they have such genes, that is, dedication and extreme. Entrepreneurs can become great companies like Google and Apple if they insist on concentration and perfection!
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