Thanks @dredurr! Hey Product Hunt!
Startup Rocket was birthed out of the frustration of re-inventing the wheel every time we, the partners and advisors behind Prota Ventures, started validating a new idea, building a team, launching a product, and accelerating a business to a place where it made sense to raise capital.
On the other side of the table, it also came out of countless conversations with early-stage founders seeking to land their first round of funding.
Not surprisingly, there are a common set of mistakes that most founders make that are avoidable with the right coaching.
Thus, we've built and now launched Startup Rocket, which provides an ops framework (ideate, validate, create, grow, fund), a collaborative web app, personalized coaching, and a ton of resources designed to help new founders at every step of their early journey.
Let me, @tristarter, or @perryazevedo know if you have any questions. Thanks all!
@wclittle@dredurr@tristarter@perryazevedo
Its a pretty detailed framework thats for sure!
Is there a certain stage for this? Would you recommend a framework for building and shipping an MVP first?
@bentossell@wclittle@dredurr@perryazevedo Ben - generally speaking this is good for pre-funded ventures/startups.
That said, I've personally used it for a variety of businesses ranging from a Hairpin Legs company that's on a run-rate of over $200k/yr and growing in just 3 months time (www.diyhairpinlegs.com) to a cybersecurity startup that's still in a bit of stealth mode. Each time that I skipped a step I kicked myself later on for not doing it at some point... lots of lessons learned and iterations on the framework during those times! Trust me - not all of it worked well and we still have a lot to learn to make it better. :D
It's now become our standard for Prota Ventures and something we live by.
Depending on the stage of the company, certain sections of the framework may be more critical than others at that time... for example, a company that launches, has a small team of co-founders, gets some initial revenue and is in the process of learning their best initial customer base (early adopters) may end up going back and forth between the Grow and Fund portion of the framework for a while - even as a revenue generating company.
Hope that helps. I'm sure @wclittle will chime in as well with his experience over the years in a bit.
@bentossell@dredurr@tristarter@perryazevedo Hey Ben! Yeah the framework has baked into it the standard Lean principles, combined with decades of ground-and-pound experience with the nuances of what "MVP" means for various business models and markets.
In other words, we try to help founders test value hypotheses relentlessly before getting to the "create" stage of our framework, while still teaching them the benefit of having a strong product vision and not letting a small number of data points overly sway direction. It's a balance.
That being said, at the end of the "create" stage, founders will of course still have a very minimal product. But if they've gotten that far in the way we suggest, then they will have already landed a ton of decision-maker customers who are in love with the startup's value prop and early concierge services. :)
Great Framework!
When I hear about people actually getting some value out of a product. I have to hook me peeps up.
The team did a great job making the funding part of being a founder seamless
@dredurr Thanks for the hunt! Glad to be here and will be around for anyone with questions about the framework. Where it came from, who it's for... how it works best... our own experience with it, etc. Cheers!
@dredurr Thanks! While we emphasize that founders should plan to bootstrap and "fund" their startups via profits, indeed for some companies it will make sense to fuel growth via outside capital. In those scenarios, we help founders lay a *solid* foundation so the fundraising process is at least a tad smoother than normal. :)
I'm trying to get a side-project off the ground and can't go full-on startup with it. Are there insights in the framework which can help this type of scenario? Thanks.
@ichillidesign read about #7daystartup. I am in same situation and try this approach. It's brutal, especially about what is MVP, but promise fast validation.
@ichillidesign This should totally help in your scenario. We’ve tried to cover every part of going from "idea to launch." Sign up on the free tier and let us know if any part of the process can be improved.
@ichillidesign re: insights in the framework that can help get a side-project off the ground:
Yes. For starters, right out of the gate we suggest using the ideation content to help recruit both a co-founder (i.e. an important validation step) AND identify the first influential decision-makers who will buy/significantly engage with your product. Focusing on these, for example, will help save a significant amount of your time and likely increase velocity.
Also, when you find yourself with a solid set of customers who love what you're up to, and you feel confident it's time to build out a more robust product and put some business structure around it, the framework is designed to maximally optimize your team's time and operational efficiency. This lends itself while for side gigs, as most startups rarely have their team working full-time on it in these very early stages.
Let us know how else we can be helpful. Thanks!
Startup Rocket Framework
Makerpad
Startup Rocket Framework
Startup Rocket Framework
Brightwork
Startup Rocket Framework
Startup Rocket Framework
Digsby
Digsby
Startup Rocket Framework
Digsby
Startup Rocket Framework