A walkthrough of Viximo's expansion into mobile including early indicators, customer development work, product planning, pilot customers, and go to market - with plenty of lessons learned along the way that should save you time and money.

1. Viximo, Going Mobile
R. Sean Lindsay
@rseanlindsay
http://seanlindsay.com
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2. Who’s This?
Technologist, Creator, Connector, Advisor, Mentor
‣ Co-Founder & CTO, Viximo
‣ Creator, Founder Mentors
‣ Advisor, Boundless Learning
‣ Advisor, StartStreet Sports
‣ Advisor, HelpScout
‣ Mentor, TechStars & MassChallenge
‣ Formerly PanGo, BEA, Upromise
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3. How do I define LEAN?
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4. Focus on the Customer
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5. Focus on the Customer
Iterate, Iterate, Iterate
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6. Focus on the Customer
Iterate, Iterate, Iterate
Maximize Learning : Investment
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7. Background
Viximo provides social apps distribution,
engagement, and monetization
‣ Founded 2007, 25 employees today
‣ Lots of “pivots” along the way (not always “lean”)
• Virtual Gifting, Content Marketplace, Mobile Markup Language,
iPhone Apps, Content Distrib Platform, Social Game Developer
‣ Now largest independent social game publisher
• Millions of users all over the world
‣ Integrate, localize, and distribute social games on web
‣ B2B2C business, revenue sharing business model
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8. “So, what’s your
mobile strategy?”
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9. Mobile Market Assessment
September 2011
Summary
‣ Management decision to
assess mobile opportunity
‣ Single resource (me)
allocated to research
‣ 20+ customer development
discussions
‣ Goal is informal summary
of the opportunity
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10. Mobile Market Assessment
September 2011
Summary Takeaways
‣ Management decision to ‣ Assign a lead to the task
assess mobile opportunity
‣ Hold interviews even
‣ Single resource (me) before product concept
allocated to research
‣ Meeting are surprisingly
‣ 20+ customer development easy to get, people want to
discussions talk about their challenges
‣ Goal is informal summary ‣ Approach as research, not
of the opportunity sales
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11. This is gonna
be BIG...
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12. Mobile Solution Design
October 2011
Summary
‣ Distilled information
‣ Outlined customer
acquisition offering
‣ Engaged product team part
time to outline product
‣ Socialized proposal
‣ Goal is validated plan
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13. Mobile Solution Design
October 2011
Summary Takeaways
‣ Distilled information ‣ Ramp in product and
business development
‣ Outlined customer slowly
acquisition offering
‣ Review with both those
‣ Engaged product team part who shared pain point and
time to outline product new prospects
‣ Socialized proposal ‣ Be ready to acknowledge
‣ Goal is validated plan you’ve got it wrong
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14. Oops...
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15. Mobile Solution Redesign
November 2011
Summary
‣ Revisited information
‣ Outlined social toolkit
offering
‣ Engaged product team part
time to outline product
‣ Socialized proposal
‣ Goal is validated plan
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16. Mobile Solution Redesign
November 2011
Summary Takeaways
‣ Revisited information ‣ Ramp in product and
business development
‣ Outlined social toolkit slowly
offering
‣ Gather assessments from
‣ Engaged product team part both those who shared pain
time to outline product point and new
‣ Socialized proposal ‣ Be ready to act when
‣ Goal is validated plan you’ve got it right
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17. The Solution: Social Zone
The ultimate toolkit for making mobile apps truly social
Social Zone Social Zone Social Zone Social Zone
Supergraph Messsaging Presence Promotion
Most Optimized Real-time Social proof
comprehensive multi-channel player cross-promotion
social graph push notifications interactions engine
available
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18. Mobile Product Plan
December 2011
Summary
‣ Engaged engineers in tech
planning
‣ Understand what remains
to learn
‣ Build learning milestones
into plan
‣ Goal is MVP development
plan
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19. Mobile Product Plan
December 2011
Summary Takeaways
‣ Engaged engineers in tech ‣ Be ruthless about reducing
planning to the core value (minimum
sales reqs)
‣ Understand what remains
to learn ‣ Get it into customers hands
as soon as possible
‣ Build learning milestones
into plan ‣ Realize that you’ll have it
wrong, plan for iteration
‣ Goal is MVP development
plan
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20. Original Product Development Plan
...which we actually beat
January 2012 February 2012 March 2012
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4
Available on
Documentation 1/13
Available on
Alpha (Android) 2/3
Available on
Beta (Android) 2/17
Available on
v.1.0 (Android) 3/2
Available on
Beta (iOS) 3/15
Available on
v.1.0 (iOS) 3/31
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21. Mobile Go-To-Market
December 2011
Summary
‣ Segmented self-serve
channel from BD channel
‣ Added new resources
‣ Developed pipelines
‣ Began capturing leads
‣ Goal is customer
acquisition plan
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22. Mobile Go To Market
December 2011
Summary Takeaways
‣ Segmented self-serve ‣ Revisit your entire early
channel from BD channel customer list and grow it
‣ Added new resources ‣ Test variety of messages,
channels
‣ Developed pipelines
‣ Match right message to
‣ Began capturing leads right audience in right
‣ Goal is customer channel
acquisition plan
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23. [ Lots of hard work
and a cloud of dust ]
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24. Launch
March 2012
Summary
‣ PR launch, conference
presence, hackathons, etc
‣ Continued BD efforts
‣ Continued product dev
based on real use
‣ Goal is repeatable channel,
adoption, and customer
success
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25. Launch
March 2012
Summary Takeaways
‣ PR launch, conference ‣ Test various onboarding
presence, hackathons, etc techniques
‣ Continued BD efforts ‣ Be willing to be high touch,
figure out how to scale later
‣ Continued product dev
based on real use ‣ Determine what’s working
and double down on that
‣ Goal is repeatable channel,
adoption, and customer ‣ Keep learning
success
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26. And now the hard work begins...
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27. Ramping Resources
Only as traction and plans justify
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BD
PM
Eng
9
15
6 6
3
3
10
3 3 3
2
5
9
3 7 7 7
2
2
1 1 1
0
Sep 2011 Oct 2011 Nov 2011 Dev 2011 Jan 2012 Feb 2012 Mar 2012 Apr 2012
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28. Ramping Resources
Only as traction and plans justify
MVP Shipped
Marketing
20 Begins
BD MVP Plan
PM
Eng Finalized
9
15
Customer
Confirmation 6 6
3
3
10
Commitment 3 3 3
to Market
2
5
9
3 7 7 7
2
2
1 1 1
0
Sep 2011 Oct 2011 Nov 2011 Dev 2011 Jan 2012 Feb 2012 Mar 2012 Apr 2012
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29. A Few Final Thoughts On Pivots...
‣ Leverage what you know/have
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30. A Few Final Thoughts On Pivots...
‣ Leverage what you know/have
‣ Beware the demotivation of chasing
shiny objects (minimize impacts)
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31. A Few Final Thoughts On Pivots...
‣ Leverage what you know/have
‣ Beware the demotivation of chasing
shiny objects (minimize impacts)
‣ Think evolution, not revolution,
whenever possible
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32. Questions?
R. Sean Lindsay
@rseanlindsay
http://seanlindsay.com
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