The document provides guidance on building a compelling value proposition for a startup. It discusses evaluating problems that are unworkable, unavoidable, urgent and underserved. It also discusses defining solutions that are discontinuous, defensible and disruptive. The document emphasizes building the startup around the founder's unique understanding of problems and ability to deliver solutions. It stresses that the customer gain/pain ratio should be greater than 10 to overcome inertia and risk. Examples are provided of startups like Disqus, uTest (Applause) and Diagnostics for All that demonstrated high gain/pain ratios for customers.
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Startup Secrets
Workshops
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1. What’s Your Roadmap to Success?
2. Building a Compelling Value Proposition
3. Turning Products into Companies
4. Culture, Mission and Vision
5. Hiring A+ Talent
6. Game-Changing Business Models
7. Go to Market Strategies
8. Getting Behind the Perfect Investor Pitch
9. Funding Strategies to go the Distance
10. Have You Got What It Takes?
11. Mastering Mutual Mentorship
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Agenda
Evaluate Build
Gain Pain
Value
Prop
Define
Ideas
Problem
Solution
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● For (target customers)
● Who are dissatisfied with (the current alternative)
● Our product is a (new product)
● That provides (key problem-solving capability)
● Unlike (the product alternative)
Value
Proposition
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● For Mobile Enterprises
● Who are unable to deliver Apps to users bringing their
own devices to work
● Our product is an Enterprise App Services
Environment (EASE)
● That provides for users to securely access Apps and
Information
● Unlike (MDM), our patented Cloud based (MAM)
solution is instantly turned on and scales to tens of
thousands of users
Example:
Apperian
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Where Might You Start?
Evaluate Build
Gain Pain
Value
Prop
Define
Ideas
Problem
Solution
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Agenda: Problem
Evaluate Build
Gain Pain
Value
Prop
Define
Ideas
Problem
Solution
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● Unworkable
● Unavoidable
● Urgent
● Underserved
Problems worth solving
are usually the 4 U’s…
Problem
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● Broken business process
● Consequences?
If the consequences are costly or painful,
so much the better.
e.g., Who gets fired if this doesn’t work?
Unworkable
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● Accounting
● Regulation
Unavoidable
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Is the problem so fundamental
you can’t avoid it and just have to comply?
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● Relative to Other Needs
● Priority
○ Determines resources allocated
Urgent
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If you’re not at the top of the list, are you at least in the top 3?
If not, will you get moved up or down over time and why?
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Underserved:
Business
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● You will compete in a zero-sum game
● Finite:
○ Money
○ Time
○ People
○ Attention
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Qualify
the Need
Is it BLAC & white?
● Blatant
● Latent
● Aspirational
● Critical
Blatant
Latent
Aspirational Critical
White
Spac
e
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● Is it addressing a “white space” in the market?
○ an open area of opportunity
○ which you can capture
○ uniquely well
○ AND defend with a moat
■ NOT just technology, business model too
moat
Startup
Secret!
Create a
Moat
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● Is it 4 U?
○ Unworkable
○ Unavoidable
○ Urgent
○ Underserved
● Is it BLAC and white?
Problem:
Summary
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3D
Breakthrough
Opportunities
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● Discontinuous innovation
● Defensible technology +
● Disruptive business model
A breakthrough that
COMPELS people to
ACT !
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● It’s often as much work going after a small fight…
● Big problems often = big opportunities
Startup
Secret!
Pick a
BIG Fight
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● It’s often as much work going after a small fight…
● Big problems often = big opportunities
● Start small (Execution), think BIG (Vision), develop
a ROADMAP
● See Roadmap to Success on startupsecrets.com
○ e.g., Uber
■ An app with the potential to disrupt an
industry
Startup
Secret!
Develop a
Roadmap
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Agenda: Evaluate
Evaluate Build
Gain Pain
Value
Prop
Define
Ideas
Problem
Solution
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Before After
Acute Pain ☹ Absolute Joy ☺
Qualitative
Evaluation
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Before After
Acute Pain ☹ Absolute Joy ☺
Qualitative
Evaluation
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Vitamin vs. Morphine
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● For companies with web or mobile apps
● Who are dissatisfied with apps that work as expected in the QA lab, but
not in the hands of end users
● Our in-the-wild testing
● Enables them to test their apps under real-world conditions
● Unlike outsourced testing, which merely moves the QA lab to a cheaper
part of the world, but doesn’t actually improve app quality
uTestBefore & AfteruTest - Value Proposition
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Before: Test In The Lab & Hope
Testing inside the lab is vital. But today’s web & mobile apps require a new approach to
augment lab testing: in-the-wild testing
After: Test Where Your Users Are
Before & AfterBefore & After
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Introducing the gain / pain ratio
Gain Pain
Quantitative
Evaluation
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The gain delivered to the customer
vs.
The pain and cost for the customer to adopt
Gain Pain
Gain/
Pain
Ratio
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● Revenue
● Cost savings
● Time
● People
● Competitive advantage
● Reputation
● Etc.
Gain
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Gain Pain
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● Gain from uTest:
○ Scale infinitely and immediately
■ From 3 testers, to 30, to 300, and back to 0
○ Lower total cost of testing
■ EG: SMBs - unlimited testing for ½ the cost of one FTE
○ Test under real-world conditions
■ Live testers, real devices, imperfect conditions… in-the-wild
● Pain from uTest:
○ More testing reports, creating more work
■ Takes time to re-produce, vet and rate 50+ bugs
○ More collaboration, creating more oversight
■ Coordination between in-house & crowd testers
● Goal:
○ Maximize in-the-wild testing, while minimizing overhead
uTest: Gain vs Pain
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● Switching costs?
● Default = do nothing
● Alternatives?
● Good enough =
good enough!
● RISK on a startup
Inertia
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Gain Pain
Inertia,
RISK
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Average of 30:1 benefit
● $34m vs $1.2m
● Recovery used to take 8.5 hours vs. 2 minutes
Gain/
Pain
Ratio
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Inertia,
RISK
Gain >10
Pain
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Customer
View:
Gain/Pai
n
Ratio
● Revenue
● Cost savings
● Time
● People
● Competitive
advantage
● Reputation
● Etc.
● Inertia
● Switching costs?
● Default = do
nothing
● Alternatives?
● Good enough =
good enough!
● RISK on a
startup
● Find (See)
● Try
● Buy
● Implement
● Deploy
● Own – e.g., TCO
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Inertia,
RISK
Gain
>10 Pain
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Customer
View:
Gain/Pai
n
Ratio
● Revenue
● Cost savings
● Time
● People
● Competitive
advantage
● Reputation
● Etc.
● Inertia
● Switching costs?
● Default = do
nothing
● Alternatives?
● Good enough =
good enough!
● RISK on a
startup
● Find (See)
● Try
● Buy
● Implement
● Deploy
● Own – e.g., TCO
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Inertia,
RISK
Gain >10
Pain
An Order of
Magnitude!
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Tough to quantify precisely, but here’s what we’ve learned
Gain vs. Pain Ratio
Gain Pain
Cost Savings: 10X
Lower Escape Rate by
75%
Make Testing Mirror User
Base
Launch Confidence
Higher Quality Apps
vs
.
Increased Overhead
5:1
on cost basis
20:1
on cost + value basis
Customer Gain / Pain Ratio
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Test latest version of Google Chrome across 300 highest trafficked URLs
on the web
Traditional Outsourcing vs. uTest
Testers 8 Testers 30
Hours / Tester 40 Hours / Tester 10
# of Days 5 # of Days 2
# of URLs Tested 300 # of URLs Tested 300
# of Discovered Issues 19 # of Discovered Issues 129
Price $15,000 Price $10,000
Price-per-Issue $789 Price-per-Issue $78
Sample Customer ROIGain vs. Pain Ratio
Sample Customer ROI
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▪ Increase revenue by 40% at counters
▪ Roll out 17,000 iPads
▪ Deliver worldwide no IT touch required
▪ Saved $2.5M+ in direct IT costs
Example:
Apperian
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Agenda: Build
Evaluate Build
Gain Pain
Value
Prop
Define
Ideas
Problem
Solution
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● For (target customers)
● Who are dissatisfied with (the current
alternative)
● Our product is a (new product)
● That provides (key problem-solving capability)
● Unlike (the product alternative)
Value
Proposition
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● What problems do you understand
uniquely well?
● What solution can you deliver uniquely
well?
● What kind of disruptive business model
can you bring?
Build
Around
YOU
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● Define
○ 4U Need (Unworkable,
Unavoidable, Urgent,
Underserved)
○ 3D Solution (Discontinuous,
Defensible, Disruptive)
● Evaluate
○ Gain / Pain >10
● Build
○ Around YOU!
Summary
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1 2 3
• Easy install for all platforms
• Sites are part of the Disqus network
Sites integrate Disqus Users engage with Disqus
Users discover new content &
sites across Disqus
• Sites see tangible benefits, including
increased traffic on their pages
Audience development made easy.
Millions of users use Disqus to participate online and we make
that valuable for publishers in a way that they can measure.
How DISQUS Works
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A COMMUNITY ECOSYSTEM
is the foundation of our
business.
USERS
GOALS
Discovery
Community
ADVERTISERS
GOALS
Acquisition
Retention
PUBLISHERS
GOALS
Engagement
Growth
Revenue
The DISQUS Ecosystem
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DISQUS:
Value
Proposition
for
Publishers
● FOR publishers, like online media or bloggers
● WHO CARE ABOUT building more engaged, loyal
audiences directly on their sites
● OUR PRODUCT IS the most widely used discussion
platform online
● THAT PROVIDES an “engagement management platform”
for publishers, and direct reach into millions of engaged
community participants online
● UNLIKE social networks, which don’t properly serve the
needs of publishers, or white-label software, which
doesn’t provide the wide network reach of users.
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● FOR those in the developing world
● WHO ARE DISSATISFIED WITH limited
access to diagnosis
● OUR PRODUCT IS A patterned paper-based
diagnostic technology
● THAT PROVIDES low-cost, easy-to-use,
point-of-care diagnostics
● UNLIKE no diagnosis
Diagnostics
for All:
Value
Proposition
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Before
Need
After
Solution
53%
of Rwandan women
cannot afford healthcare
26%
of Rwandan women
live too far from a hospital
[1] National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR) [Rwanda], Ministry of Health
(MOH) [Rwanda] http://www.measuredhs.com/publications/publication-fr259-
dhs-final-reports.cfm
Point-of-care
Minimal training required
Cost = 1¢
Diagnosis by telemedicine
Image: http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/alertnets-top-20-big-ideas-that-
dont-cost-the-earth/
Diagnostics for All
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● NO current solution => huge
● NO infrastructure required
● NO training required
● NO time required
● Customers’ Gain / Pain ratio = ∞
DFA:
Gain/Pain
Ratio
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DFA:
Example
At-risk pregnancy
Liver function
● 8 million affected globally
● Conducting ~700 person trial in Vietnam
● Test for ALT/AST enzymes
● Cost: $14 v. 1¢ (DFA)
Child nutrition
Small farmer support
Customer ‘pain’ is real pain
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How Thoroughly Should You Define?
A little and then iterate?
or
A LOT and then execute?
“A problem well stated is a problem half solved” - Charles Kettering