Build a better startup by running lean
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<strong>Build</strong> a <strong>better</strong> <strong>startup</strong> <strong>by</strong> <strong>running</strong><br />
<strong>lean</strong><br />
Airbnb is now a household name, over the years they've become a<br />
powerhouse in the travel sector.<br />
They've disrupted an industry <strong>by</strong> providing travellers with an<br />
alternative to staying in hotels, and also provided a new source of<br />
income to individuals with spare rooms and apartments.<br />
Key metrics<br />
When it came to growth, the founders had a very <strong>lean</strong> mindset and<br />
focused on that one key metric that could change things.<br />
It happened to be professional photography.<br />
It all started with a hypothesis.<br />
Hosts with professional photography will get more<br />
business.<br />
This is where gut instinct comes into play, they were all pretty<br />
confident that professional photography would help their business.<br />
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Instead of implementing it straight away, they were smart, they built<br />
a concierge minimum viable product.<br />
A concierge minimum viable product is essentially the smallest<br />
thing you can build, with the least amount of effort, but still delivers<br />
the value you said it would.<br />
A concierge approach is where you manually run<br />
things behind the scenes for the first batch of<br />
customers, this lets you validate whether the need<br />
is real, before writing a single line of code.<br />
Initial tests showed that listings with professional photographs got<br />
two to three times more bookings than the market average.<br />
In the early days, Airbnb had 20 photographers out and about<br />
taking pictures for their hosts.<br />
Once Airbnb proved their original hypothesis, they took it a step<br />
further, they started to watermark their photos to add a sense of<br />
authenticity.<br />
Customer service then started to offer professional photography as<br />
a service when hosts or potential hosts called.<br />
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Each step of the way, Airbnb kept measuring the results and<br />
adjusting as necessary.<br />
By 2012, Airbnb was doing close to 5000 photo shoots per month.<br />
Key points<br />
Airbnb had the notion that <strong>better</strong> photos would lead to more rentals.<br />
They tested the idea with a concierge minimum viable product,<br />
putting in the least amount of effort as possible, but still getting valid<br />
results.<br />
When the experiment yielded positive results, only then did they<br />
build the required components to roll it out to all their customers.<br />
Conclusion<br />
Sometimes growth can come from parts of your business that you'd<br />
least expect.<br />
When you think you've got a decent idea, you should figure out how<br />
to test it quickly, with the least amount of cash.<br />
You should define what a successful test will look like before you<br />
start, and what you're going to do if you're right.<br />
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