Kudos to making the journey to the most critical milestone in your technology journey. By this phase, the concept is a pathbreaking venture with a phenomenal team. As the market is adapting to new technology to perform the intended tasks, competing claims of best technologies are competing. Notwithstanding the competition, what should you be focusing on at this stage of your journey?
You are peaking too soon: with technology fast-changing, it’s tough to continue delivering the same value to your customers when you started your startup journey. How do you keep your customer interested in using your technology? That’s the Holy Grail!
Although there are no definite answers, there are aspects that innovators can focus on to be valuable. Are there any ancillary features or services to perform the same task? Is the product/technology still relevant to the market, or can technology be further streamlined to serve customers better?
Do not over-engineer: Often, teams find themselves digging into engineering rabbit holes where they over-engineer and over-commit to finding a perfect solution. Be cognizant of perfectionist tendencies, especially when most team members are working on equity.
Tighten the ship: There is no end to making something perfect; continue to make your technology better by making it more secure or reduce the number of interactions that a user needs to perform tasks, optimize workflows.
Set and achieve goals: Set minimum targets, for instance, setting a minimum number of transactions using the platform. Execute and achieve the minimum goals for the platform to be a viable business.
Asset generation: Identify assets for the technology, user data, patents around technology, patents around processes, generating value for the venture to make it an attractive investment for outsiders. Nurture and value your human capital.
Globalize and localize: Have a plan to expand the footprint to a larger audience, potentially to national and global markets. With expansion also comes the need to adapt the product to local conditions and cultures. Ideas are global, but the execution of ideas has to be intensely local.
Continue the hard work, continue to invest in yourself and people who have trusted your ability to bring the technology to life.
