Lecture 12 — Building for the Enterprise
Video started very funny😂 It’s already t stands out from the rest.
Aaron Levie — CEO and founder of Box.
The first point to remember, always look for the changing technology factors.
In the enterprise there are $3.7 trillion on enterprise IT every single year. These are the servers, the infrastructure, the software, the networking, the services. All of that stack of technology equates to a few trillion spent every year. In enterprise, its not about them trying to save money on IT. They are either trying to increase productivity, they are trying to increase business. But consumers try to minimize cost or find the best deal.
Everyone is used to this philosophy that when you are trying to sell enterprise software, it could take up to years for them to actually just buy the software. I think it’s real huge problem of that area.
So everything about enterprise, and by definition the software that the enterprise uses, has changed just in the past 9 years. All companies are moving to the cloud.
Some practical advices:
1.Intentionally start small, then expand over time. If someone says its a toy, you are on to something. Industry leaders don’t go after small but important pains. Startups can exploit this point, to build a fantastic product, then move up market to larger problems.
2.You should find the mostly crazy, but still reasonable outliers within the customer ecosystem. So you need to find the customers that are at the edge of the business, their business model, their industry and find the unique characteristics of those customers. Leverage them as your early adopters.
3.Listen to your customers but don’t always build exactly what they are telling you. This is a really key distinction around building enterprise software. Your customers are going to have a large number of requests.
4.Focus on the user always. The magical thing about building an enterprise software company right now is you can keep consumer information at the center of the product. Always make sure you bring consumer DNA into the product. Your product should sell itself. But that does not mean you don’t need sales people.