Most Start-ups Fail. Here's a Checklist That Makes Success More Likely

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - July 18, 2013 - PRLog -- July 18, 2013 - Mountain View, CA. Most of the big headlines are about the rare successes in innovation – Google, Facebook, Netflix – but most innovations and startups fail. A new fieldbook by Alistair Davidson, Innovation and Startup Checklist for a Zeitgeist World, available as an Amazon Kindle book, lays out the important questions you need to ask about starting up a new business or building a new product.

“People fall in love with their new product idea.” says author Davidson. “They don’t realize is because of the time and energy they have invested in their product, they may have lost sight of how the potential customer sees the problem. They are, in a sense, the victims of their own passionate involvement.”

Davidson lays out some of the ways you can test whether your idea makes sense. “I am a big believer in checkbook market research. If customer will preorder or commit to working with to develop the product in advance of it being built, that’s a pretty good test of the potential of the product.”

Other insights in the book include keen observations from his own startup and product development experience (as an entrepreneur, incubator head and venture capitalist).

Most innovators commit to building a product too early, before they really understand what customers want. Often it makes more sense to seek other ways of learning about customers before you start building.

Many product developers specify their product and commit to delivering a product before they really know which features are the most important. Davidson calls these the Pareto features or the 20% of features that account for 80% of the value in the product.

Even if you are a genius with a brilliant product idea, it’s important to learn to shut up and listen to customers unfiltered by your desire to hear that they want and need your product.

It’s easy being a Monday morning quarterback, but an innovator needs to think like a chess master and forecast five key shifts: how customers, product and delivery, product features and performance, business models and pricing are all evolving and likely competitor moves and evolution.

Alistair Davidson is a business development and strategy consultant. He is the author of five books on business and technology strategy and a contributing editor at Strategy and Leadership Magazine. His latest book is Innovation Zeitgeist: Digital Business Transformation in a World of Too Many Competitors (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00DBCQC3I/ref=as_li_tf_...), Amazon Kindle Book, June 2013.

Alistair Davidson Contact Information:          

Phone: +1-650-450-9011

E-mail: Alistair@eclicktick.com

Web site: www.eclicktick.com

Book page on Amazon: Innovation and Startup Checklist for a Zeitgeist World (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00DX63CIA/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00DX63CIA&linkCode=as2&tag=eclicktconsul-)

Alistair Davidson Amazon author web page: http://www.amazon.com/Alistair-Davidson/e/B000APSDS6/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Reviewer Comments for Alistair Davidson’s Previous Book, Innovation Zeitgeist

“Innovation Zeitgeist is thoughtful, pragmatic and comprehensive in its analysis of digital product and service opportunities. The business advice it offers is understandable, even to an engineer like me!” Vint Cerf, VP and Chief Internet Evangelist, Google

"Alistair Davidson has written an ambitious, encompassing, and down-to-earth treatise on the current digital transformation.  It’s the best description yet of the digital transformation engulfing us and what we should do about it, written in plain language and illustrated with his own photographs and questions for the reader after every chapter. An iconic, original contribution to the literature on digital transformation that is hard to put down. There is good advice and commonsense written on every page.  Must reading."  Stanley Abraham, Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, Cal. State. Polytechnic University, author of “Strategic Planning: A Practical Guide for Competitive Success.

"Innovation Zeitgeist is essential reading for any venture capitalist or startup. It forces the reader to consider what they are doing and what they must continue to do that is different than their many domestic or international competitors, a critical issue for successful startups and for high growth companies." Norm Fogelsong, General Partner, Institutional Venture Partners

“Alistair Davidson has produced an insightful analysis of innovation in the digital era.  This book is a must read for executives seeking survival and success in today's challenging competitive arena.” Robert Allio, founding editor of Strategy & Leadership magazine, former Dean of Rensselaer School of Management. Author of Seven Faces of Leadership

A.T. Kearney's clients are all facing the issue of their business being transformed by digital technology.  Innovation Zeitgeist is a great resource for helping our Digital Business Forum clients understand how important it is to actively scope and manage the changes to their business, organizational structure, acquisition strategy, business model and required innovation approaches. Michael Roemer, Partner and International Co-head of A.T. Kearney, Digital Business Forum

"In Innovation Zeitgeist, Alistair zeroes in on many of the key issues we see our market research service-industry clients facing - rapidly changing customer expectations, the need for rapid service introductions, more competition, a need to rethink business models and the types of innovation pursued." Jim Hollingsworth, VP Finance and Security, Pacific Consulting Group

"Innovation Zeitgeist is a marvelous creation.  I love what Alistair Davidson has done.  I enjoy most the narrative style (feels more like a weekend read) and yet it is packed with facts, ideas, authority. There is more content here than an entire MBA course.  It's an MBA on digital" - James Lau, Founder movesandshakes.com

“Mr. Davidson has a knack for bringing the thirty-thousand foot practice of strategy down to earth. His discussion of strategic considerations leads directly to an actionable planning structure. Strategy, then, can form a tactical plan. The benefit of the book is twofold: food for thought and a framework for action.” Bruce Rosebrugh, President, VPQ Scientific

“Bravo! Innovation Zeitgeist offers deep yet pragmatic ideas to address today’s business challenges. Alistair Davidson’s depiction of trends dramatically altering the competitive landscape such as technology overabundance and customer attention scarcity hits the nail on the head.”  Adrian C. Ott, author, “The 24-Hour Customer (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0061798614/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0061798614&linkCode=as2&tag=eclicktconsul-20)”; CEO, Exponential Edge Inc.