5） It'll Show You How Little You Know About Money
To launch our web development magazine, Treehouse, we gave out the first issue for free in order to generate a little buzz. Even though thirty thousand people downloaded the free issue in its first week, only about 300 of them felt it was worth paying for. According to Ryan Carson, cofounder of Dropsend, that's a lot closer to the norm than we previously believed.
“If you're offering a free plan to your customers then expect to get around 98% or 99% of your customers on that plan. That means that you can only really bank on 1% or 2% of your total customers on the paying plan. In our experience this is true and other major players in the web app industry have agreed. This is about the industry average.”
Getting customers to pay for your product is hard work, and it's no surprise that startups often fail due to poor budgeting and cash flow. According to SCORE's, Top Reasons Why Businesses Fail, misguided financial expectations often explain why companies call it quits.
82% Poor cash flow management skills/poor understanding of cash flow
79% Starting out with too little money.
77% Not pricing properly - failure to include all necessary items when setting prices
73% Being overly optimistic about achievable sales, money required and about what needs to be done to be successful.
While Treehouse didn't necessarily fail, the experience taught us an important lesson on estimating cash flows. That knowledge was pretty important in determining how much angel investment we decided take in order to ensure we could make it to break-even with Wufoo.
五、它會告訴你，你對錢其實一無所知
推出Web開發(fā)雜志Treehouse時，為了賺取一點人氣，我們提供了免費版。盡管第一周就有3000人下載，可只有300人左右認為值得付費。事實離我們之前的想當然有很大差距，正如Dropsend的聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人Ryan Carson所言：
“如果你提供了免費版，就得預計有98%-99%的用戶會一直使用。也就是說，只能指望1%-2%的用戶付費。我們的經(jīng)驗就是如此，同行業(yè)的其他網(wǎng)站也都同意。這大約是行業(yè)的平均值。”
讓用戶為產(chǎn)品付費很難，創(chuàng)業(yè)公司也經(jīng)常因為預算不足和缺乏現(xiàn)金流失敗，這不稀奇。SCORE的調(diào)查《公司失敗的大原因》（Top Reasons Why Businesses Fail）表明，錯誤的財政預算經(jīng)常導致公司失敗。
82% 缺乏現(xiàn)金流的管理技巧/缺乏對現(xiàn)金流的理解
79% 起步時資金太少
77% 定價不合理：制定價格時未包含所有必需物品
73% 對可實現(xiàn)銷售額、所需資金和成功需要的工作量過于樂觀
即使Treehouse并不一定會失敗，這個經(jīng)驗也給我們上了重要一課：估算現(xiàn)金流。這門學問至關(guān)重要，我們就是根據(jù)它決定了Wufoo吸收多少天使投資以達到收支平衡。
To launch our web development magazine, Treehouse, we gave out the first issue for free in order to generate a little buzz. Even though thirty thousand people downloaded the free issue in its first week, only about 300 of them felt it was worth paying for. According to Ryan Carson, cofounder of Dropsend, that's a lot closer to the norm than we previously believed.
“If you're offering a free plan to your customers then expect to get around 98% or 99% of your customers on that plan. That means that you can only really bank on 1% or 2% of your total customers on the paying plan. In our experience this is true and other major players in the web app industry have agreed. This is about the industry average.”
Getting customers to pay for your product is hard work, and it's no surprise that startups often fail due to poor budgeting and cash flow. According to SCORE's, Top Reasons Why Businesses Fail, misguided financial expectations often explain why companies call it quits.
82% Poor cash flow management skills/poor understanding of cash flow
79% Starting out with too little money.
77% Not pricing properly - failure to include all necessary items when setting prices
73% Being overly optimistic about achievable sales, money required and about what needs to be done to be successful.
While Treehouse didn't necessarily fail, the experience taught us an important lesson on estimating cash flows. That knowledge was pretty important in determining how much angel investment we decided take in order to ensure we could make it to break-even with Wufoo.
五、它會告訴你，你對錢其實一無所知
推出Web開發(fā)雜志Treehouse時，為了賺取一點人氣，我們提供了免費版。盡管第一周就有3000人下載，可只有300人左右認為值得付費。事實離我們之前的想當然有很大差距，正如Dropsend的聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人Ryan Carson所言：
“如果你提供了免費版，就得預計有98%-99%的用戶會一直使用。也就是說，只能指望1%-2%的用戶付費。我們的經(jīng)驗就是如此，同行業(yè)的其他網(wǎng)站也都同意。這大約是行業(yè)的平均值。”
讓用戶為產(chǎn)品付費很難，創(chuàng)業(yè)公司也經(jīng)常因為預算不足和缺乏現(xiàn)金流失敗，這不稀奇。SCORE的調(diào)查《公司失敗的大原因》（Top Reasons Why Businesses Fail）表明，錯誤的財政預算經(jīng)常導致公司失敗。
82% 缺乏現(xiàn)金流的管理技巧/缺乏對現(xiàn)金流的理解
79% 起步時資金太少
77% 定價不合理：制定價格時未包含所有必需物品
73% 對可實現(xiàn)銷售額、所需資金和成功需要的工作量過于樂觀
即使Treehouse并不一定會失敗，這個經(jīng)驗也給我們上了重要一課：估算現(xiàn)金流。這門學問至關(guān)重要，我們就是根據(jù)它決定了Wufoo吸收多少天使投資以達到收支平衡。