Comments on: Add Another Zero

By: kevin

kevin — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 17:22:27 +0000

thanjks for share

By: replcia handbags

replcia handbags — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 15:17:00 +0000

this is something i have been very interested in lately. thanks.

By: Randy Domolky

Randy Domolky — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:45:13 +0000

I also think this can be a wake up call for company mgmt too in the sense that they will have to ask themselves:

"Are there 10x as many customers out there for us to get?"

"Will our systems be able to handle 10x volume or do we need major upgrades?"

"Will we be over 100% of the current market for our product if we grow revenue 10x?"

"No wonder my investors are not so happy with my modest 20% or 40% growth rates!"

By: Brad Feld

Brad Feld — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 22:35:11 +0000

Both are important. I often feel that too much time is spent on the shorter term / “obvious goals” in a lot of young companies. There’s a ton of value in thinking big on a regular basis.

By: James Reinhart

James Reinhart — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:59:35 +0000

Hey Brad,
I think this is great advice for "aiming high" but I hear so often "pick metrics you can hit" and then "hit them". Do you worry about pushing too hard on thinking big(ger) and not enough on the tactics of the strategy? I understand the premise of cascading leverage but I think company lifecycle is a critical piece here. Ship early and ship often might (and i do mean might) run counter to ship later, ship bigger. Maybe focusing less on magnitude and more on milestones moves the ball forward a bit faster. Probably need a dose of both I'd think.

By: RichardForster

RichardForster — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:26:41 +0000

awesome thought….

By: Chart

Chart — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 07:55:15 +0000

Living in a major earthquake zone orders of magnitude are much more real (and scary) however even in an earthquake zone business people rarely understand what an OoM really means. Improvements in networking over the years is one of the best examples of this 10M => 100M => 1000M => 10G however there is still a huge gap in getting people to realize this. Your explanation of "add another zero" brings it home in a much better way that everyone can quickly grasp. Excellent post.

By: Brad Feld

Brad Feld — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:53:06 +0000

Oooh – I love the 50 ideas thing. Great idea.

By: @reecepacheco

@reecepacheco — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 21:08:11 +0000

Love this line of thinking as it is especially relevant to what I'm working on now. We're taking in revenue from one subset of our user-base, but working to integrate a subset that is 10x our core users and is a wealthier demographic to boot. Actually, saying that makes me rethink my use of the word "subset."

By: josh

josh — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 18:41:07 +0000

Hey Brad,

Could not agree more with this. You are essentially asking people to shatter preconceived notions of growth or whatever metric is might be. Sometimes people form mental obstacles that are more like mirages.

How to shatter the preconcieved notions is important as well. I have another wise mentor who believes in the "50 Ideas Approach." It is simply, for whatever problem you are trying to solve, brainstorm at least 50 ideas of how to solve it. The kicker is if you cannot brainstorm 50 ideas, then you don't know your business well enough. Of course each idea will need the appropriate analysis (ie SWOT, etc), but that is secondary.

Good post.