Reddit reviews Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers

you don't need a business school to experience the core of this class ...

Here's a link to Steve Blank's HBR article on The Lean Startup. Also a series of free lectures that Steve Blank put up on  Udacity, called "How to Build a Startup" a course that over 500,000 people have viewed.    These lectures are supported by a book that Steve Blank wrote with Bob Dorf called The Startup Owners Manual, as well as a best selling business book by Alexander Osterwalder called  Business Model Generation. You may also want to see Alexander's other book, Value Proposition Design for more input/insight.

Came here to say basically this.

OP - you need to think about this from the customer end of things - how many people go out looking for "a creative mind"? No one I know of, unless they have a follow-on, "for ___". You need to make it clear what you provide and who your target market or markets are.

Sachbl makes a great point about kid-focussed services, so let's start with that.

You decide (in our example) to target the market defined as 'parents with 1 or more children under 7-8yrs of age' to sell a service that could be described as 'decorating/painting children's room and furniture'.

With that starting point you now know you need to make your service visible to that market. So, where do they go, what do they do, who do they communicate with or work with in their day to day lives?

A few answers might be day-care, pediatricians, and other service providers who target the same market. Perhaps even stores that sell second-hand kid supplies (more on that in a second).

Now, knowing that, how do you get information about your service into those areas? Are there day-care providers in your area that would be willing to make flyers available to parents, on a bulletin board, flyer rack in their lobbies or something like that? Same question with pediatricians offices.

If yes, put a flyer together - as professionally done as you can, make it clean, spell-checked, proofed by a friend, and go by businesses willing to let you advertise like that. Bring a portfolio in case they are interested in seeing your work - don't be pushy and do be mindful that they are doing you a huge favor by letting you advertise there. You are at their place of business and they may not have time or interest, but if they are interested, a good impression could lead to verbal referrals.

Now, back to businesses selling secondhand / hand-me-down / twice-loved goods for kids, these are an opportunity for B2B (business to business) rather than B2C (business to customer/consumer) work. How many of them get furniture in that they would be willing to pay to get reconditioned/refurbished? How much could you charge them while still leaving them an ability to make a profit off the final product? Would charging that amount be worth your time? If they can afford to pay $10 to have a chair done and it takes you 2hrs, then you are making $5/hr, out of which you are having to pay your own taxes as a small business owner. You've already had experience with this issue, but I wanted to reinforce that - it's something a lot of businesses lose track of sometimes - you don't just need to make money, you need to have positive cash flow, which you won't have if you spend too much time making too little profit.

What about people selling/renting homes or apartments to parents? Or companies that do home remodeling? Do either of these businesses market themselves to parents specifically? Would they be interested in a partnering arrangement, where they do some sort of construction/remodeling work and you come in and decorate? I have no idea if that's an opportunity, but partnerships where you can represent an additional service someone else can sell is another angle to use.

The above discussion is oriented around the example of decorating for children's spaces, but I think you can see the general ideas in play. Just ask the same questions for whatever market you are aiming for.

Resources

Business Model Generation
If you can track down a copy of Business Model Generation (amazon.com), I think you'll find it very helpful in organizing your thoughts on all of this, especially with the visual approach to modeling. If you can't afford it, check your local public library and see if they have it locally or available via interlibrary loan.

The Business Model Generation website is also useful.


The Small Business Administration (SBA)

You sound very motivated and at the beginning of the entrepreneurial adventure. A good resource for someone in your position, besides your local bookstore/library business section, is your local SBDC.

• The SBA runs local Small Business Development Centers (SBDC) throughout the country, in partnership with colleges and universities. You can which one is nearest you at Wisconsin SBDC Locations and call to set up an appointment. Most of their services are free, some classes and seminars may cost a modest fee. There is usually a lending library, and you can get assigned a counselor who can provide some advice on various matters.
  
  
• For that matter, the SBA website has various learning resources that provide plenty of reading material on the business end of running a business.
  
  
• Lastly, check out your local Chamber of Commerce. They will usually run networking events and may also have classes. Word of mouth and networking are probably going to be your best tools for generating business for a while. The more opportunities for exposure, the better.
  
  
  Last Thoughts
  
  Keep in mind these are also opportunities to make a very bad impression. A key thing you want to do is create the impression that despite your youth and the fact that you are in the early days of your business, you both understand that you have a lot to learn (and are thus seeking out resources, information, business education) and approach your business as a business, not a hobby you hope to make money off of.
  
  I'm not saying that in relation to anything in your post, but I've seen a lot of people who ... basically gave one the sense that they had no idea what they were doing, no idea that they had no idea what they were doing, and were basically just making/doing something for money and throwing it out into the market and hoping for the best. Ugh.
  
  That's about all I've got in me at the moment. I hope you find it helpful. Don't be afraid to take a day / weekend job to keep your head above water. Getting a business started can take time. You need to eat and have a place to live until then. Money helps with this. :)

I don't really understand the economics of these stores but I see it like this:

They need to either charge full retail and hope they can make enough sales that way for it to be profitable OR come up with an alternate solution.

Here is a suggestion for one kind of alternate solution. Retail sales is no longer the business model. Instead you move to a membership model. You sell games at prices that are competitive with online stores but only to people who have a paid membership. So, random people that come in to buy one thing that would have paid retail anyways can still pay retail. Regulars that would rather just buy all their games from CSI can but them locally instead now. It doesn't have to be an exact price match - there is some value in being able to just drive somewhere and get a game immediately, but it needs to be much closer than it is now. What else do they get for that membership? Maybe they can reserve seating, get in an hour earlier than everyone else, discounts on tournament entry fees, members only tournaments, etc. Preferably think of free or very low cost benefits you could throw in.

How much money do they need to make in board games annually? How many people would pony up $XX for an annual membership?

What is the expected profit from full retail sales vs membership dues + profit from reduced price sales + profit from full retail sales to non members?

Volume of sales should be higher with a low price, will that help them get a price break or some other kind of advantage with distributors?

This is a question of coming up with a good business plan. The traditional plan is getting crushed by online retailers so you have to come up with a new way to approach the problem. Check out Business Model Generation if you're serious about wanting to come up with a new business plan to focus on this.

• The Lean Startup
  
• Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers
  
• Lean Analytics
  
• The Lean Entrepreneur: How Visionaries Create Products, Innovate with New Ventures, and Disrupt Markets
  
  If you want to get started sooner:
  
  
• The Startup Owner's Manual: The Step-By-Step Guide for Building a Great Company
  
• Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works

If you are going for a internet business or any product-oriented business here a are the best books



BEST ONES

"The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses" (Eric Reis) - 2011

https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898/

"Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works" (Ash Maurya) - 2010

https://www.amazon.com/Running-Lean-Iterate-Plan-Works/dp/1449305172

"Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days" (Jake Knapp - Google Ventures) - 2016

https://www.amazon.com/Sprint-Solve-Problems-Test-Ideas/dp/150112174X/ref=sr_1_1?qid=1550802301&s=gateway&sr=8-1

​

ALSO GO FOR (these are the ones that started organizing the Startup world)

"The Four Steps to the Epiphany" (Steve Blank) - 2005

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0989200507/

"Business Model Generation" (Alexander Osterwalder) - 2008

https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/

Yeah, some of the wording was a bit awkward.

for example: "We want to provide you that place where you can share and access any file, when you want and for free"

Say something along the lines of "Access your files from anywhere in the world at any time"

Example 2 "Fufox is not using your personal data for commercial purposes"

Instead say "Fufox(or we) respect(s) our users' privacy and we pledge not to sell your personal information to third parties.

Avoid using "you" and complete sentences. You're trying to get a point across and not make someone understand a legal contract. It's ok to be a little vague.


The web design is nice. A bit cliche but nice.
Best of luck! Just remember that in order to be successful, your product has to be a heck of lot better than the competition or a heck of a lot cheaper. Being slightly better than the competition (dropbox) isn't enough to succeed. I sadly have had to drop ideas myself because of this.

You can learn a lot from this book. It's easy to read. http://amzn.com/0470876417

My favorite is Business Model Generation. To me, it really lays the foundation about before starting your business. In my opinion, a business makes or breaks during the initial planning stages. There are exceptions, but this book helps guide the thinking and really helps with understanding why a business will be successful or not.

Sometimes it makes a huge amount of difference to go through a proper exercise in understanding the business model. Use this: http://6w2x.com/mm-devel/mmc-canvasv01explained.html to fill out all the sections so you understand your business model. Ideally, you should get your hands on the book itself: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417

Traffic, fan base, etc come later, once you've decided on things like your value proposition, customer segments, distribution channels, etc. Then you execute on the plan, targeting the segments and measuring the responses. Be data orientated from day 1 so learn about customer acquisition and retention. It may be that assumptions that have gone into the model are not correct and you have to make changes. Investing your time now on this will pay dividends later.

Good luck.

Granted I've never had to develop a business model, but I liked Business Model Generation.

Universidade do Porto -> https://sigarra.up.pt/up/pt/web_base.gera_pagina?p_pagina=programas-de-apoio-empreendedorismo

ANJE -> http://www.anje.pt/portal

Recomendo também a leitura de -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Model_Canvas

Livro -> https://www.amazon.co.uk/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417

Boa sorte!

Had this list together from a blog post I wrote a few months ago. Not sure what exactly you're looking for, but these are my favorite books and I'd recommend everybody read them all. There are other great books out there, but this is a pretty well rounded list that touches everything a company needs.

The Lean Startup https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898

Business Model Generation https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417

Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products https://www.amazon.com/Hooked-How-Build-Habit-Forming-Products/dp/1591847788

Talking to Humans https://www.amazon.com/Talking-Humans-Success-understanding-customers-ebook/dp/B00NSUEUL4

Predictable Revenue https://www.amazon.com/Predictable-Revenue-Business-Practices-Salesforce-com/dp/0984380213

To Sell is Human https://www.amazon.com/Sell-Human-Surprising-Moving-Others/dp/1594631905

Rework https://www.amazon.com/Rework-Jason-Fried/dp/0307463745

Delivering Happiness https://www.amazon.com/Delivering-Happiness-Profits-Passion-Purpose/dp/0446576220

Boas, vou tentar dar-te uma resposta abrangente mas directa. Googla tudo o que precisares de perceber melhor - uma pesquisa que irias precisar de fazer de qualquer as formas.

• Idealmente precisarias de um co-founder técnico na equipa visto que neste momento não tens como executar. Mas tens um ponto a teu favor: domain expertise. Além disso, o teu ponto de partida é resolver um problema real, o que é bom (vs. "tive uma ideia de negócio"). Melhor ainda por estares a construir para ti mesmo ("scratch your own itch"). Que mais valias tens nesse teu grupo de colegas? Coisas como sales ou marketing digital são úteis.
  
  
• Por falar em "colegas de trabalho". Quantos são? Historicamente equipas com 2-3 co-founders têm melhor performance. (uma das maiores causas de insucesso em startups são cofounder issues)
  
  
• Não penses "tenho uma ideia para uma app", pensa em termos de modelo de negócio. Responde a questões fundamentais como "quem vai usar esta app?", "como faço dinheiro com isto?", "que recursos preciso para montar este negócio?", "como faço isto chegar ao utilizador?", etc. Saca este canvas como ponto de partida.
  
  
• Neste momento falta-te capacidade de execução. Só há duas maneiras de a adquirires: ou arranjas um co-founder técnico (muito difícil) ou pagas por ela.
  
  
• Pagar pela execução não é assim tão caro como estás a antecipar. Só tens de redesenhar o produto. Qual é a versão mais primitiva e básica do produto que te permite provar que o negócio é viável, ie, que a consegues vender a users? Se calhar não precisas de uma app pronta. Se calhar bastam-te mockups do UI. Reúne o pessoal à volta de um quadro branco e risca todos os features da app que não são essenciais. Depois de fazerem isso, continuem a riscar. Pega nesses features e pede orçamentos a developers. Com 2.000€ já é possível fazer um MVP decente. (Googla Minimum Viable Product).
  
  
• Com o MVP que valide a tua ideia (prove que tens pessoas dispostas a dar-te dinheiro pelo teu produto) é mais fácil recrutar um co-founder técnico a troco de equity e/ou angariar investimento para pagar mais desenvolvimento (nota: o desenvolvimento nunca acaba).
  
  
• Lê o máximo que puderes sobre o assunto. Três livros bons: 1, 2, 3.
  
  
• Rodeia-te de pessoas que já o tenham feito.
  
  EDIT: Não te metas nisso porque "fazer startups é cool" ou porque "dá dinheiro". É difícil para crl e há muitas maneiras mais fáceis de fazer dinheiro. A probabilidade é falhares.
  
  EDIT 2: Uma startup não é uma versão miniatura de uma empresa grande. Maior parte dos princípios de gestão que se aprende numa business school não se aplicam.

Definitely look into bussiness management books as well. if you are going down this road, there is a chance you will want to start doing it on your own and having proper business skills will help tremendously in securing work, and balancing costs, and making money doing it! I am sure some people on this sub can recommend some great books on this topic as well.

Here are a couple books,

https://www.amazon.ca/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/ref=sr_1_1?gclid=Cj0KCQjw5MLrBRClARIsAPG0WGxuwhyo-18J3-xPOVP8bXeTJ4zbGZHkpO4GqIGKlz-WCRxt3aUroqQaApECEALw_wcB&hvadid=229992601126&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9000745&hvnetw=g&hvpos=1t1&hvqmt=e&hvrand=4412519744533501821&hvtargid=aud-748919244907%3Akwd-297504215686&hydadcr=16960_10238137&keywords=business+model+generation&qid=1567691052&s=gateway&sr=8-1

https://www.amazon.ca/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_3/141-1005106-2495725?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0307887898&pd_rd_r=3ef234c3-168a-4156-bb6b-32f1e4f1ecca&pd_rd_w=PEqJa&pd_rd_wg=P882W&pf_rd_p=a62e2918-d998-4bbb-8337-35aac776e851&pf_rd_r=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H&psc=1&refRID=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H

https://www.amazon.ca/Startup-Owners-Manual-Step-Step/dp/0984999302/ref=pd_sbs_14_3/141-1005106-2495725?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0984999302&pd_rd_r=3ef234c3-168a-4156-bb6b-32f1e4f1ecca&pd_rd_w=Oruqz&pd_rd_wg=P882W&pf_rd_p=f7748194-d8e0-4460-84c0-2789668108bc&pf_rd_r=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H&psc=1&refRID=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H

https://www.amazon.ca/Business-Model-You-One-Page-Reinventing/dp/1118156315/ref=pd_sbs_14_4/141-1005106-2495725?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1118156315&pd_rd_r=3ef234c3-168a-4156-bb6b-32f1e4f1ecca&pd_rd_w=Oruqz&pd_rd_wg=P882W&pf_rd_p=f7748194-d8e0-4460-84c0-2789668108bc&pf_rd_r=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H&psc=1&refRID=RMAX7VQZE9TKPTQ2SM8H

When I find myself in this position (which I'm currently in after burning 18 months and a big chunk of cash on my last startup only to have it fail), I usually slink off, lick my wounds, do a lot fo reading and then approach my next project feeling a little more educated, refreshed, and ready.

Some suggestions if I may:

• The Four Steps to the Epiphany: Successful Strategies for Products that Win: http://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Successful-Strategies/dp/0976470705
  
  
• Founders at Work: http://www.amazon.com/Founders-Work-Stories-Startups-Early/dp/1430210788/
  
  
• Business Model Generation: http://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/
  
  Founders At Work is an easy, fun and somewhat inspirational read. The concept behind 4 Steps to an Epiphany is pretty simple, so odds are you won't need to read the whole book as its a little dry. It is authored by Steve Blank and I highly recommend watching his lectures on youtube. Business Model Generation was a mind bender and I've read it about 6 times. I've run all my past businesses and current business through it plus a couple non-profits. It is fantastic and I love it.
  

• The Startup Owner's Manual by Steve Blank and Bob Dorf
  
• [Business Model Generation by A. Osterwalder] (http://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1453755761&sr=8-1&keywords=business+model+generation)
  
• [Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want] (http://www.amazon.com/Value-Proposition-Design-Customers-Strategyzer/dp/1118968050/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1453755761&sr=8-2&keywords=business+model+generation)

You might find some of these resources helpful to get a sense of some of the moving parts for the "lean" / "customer development" approach:

Steve Blank's free Udemy course: https://www.udacity.com/course/how-to-build-a-startup--ep245

And his protege Eric Ries' Lean Startup book:
https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898

And Blanks'
https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417

A rough, top-level, possible roadmap for a bootstrapped solo product:

1. Talk with a bunch of potential customers to validate whether the problem you will be solving for is in fact an acute problem.
   
   
2. Validate that your solution is a good one to solve that problem. Again, you can start with customer interviews with a prototype of your product. Validation can also be pre-sales, one pager landing page "coming soon" sign ups and other things.
   
   
3. Product development and customer development happening in tandem. Customer feedback informing the product. Yeah minimum viable product: what's the minimum version of your product that proves your assumption that people will find this valuable?
   
   
4. Participating / building an audience / community around folks who value solving this problem can happen during development too. Some like to do this BEFORE building the product -- and having an audience to pitch different variations of products to.
   
   
5. Get early adopters in the door, helping you improve the product. "Doing things that don't scale" while you are still in learning mode.
   
   
6. Try different experiments to improve A) the product and B) different ways/channels to find customers.
   
   
7. McClure's Pirate Metrics: measuring the customer journey of acquisition, activation, retention, referrals, revenue. At this stage retention is probably #1: am I building a product people are finding valuable enough to stick around and continue to use?
   
   
8. "Product/market fit" means your product and the particular type of people you are helping are a happy fit. Time to make those "things that don't scale" more scalable. Time to hit the gas pedal on the marketing side. More experiments to find growth...

I had the same problem in business school. I'm went back mid-career and sometimes it felt like I was taking classes from the 90's.

If you're interested in a more recent approach to business models, check out Business Model Generation. It provides a canvas that helps you visualize how different components of a business model interact and influence each other. It's also filled with great examples of how businesses you know would be modeled through their framework.

Can you be more specific about your advertising ask? Google & Facebook are both anchored in ads to generate revenue. Many "freemium" products supplement subscriptions with ad revenue. If a digital experience feels like you're "getting it for free" it's likely either supported by ads or IS an ad for something else.

While it's not digital business model exclusive, I'm a big fan of Andrew Chen. His once a week newsletter is a must read for me (I'm a consultant in digital strategy/digital product). He talks a lot about the underlying economics of companies and why certain technologies win in certain circumstances and other don't. https://andrewchen.co

Here’s a good website to walk you through creating a business model canvas.

https://www.strategyzer.com/canvas/business-model-canvas

It’s based on this book which is a great resource

https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/ref=nodl_

Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries- Book on Amazon

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Business Model Generation is a great start https://www.amazon.ca/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417

Also, the Lean Startup also great https://www.amazon.ca/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898

Hi Jawilson2, here's a few books I've read in the past that helped prime me. I guess at the minimum these books helped me understand who was a bullshitter and who wasn't when they claimed they "knew the business side."

Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur - Fund raising basics. Key if you ever plan to raise money. You'd be stupid to try without reading this first.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0071496025/

Business Model Generation - This book helps you think through the business model issues most "hacker" type entrepreneurs skip. Makes you think more holistically.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0470876417/

The Entrepreneur's Guide to Business Law - Basics about legal issues you should be aware exist. I haven't read through it all at once, but it's a good guide when I run up against areas I'm murky on.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Entrepreneurs-Guide-Business-Law/dp/0324204930/

This guest post on Forbes should be helpful: What's The Secret To A Successful Coffee Shop?

Don't forget to build a well thought-out Business Model before starting up.

Best of luck

Business Model Generation

I got a lot from Business Model Generation.

Upwork is a great place to start to sell your CAD skills as a freelancer, either to get cash flow to support your future plans or to be your primary source of income.

As far as resources goes on the how to start something. I found "The Startup Owner's Manual" (https://www.amazon.com/Startup-Step-Step-Building-Company/dp/0984999302/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1518503563&sr=8-2&keywords=startup+handbook) and "Business Model Generation" (https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417) both have very boring titles, but great content and guided both myself and my co-founder down the road of finding our business idea and launching it. We are now a $5M a year business.

Sort of a tough question since it depends tremendously on the type of work you're doing, the audience you're targeting, their purchase and research patterns, etc. Have you developed any kind of a business plan to help define those variables?

The Business Model Generation handbook (https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417) is a solid reference for laying out a framework to help answer those questions and start narrowing down toward a GTM strategy. I've used it working with a number of startups and still reference it in a lot of my work with Fortune 500 companies.