We always try to do more than we actually have to.

For entrepreneurs like you and me, we tend to want to 10x everything and just work harder than everybody else, which sometimes can go against us.

For startup founders, this tends to happen with our products as well.

You will always have lots of things in your list that you could build, which you “think” would make many people happy.

But is it really worth it? Are people really using them? More importantly, will it affect your main metric?

Face It, You’re Doing Too Much

In most cases, startups tend to lose focus on what brought them to the game.

Focus is something that I keep preaching about but we all can fall off the boat and lose focus.

Nobody’s perfect. Our users can really mess with our heads sometimes and our decision making can get affected.

The important part is to understand when you fall off and how to get back on the boat.

We realized recently that we were actually spreading ourselves too thin. How? Because there were just too much requests/suggestions that we initially thought would improve the product dramatically. We thought the things we lined up will increase usage and referrals but actually, each of the things we added were just nice to have and not a critical, high impact type of thing. (This is why analytics should be a priority for you right from the start. Don’t hold it off.)

Instead of focusing our efforts on a certain feature or part of the product that’s already been proven to be the main draw or focusing on a single new feature that will actually make the biggest impact, we spent time with the things that affect our vanity metrics.

We’ve tried to change this recently.

How?

How to Focus on What Really Matters

The simplest way is to just ask:

What do people love about the product and what can we go deeper into?

And NOT:

What do people love about our product? Lets add a bunch of shits.

We wanted to take it to the next level, so here’s what we did.

1. We asked “Why”

For each task we came up with, we asked WHY. Coming up with an answer to your Why is your hypothesis until proven in the next step.

2. We calculated respective scores based off analytics

It’s time to prove your the concept by running some numbers. You’ll need some help here if you can’t extract analytics but don’t forget to draw up what you need first before extracting data.

By doing so, we can prove our Why’s and we’ll be able to further go deeper into certain things to give even more value to what we’re already doing great on.

From there, you’ll be able to see certain feature updates that you thought were really needed…but weren’t really being used or that vital.

If it was a new thing that we can’t get analytics for, we just jump into talking with users or even polling them in our private Facebook group. (Note: Once these are implemented, we’ll need to run the numbers to prove it to see if we still need to continue building it out.)

3. Weed out the non-impactful stuff

It’s time to cull the low impact tasks and focus only on high impact tasks. As long as it wasn’t a bug, then it’s sent into a backlog list that we’ll probably do when there’s more time. “Nice to Have” improvements usually add to the overall experience after all, but it’s not something that will make a big impact, business wise.

By doing the above, we were able to eliminate unimportant tasks and refocused our team to where we really needed to be working on.

As they always say, “less is more” or rather, “less fluff, more focus on business impact.”

[Tweet “Less fluff, more focus on business impact.”]

Though I always say “work harder than everybody” you shouldn’t just be all “Go! Go! Go!”

You also need to amplify your output by working smart.

—

Tl;Dr

It’s always easy to fall off, act busy and pretend that you and your team are being productive but as a founder, you need to be able to identify issues like this which can ultimately make or break your startup.

There are times that you need to step back and refocus. There’s nothing wrong with that.

We all want to keep working and “GO! GO! GO!” but it’s not always the right decision. Sometimes, taking a step back will help you see things more clearly, which only solidifies your decisions to lead the company in the right direction.

Stop wanting to do more than you have to.

Focus on business impact and less of the fluff.

Snap me on Snapchat if you liked this or leave a comment below! Let me know what your experience has been with this topic.

The post Startup Focus: Less Fluff, More Focus on Business Impact appeared first on Dennis Seymour.

There’s this ONE thing that has defined successful startups over the course of history.

I’ve personally experienced this with my own work. It’s the real deal and if you are kind of wavering/doubting yourself and your startup now, then please read on.

This might make or break your startup. I’m not scaring you.

I’m just keeping it real.

Now, let me ask you a question. Do you see anything similar with these 2 wildly popular companies?

• uBer
• Snapchat

Do you see what those 2 have in common with these other companies?

• Slack
• Casper
• Product Hunt
• Medium

You see it, don’t you?

Successful startups all have one thing in common.

FOCUS

Let me re-phrase that, they are all incredibly focused.

In the startup phase, success is defined by what we say “no” to and not the other way around.

• You need a Strong Vision
• More often than not, you need to Stick to the Plan
• Only change when you see something is not working

People, and often, investors, will tell you that you need to be in Hong Kong, you need to be in Japan, Australia, everywhere!

NO! You don’t!

You need to be uber (no pun) successful in where you are right now and CRUSH IT.

Crush it first in your location and expand. By doing so, you can grow incredibly fast.

If you win just doing that, you don’t need to race to China, you don’t need to race to Canada, you don’t need to jump in a plane and try to convince people in South-east Asia or wherever.

Stop chasing those shiny objects.
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I know how hard it is.

[Tweet “Success is defined by what we say “no” to and not the other way around.”]

Being an entrepreneur, it’s easy to see the golden snitch and feel the need to chase it.

• You’d want to try “this new thing” for your startup.
• You’d like to use this new tool.
• You’d like to add this feature and this new feature that you saw from this other app.

Stop spreading yourself too thin.

Stop chasing the shiny objects and have a strong conviction to stay the course.

Get out of the office and talk to your customers.
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Use data you have to prove something before you actually act on it.

Sure, your gut feel is great and all, but it shouldn’t distract you from your main focus, which is at this point, should already have been proven with your MVP.

Stop saying Yes to everything.

FOCUS now and reap the rewards sooner, rather than later.

My Recent Experience

I’ve moved on from my old businesses and just fully focused on this new one. We’re at a very young stage right now but here’s a small example from my current startup, SeriousMD.

If we listened to every single request from users, then we won’t have enough time to actually release anything, let alone fix existing bugs.

If we went ahead and partnered with the different people that contacted us, then our original idea would be messed up, the core functions will be changed, users will be neglected and the overall focus would be scattered.

If we didn’t know how to filter and process the feedback we get, then we’d just be chasing one thing after another only to fix it again, then do it again. It’s a really bad cycle to be in.

If we didn’t have a schedule in place, then we we’d be lost and jump into doing the next shiny object that comes along, never actually finishing something.

Sure, we can get distracted by certain things that needs immediate attention BUT we don’t lose focus.

The management in place should be responsible and should keep the boat moving forward.

As hard as it is to say no, you will have to and those NO’s will define your success.

Now, take a look at the rockstar startups that you see everywhere today.

Heck, take a look at the startups that are growing consistently without the blockbuster press coverage.

See the trend? You see it now, don’t cha?

Key Takeaways

As a founder, there are just a couple things that you need to remember when it comes to identifying where you need to “focus” on.

1. You need to FORCE yourself to have a defined strategy.
2. You need to be CLEAR as to why THAT strategy is working or why it’s successful.

Knowing those will make it easy for you to answer why what you are doing is better for your customers as well as your investors.

Remember, it’s not ok to change things without the data or information to back you up.

You have to always keep in mind that you have a limit in what you and your team can do. With that management bandwidth limit already in place, you don’t want to add to your overall workload without proper reasoning.

Why?

You’ll be spreading yourself too thinly across a bunch of things and that’s never wise.

Instead, you need to focus.

Go deep, conquer the markets that you can and win at the things that actually matter.

Now, go and take a broad look at your startup. Check out what you are doing and see which tasks or projects that are actually hurting your progress.

Tell me about what you’ve found and tell me what happened after you’ve applied some of these tips.

Snap them over to me or comment below. I’d love to hear from you!

The post The ONE Thing that Will Save your Startup and Make it a Success appeared first on Dennis Seymour.