E. Joseph Cossman Quotes

When talking to first-time entrepreneurs, I often ask them: 'How do you know that people want your product or service?' As you can expect, the answer is often that they don't yet, but will know once they launch. And they're right. That's why it's critical to launch as quickly as possible so you can get that feedback.

Launch your product or service before you have funding. See how people respond to it before you have a PowerPoint and business plan - have something people can use, and go from there.

Tell your idea to whomever will listen, and you'll get valuable market feedback before writing a single line of code.

I think, with any new product that's difficult to understand, there are always lots of questions and criticism. I think we have all the right criticism. We're just going to keep executing on what we believe.

Most entrepreneurs don't need as many customers as they think. A lot of people think 10 is too few for a sample. But if all 10 refused a product, why is that not enough? If you want 100, 1,000 or a million customers, you first have to get 10.

I don't micromanage, but I do care deeply about every product we make. Every one goes through me, and I try most of our products before they go to market, including our John Paul Pet flea and tick shampoo. If I don't like it, it's not coming out.

I just think that when you're coming out with a new product, you're gonna be criticized.

As an entrepreneur and public company CEO, I've dealt with dozens of rollouts, and when unveiling a new product, the operating approach should be, 'Hope for the best but prepare for the worst.'

Customer discovery is the process of translating a founder's vision for the company into hypotheses about each component of the business model and creating a set of experiments to test each hypothesis.

Get a minimum viable product out there, test it out, see how customers respond.

If we launch a new product, we have to time it right. It's not about how soon you can do it but how well we can do it.

Face-to-face customer feedback refines or validates every component of the startup's business model, not just the product itself.

Run focus groups. Do whatever you need to do to get 8 to 10 people together in a room and put your product in front of them. Ask them how much they would pay for it and whether they would pay for it. It's really important to get user validation early and often.

Product development is emotional for me! It's really important as a brand that we feel that our products are going to be life-changing for everyone who buys them. We won't ever launch something we don't feel strongly about.

We don't believe in market research for a new product unknown to the public. So we never do any.

The minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.

Because startups often accidentally build something nobody wants, it doesn’t matter much if they do it on time and on budget. The goal of a startup is to figure out the right thing to build - the thing customers want and will pay for - as quickly as possible.

The only useful information about the market will be what I create through expeditions into the market, through testing and probing, trial and error, by selling real products to real people who pay real money.

I have to experience the Nokia products. I'm a major contributor to the design and the quality of the devices. I have a lot of feedback to provide the teams on that. But also I have to carry competitive devices. You have to understand the competition.

People test movies within an inch of their life so that the entire audience experience is a uniform one.

Hammer down product fundamentals first. Make sure you've got something that works before doubling down on promotion and marketing. Create a groundswell of organic support, and only then leverage PR and advertising to spread the word.

Get your product in front of actual, living, breathing strangers. Your college roommate's approval does not mean there's market demand.

If you're an entrepreneur and you're starting a company, I think the first thing you do is you go and talk to a bunch of people. But then the next thing you probably should do is figure out if there's a broader demand than just people you know. That's where I think SurveyMonkey is pretty valuable to people.

When you say we're bringing a product to market, you make sure you execute.

To bring out a new technology for consumers first, you just had a very long road to go down to try to find people who actually would pay money for something.