Sam Altman Quotes

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.

The problem with entrepreneurship is we are often working really hard producing high quality products that no-one wants. The creation of stuff is not valued.

What I tell founders is not to sweat the business model too much at first. The most important task at first is to build something people want. If you don't do that, it won't matter how clever your business model is.

Too many bar owners built a bar for themselves... when they should have built what their market and demographic demands!

A successful business must have a sound knowledge of its market and work on how its product or service will be different, stand out and improve people's lives. If you can ensure it responds to a real need in the market place, your business can punch well above its weight.

To create something you want to sell, you first study and research the market, then you develop the product to the best of your ability.

Think about the market, think about the design, and think about who is going to design for that market. Hit the mark.

Most startups are not just built for the person who is using them. When you do that, every now and then you get really lucky and... are representative of some huge class of people who all want the same thing you do... but very often that just turns into a side project that doesn't go anywhere.

Creating demand is hard. Filling demand is easier. Don't create a product, then seek someone to sell it to. Find a market - define your customers - then find or develop a product for them.

If you can just learn to think about the market first, you will have a big leg up on most people starting startups.

We know: of course, with regard to the market and similar social structures, a great many facts which we cannot measure and on which indeed we have only some very imprecise and general information.

We recognize the need to adapt to a changing competitive environment.

I think there's space in the market for a half-dozen kind of polling analysts.

I think every market has lot of things in common, and at the same time, every market has lot of different things.

I think there is a niche for every market.

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

Every startup should address a real and demonstrated need in the world - if you build a solution to a problem lots of people have, it's so easy to sell your product to the world.

We're not in the business of shaping consumer demand. We respond to it.

The thing about startups is you can make it, and if it's wrong you can remake it, and you can build a team that you want to have, a product that you want to have. You're utterly focused on your users or your customers and their needs, and trying to figure out how to meet those needs.

Most marketers think there's a concept called a product life cycle. Once you realize that the world is organized by jobs that need to be done, you understand that product life cycles don't exist.

I mistrust anyone... if they're saying, 'Well, that market wants this,' and you're not part of that market.

Wherever we are seeing something getting used, that to us is an early indicator that there might be something that people want. And then let's figure out how to make that great. And then let's go figure out monetization.

Don't spend months building something without any idea if someone actually wants it.

When a market isn't in transition, gaining market share is hard - you're fighting to take one or two points of share from competitors.

Launching a successful product or startup has little to do with luck. Any business that gains traction on the market is the result of very careful strategizing and market analysis, not to mention the development of an original product or service.