Joost Innovation: lecciones de un fracaso

La entrada es de Om Malik. ¿Cómo es que un emprendimiento fundado por los creadores de los exitosos Kazaa y Skype, respaldado por inteligentes y bien conectados Venture Capitalists, con una tecnología probada para desarrollar sus productos, etc. etc., puede fallar así de estruendosamente? De seguro que en explorar las respuestas a esta pregunta hay más de una enseñanza. Es lo que hace Om Malik, y sugiere:

(de entrada digamos que un competidor directo, Hulu, ha logrado en el mismo período todo lo contrario, un éxito estruendoso)

Extracto 1: comportamientos de no-emprendedores

"Too Big, Too Fast: Joost hired too many people, too quickly. It never behaved like a startup but instead always felt like a grown-up company with too many bureaucratic layers

Too Geographically Spread Out: The company was based in multiple geographic locations — New York, London and The Netherlands — and as a result, each location became somewhat of a silo

Not Enough Focus: Remember what your mom used to say when you took too big of a bite? If you’re not careful, you’re going to choke. Startups are just like that. Unless you focus, you’re going to choke. Joost couldn’t focus on one single market — and startups need to focus on one market at a time in order to win"

Extracto 2: la experiencia del cliente es lo primero

"Slow to Fix Its Technology Problems : Joost’s P2P network had technical problems early on that resulted in user defection. The company didn’t move to address those concerns fast enough. These technology problems have continued to nag the company throughout its life, even when it switched to a browser-based focus"

Extracto 3: la cadena de valor y el modelo de negocio

"Didn’t Press Its Early-Mover Advantage: Joost had correctly identified that it needed the blessing of the content owners, but it failed to move aggressively enough to convince them to work with its platform. The client and technology problems didn’t help matters, either

Big Media Dis-Connect: Its big media investors were never willing to give Joost a content edge over the competition, prompting users to tune it out in favor of other services"

Extracto 4: el competidor in-esperado

"Hulu: It started with a simple, easy-to-use interface for its browser-based video service, offered higher-quality video and used content from its backers, NBC and Fox, to become a household name, which in turn allowed Hulu to convince other content owners to sign up for its platform. Now it owns 10 percent of online video traffic"

Extracto 5: ignorar las tendencias para la comunicación del valor del momento

"Chasing Its Own Tail: Joost also made some basic mistakes, such as not having a good SEO strategy. It never quite figured out a social media strategy in order to garner viral growth, either. It was like a tech company from the 1990s — out of sync with today’s web environment"