rcavezza -

Thanks for this tip. It's pretty clever.

When you reach out like this do you reach out with specific feedback in mind?

Again, thank you.

It really depends. Ideally, these guys you are asking for advice would either be potential customers or have some sort of interest in your application. Don't email the star street sports guys about a financial startup (unless it's a B2B product they may be interested in).

You'll want to cater specific feedback to each person you email Don't ask Alexis Ohanian technical questions - ask him about branding or design. Also - what do you honestly want feedback on? Don't think of this as a stepping stone towards VCs/Angels, you can get honest feedback about your application that may help you tremendously.

And don't forget to reciprocate. Introduce them to people you know that may be helpful in their business.

Email me if you have any follow up questions rcavezza[at]gmail [dot]com

I agree with most everyone on here and want to add two more points:

- google was not the 1st search engine - intuit was the 40th company into the small business space

Look at them now.

Evaluate. Test. Learn.

Hi Snaveint -

Congrats on getting this out! I recently started on my own startup and like you I always feel behind.

That aside, I've heard many people in the NY area ask for a service similar to this, but for managing whole buildings. Do you have an idea of what your initial target market might be?

Also, the video is very well done, but you make the assumption that someone would want to watch that to learn more about your site. I'd add some text for those that prefer reading.

Good luck!

Hi Tamle,

Thanks for the encouraging words.

Good point re text over video. I'm working on this now.

Our initial target market are people who currently own one investment property and are managing it themselves the hard way - going around to collect payments, cashing checks, calling tenants to remind them etc.

Cheers Ash

i like your style good sir/maam

this.is.awesome.

as a non-tech person trying to learn how to do this stuff - all i can say is, thank you.

Hi Abbas -

I've found that Eric builds upon Steve's philosophy while combining it with the ideas found in "Business Model Generation" by Osterwalder.

In my opinion, the two books go hand in hand more than repeat one another.

Specifically, in "Lean Startup", Ries talks about Customer Development for a bit; whereas "Four Steps..." is mainly about customer development.

In short: both books are valuable

Thanks for the valuable insight!

Would I be correct in assuming I shall read Eric's first, and then use Steve's book for elaboration or reference on an as-needed basis?

Hmmm - I think you can read them in whatever order. Steve's book came out many moons before Eric's.

Eric's is a bit easier to digest though.

Your advice makes so much more sense now that I've read about 70 pages of each book. They are same yet different. Thanks again for your response.

Hey Pawn - did that person think, "oh you just need to go build it and everything will be fine?"

If so, I completely understand why it didn't get past round 1.

Speaking of video games - play anything good lately?

Yeah, he had it in his mind that someone could build it in a few weeks and walk away, and he'd be set from that point forward.

On the videogames question, I've actually been working on creating an xbox live indie game and expect to be done in a few weeks. So, I haven't been gaming much lately, been focusing pretty hard on trying to wrap up. I did download the free zelda game for 3ds and had fun with it for an hour.

At first glance I misread the title and thought it said: "the return of in living color" - that made me excited.

When I actually read the title correctly, and clicked through to skim the article - that made me 'meh'.

You know who else thought they could make money by turning themselves blue? Tobias Funke.

1. "If I were an investor, I would have to want to invest in us." That makes so much sense, I can't believe I've never thought of it in that light before.

2. Agreed.

3. "You probably have to make it actually worth my while." - Specifically, is this money/equity? Or is there another dimension I'm overlooking?

4. If I'm understanding you correctly: you want to work with someone more passionate about figuring out how to solve problem X as opposed to someone who's passionate about using their proposed solution. Correct?

Thank you!

Money is important, but interesting challenges rank a little higher for me. If I'd be solving a really cool problem, I'd be willing to take a risk by accepting more in equity than cash. Fliko's comment covers #4.

This is very good to know... Evincarofautumn, do you think most people similar to you feel this way?

I can't speak for anyone else, but if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say so.

For #4 I think he is saying that your end product may be different then what you envisioned it as, and as such you must be willing to let go of certain things and to adapt to what is needed. Of course with that said you also have to understand that not all changes are for the greater good, and it's a powerful ability to realize which is which with context.

Yeah, that's it. Well said.