Sourabh Goyal

How 'The Lean Startup' catalyzed growth at TopGrade.pk TopGrade.pk, established in 2017, initially followed "Nail It Then Scale It" to understand market validation and scaling. In 2020, adopting Eric Ries’s 'The Lean Startup' significantly enhanced our day-to-day operations, responsiveness, and efficiency. Initial Framework: "Nail It Then Scale It" provided the foundational strategies for identifying product-market fit and developing scalable business models. This methodology was pivotal in setting the stage for our initial business approach. Adopting Lean Principles: The integration of 'The Lean Startup' principles marked a shift towards a more iterative and flexible business approach. Emphasizing rapid prototyping, validated learning, and continuous adaptation, these principles were integral as we refined our offerings. Implementing Build-Measure-Learn: Incorporating the Build-Measure-Learn feedback loop, TopGrade.pk developed and launched educational products as MVPs. This strategy enabled swift product rollout, real-time testing, and iterations based on direct user feedback, enhancing our development efficiency. Strategic Pivots and Data-Driven Decisions: Actionable data informed strategic adjustments to better meet customer needs, such as expanding from basic materials to a comprehensive exam prep toolkit. This pivot was driven by insights from our lean user engagement strategy. Focus on Actionable Metrics: We shifted our focus to metrics that provided genuine insights into customer behavior, like engagement and completion rates, moving away from less impactful vanity metrics. This strategic shift improved decision-making and service delivery. Results: Implementing lean principles transformed TopGrade.pk into one of Pakistan’s leading educational platforms, celebrated for its innovative approach and dedication to student success. Our methodology ensured agility and responsiveness, essential in the evolving edtech landscape. The transformative impact of 'The Lean Startup' on TopGrade.pk, from strategic foundations with "Nail It Then Scale It" to enhanced operational tactics, has streamlined our processes and spurred significant growth and customer satisfaction. We encourage other startups to explore how lean principles can revitalize their operational strategies, prompting a more iterative and responsive business model. Day 10 of my 30-day challenge where I'll share my entrepreneurial journey. Follow me, Dr Muazzam Manzoor , to learn from my experience and avoid the pitfalls I faced. Let's grow together! 📌 Are you a new startup founder? DM me now to book a FREE consultation call and kickstart your success journey #TheLeanStartup #DigitalTransformation #EducationRevolution #Entrepreneurship #Leadership #Innovation #Success

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Santosh Sharan famously said, “Gains from the best (GTM) practices decay over time” After experiencing this firsthand over the last year, I completely second this. We've seen various go-to-market motions adopted by different companies. In my first journey at Innovaccer, we used an outbound email go-to-market motion, which was successful back then. However, even after knowing this method worked in the past, trying it for six months at kim.cc proved it wasn’t the right fit, and we had to stop. This reinforced my belief in the importance of finding your mojo - a GTM motion that aligns perfectly with your current market conditions. For example, Adam Robinson successfully used LinkedIn as a go-to-market motion. Others have leveraged SEO for inbound, while some have used Shopify. The key is understanding where your customers are and ensuring your positioning or pitch resonates with them. What GTM strategy has worked for your startup, and how did you discover it? #gtm #businesslessons #startups #dtcbrands #entrepreneurship

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Can technical founders become effective CEOs? Srinath Sridhar knew he needed to step out of his comfort zone when he founded Regie.ai four years ago. Now he and cofounder Matt Millen have raised more than $20 million and landed on G2’s list of fastest-growing software products of 2024. My full conversation with Sri is in the comments.

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🎉 Excited to share as an indirect investor that DevRev, backed by Khosla Ventures, has officially become a unicorn. Dheeraj Pandey, CEO at DevRev, puts it perfectly: "At the end of the day, every developer is either building something new or fixing something related to the product. But inefficient systems and processes keep developers further from their consumers. We believe there's a better way to build, operate, support, and grow your business through code. That's why we've embarked on a journey to create the Developer Customer Relationship Manager (DevCRM) that we hope will help makers build the most customer-centric companies on earth." Here are some key points about DevRev: - Co-founded by Dheeraj Pandey (co-founder of Nutanix) and Manoj Agarwal (former SVP of Engineering at Nutanix). - Offers three modern CRM apps tailored for support, product, and growth teams. - Already making waves in Southeast Asia. If you're in the region and have questions, reach out to Jeffin Mathew. 💡 Fun fact: Nutanix was also backed by Khosla Ventures. Congratulations to the entire DevRev team on reaching this incredible milestone in under 4 years! I'm thrilled to be part of the journey as a Limited Partner in 2 | Twelve one of their seed investors.

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AI Self Healing is live AQUMEN LABS. Over the past month, the team has been working hard to reduce costs incurred by AI during automation. AI self-healing helped us in : 1. Reducing test writing and automation by 90% - We wrote a test for login and completing an FTUE of a game in just 2 minutes [Faster than other low code tools] and not to mention the Game is in UNITY [Yes we support Unity :) ]. 2. Reduce the Maintenance of the test script by 80%. The test will be healed when you select the Heal checkbox on your test step. 3. We have successfully implemented a Hybrid approach, where our framework is intelligent enough to decide whether to use AI, which helped us in reducing the cost. For cost reference: MultiOn [an agentic AI] uses 0.04$ per step and AQUMEN LABS uses 0.03$ per step executed and that too in an intelligent way :) This is purely a Vision-Based Multi-Model approach we do not use any locators to heal. If you and your team are exploring an AI approach in testing, we would be happy to showcase it. Schedule a call: https://lnkd.in/gmu62wzV Note: Used Multion Example as it is one of the best agentic AI tools that we follow and take inspiration from. Multion and AQUMEN LABS are two totally different tools for solving different use cases.

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Breadth Vs. Depth in Pre-PMF Product === In the pre-PMF stages, do you focus on adding more features (breadth) or perfecting existing features (depth) while building your product? From my 10+ years of building products, I have realized there is no exact solution that fits all situations, but there are a  few nuances one needs to understand to arrive at a solution. 1. Channels of Feature Requests In the early days, the product team often faces a barrage of feature requests from three primary sources. A. Sales teams - features/integration to close more deals. B. CS teams - Build this feature, or else risk churning customers. C. Market - Otherwise, you will lose the edge or stop innovating. (Hi Gen AI!) Managing these requests can be challenging, but it's crucial to setting realistic expectations and maintaining a balanced approach to product development. 2. Constrained Resources Initially, you may find yourself with a small engineering team with 3-5 members max and hardly any time. This issue of constrained res adds additional pressure on delivering on all fronts. 3. Objective: Depending on your stage, you are looking for Iteration, growth, retention, or Obsession. Iteration - Identify which features are essential and which are not. Growth - leads to more new revenue. Retention - sustainable revenue. Obsession - Leads to word of mouth or virality. Create your Solution -- Once you have grasped these nuances and understood your situation, you can start crafting your solution. And yes, there is no perfect solution; you can only aim simultaneously for some of the four. One approach I often try is to prioritize each in cycles of a week (or whatever suits your business) and progressively increase the time period as your business and the team grow. This way, you keep a tab on each of the four every month and find your balance. #startup #product #features

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🤔 what Paul Graham describes as “manager mode” just sounds like being a bad CEO. No effective CEO stays only surface level with their managers and just runs hands off the wheel. On the other hand, the other way to fail as a CEO is to try to be in the weeds on a lot of things that don’t matter. Also constantly signaling lack of trust in the capable executives you’ve hired is another way to fail too. Where I do agree is a lot of the advice on how to be a great CEO is fairly useless, if not outright bad. No two CEOs lead in exactly the same way. Figure out what works for you to get results and keep refining it, changing it up if it’s not working.

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Founders I've met think that starting something involves forfeiting salary in return for equity upside. While that's true pre-funding, you definitely pay yourself something after raising external funding! Here are the average salaries for founders based on funding stage after talking to VCs and founders: Seed round: Rs. 15-35L Series A: Rs. 35-60L Series B: Rs. 60-80L

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Shallow vs Deep; And why we must aim for depth! … Shallow knowledge; We all have access to knowledge, inside our heads and out side our heads. Rules of thumb that we apply to solve problems, filtering them by patterns that we perceive. We are pattern matching machines. But much of the knowledge is shallow, where we recall and apply, and sometimes share with others. When you face a tiger, would you want to wait and think if it’s going to attack you? Or should you just run! “Just run when you see a tiger”, is a shallow knowledge. And it worked, evolutionarily! But we aren’t that primitive anymore. We are not fighting tigers anymore. Outcomes; Outcomes; Outcomes; Most of the times these rules of thumb work. And we tell ourselves, great we have useful knowledge. However, imagine when we apply our knowledge and our recipe doesn’t lead to a successful outcome. Now what? Can you know what went wrong in the first place? Do you know why your application of knowledge did not lead you to the right outcome? Do you know if it was even the right solution to your problem? Could you have known early and course correct? Deep knowledge; This is where deep knowledge comes into play. Deep knowledge is acquired when you not just learn from sources of knowledge, but you *reflect and apply* in many contexts. It doesn’t come easy, and this is the type of knowledge you should often aim for. It comes with a cost though; And that cost is Time. (which I will address in the end of this post.) Deep knowledge allows you to assess the context and know if you can apply your knowledge. It allows you to course correct early. It allows you to succeed in less than ideal situations. This knowledge could be about People, Tools, Methods and Processes. Learn, reflect and apply; Accumulating knowledge that is shallow is not always going to get you there. Next time, when someone says “raise money don’t bootstrap“, reflect and if it makes sense apply. Go deeper. when someone says “hire fast fire fast”, reflect and if makes sense apply. Go deeper. when someone says “rust language is fast and safe”, reflect and if makes sense apply. Go deeper. when someone says “ship today”, reflect and if it makes sense apply. Go deeper. Time and Value; I tried putting “quality first, time, and money” in that order and failed. Many try “money, time and quality”. That might work for some but may not guarantee meaning. And that’s okay for a few. Now it’s “time, quality and money” in that order for me. Time is always at the top; Learnt it the hard way. Going deep has a cost. It takes time. So how do you choose? Once you realise that deep knowledge often saves you time in the future, in exchange for time now. It’s easy to make the trade off. Because if your knowledge is deep, your outcomes compound faster. Depth helps deliver real Value. Have a nice day! ☀️

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Matchmaking or dating events companies looking to hire devs or building a CRM solution ... . . . In this week, I've read posts from three different matchmaking / dating event companies in India seeking developers or expressing that they are building a CRM solution. With 15 years of experience working with startups and scaleups and over a decade as an Engineering Leader, I've led projects ranging from small 5-member teams to large-scale F&B delivery platforms similar to Swiggy and Zomato in Saudi Arabia. I understand the challenges founders face in getting the right product developed, especially when outsourcing or lacking tech expertise. Since engaging with companies in the relationship space, I've encountered multiple stories of failed app development attempts, resulting in significant loss of time and money. I'm passionate about making a meaningful impact in the relationship space, driven by personal experiences, and I'm eager to put my tech expertise to good use. I'm exploring collaboration opportunities with anyone looking to build tech-based solutions in this domain. Here’s how I can help: - Acting as a CTO / Fractional CTO: I can hire, mentor, and groom a tech team, delivering the right solution tailored to your needs. - Bespoke Solution: I can work closely with founders to offer a custom solution free of cost for a year, with a nominal subscription fee thereafter. Data privacy is assured under all circumstances. Let's connect and discuss how we can transform the relationship space to be more meaningful and spread love 💕 #matchmaking #matrimony

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most thrilling & exciting 30 days of my professional journey 👇🏼 together with Shlok (the crazy guy amongst the 2) - we spent the first 7 days solving the problem without writing a single line of code, we’re not building an ai wrapper but solving a real consumer problem - built a toy version of the product in 15 days (it worked really well, wasn’t a toy to be honest lol but i like to call it that way) - interacted with 500+ people to validate our thesis, got some learnings & implemented features accordingly - got rejections from 50+ VCs telling us that we’re too early, get some traction & other bs (we knew that we needed just one to trust us & we’re lucky to have the most amazing folks backing us) we’ve been executing things at crazy speed & we believe in failing faster & iterating with feedback our goal is to build a 100 people / $100 billion ai-first company from India (a realistic version of the 1person-$1billion company proposed by sam altman, founder of openai) looking for some exceptional designers, engineers & MiSfiTs to help us achieve that we’ve already received applications from some great folks at Meta, Google, Microsoft, Adobe which is kinda overwhelming for us too but a guiding principle of our hiring is that we don’t care about your qualifications/titles, all we care about is your ownership in what you do a few roles we’ll be aggressively hiring for  - senior ml, backend & devops engineers  - ui designers with a strong visual sense - product & design engineers for business opportunities, please reach out to Shlok ps. this would be the best place for you if you want to build a really deeeep-tech consumer product & have loads of fun at a hacker house!

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How ChatGPT and AI Disrupted Chegg’s Business Model Do not invest into edtech IPO #chegg #chatgpt 18 Billion USD valuation wiped out soon same will happened with indian #Edtech he rise of AI chatbots, particularly OpenAI’s ChatGPT, is starting to reshape industries, and the tutoring and education assistance platform Chegg offers a clear example of how fast these changes can hit. Once a go-to platform for students needing homework help, Chegg has seen its stock plunge by 99% from its peak valuation in 2021, shedding billions in market value and even leading to substantial layoffs. The question now facing Chegg—and other companies—is: can they adapt quickly enough to keep up with the rapid adoption and capability of AI tools like ChatGPT? The Late Shift to AI: A Misstep for Chegg? Before ChatGPT’s breakthrough, Chegg’s employees had pitched the idea of using AI to manage their large influx of questions, recognizing the value in automating answers to meet rising demand. However, company leadership hesitated, reportedly doubting AI’s accuracy and its potential to meet Chegg’s quality standards. Once ChatGPT launched, its accuracy and ability to respond instantly gave it an edge that Chegg had overlooked. According to The Wall Street Journal, internal evaluations showed GPT-4 outperformed Chegg's human-sourced answers, leading some to conclude that Chegg’s slow move toward AI was a missed opportunity. Cheggmate: A Collaborative Attempt at Recovery To address the competitive pressure from ChatGPT, Chegg’s CEO Dan Rosensweig reached out to OpenAI to collaborate on a new product, “Cheggmate,” which aims to enhance the AI’s responses by tapping into Chegg’s repository of educational resources. Despite this effort, Chegg is still facing declines in revenue, and the latest round of layoffs reflects the immense impact of generative AI on the company’s operations. Chegg’s President and CEO Nathan Schultz acknowledged these “significant headwinds” and cited technological shifts as a core reason for restructuring. Is Generative AI Redefining the Market for Education and Beyond? The effects of AI-driven tools like ChatGPT on businesses like Chegg prompt a broader question: Are AI models fundamentally changing the landscape for businesses relying on information services and subscription-based models? Many companies may face similar challenges as students and customers increasingly turn to free or lower-cost AI tools that can produce results on par with traditional services. A Future of Continuous Adaptation Chegg’s story is a cautionary tale for many businesses, showing that adaptability to AI advancements is not just beneficial but essential for survival. As new technologies like ChatGPT redefine the education space, companies must explore collaborations, keep pace with user expectations, and reconsider their strategies to stay relevant. Most of Indian Startup Fad out or wiped out Edtech, Service Tech and Marttech

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Big News! Unscript got featured in The Washington Post and 7 other media houses in the last 7 days I am pleased to share that Unscript has been selected as one of seven Indian Startups for the AWS (Amazon Web Services) Global Generative AI Accelerator Program. This collaboration with AWS will support our vision and mission to create advanced video content for businesses. With an acceptance rate below 2% (more selective than Stanford University (USA) and on par with YC), we made it, team! As we move forward, we remain committed to pushing the boundaries of AI in video creation. We are excited about the upcoming innovations. By the way, we are expanding our team at Unscript AI. Hiring for the following positions: - AI Developer - Sales Development Representative - Graphic Designer Comment below or apply via job posting to join Unscript. Book a demo to explore how Unscript can change your whole video creation process. Link to the post: https://lnkd.in/gJyspwZh Exfinity Venture Partners Chinnu Senthilkumar Shailesh Ghorpade Shivangi Shah Stellaris Venture Partners Endurance Capital Siddharth Sirigeri Archana Priyadarshini Abhishek Mittal Rukam Capital Archana Jahagirdar Ghazal Alagh Vikas Lachhwani #GenerativeAI #AWSAccelerator #StartupInnovation #AITechnology #UnscriptAI #VideoMarketing

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Another big ed-tech ‘Unacademy’ is up for sale, merger or bailout. Company fired 250 of their employees yesterday and is struggling with finances. It has approached the likes of Allen, PhysicsWallah, K12 Techno and others. It was also in talks with K12 Techno about the merger but looks like those talks are not advancing. Company has raised $877 million till date and company is searching for a respectable way out. Unacademy's situation highlights the potential turbulence within the EdTech sector. While the industry has seen immense growth, companies are now facing increased competition and the need for profitability. What are your views?

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My take is that this is a clear indicator that the layers of abstraction are too low level and/or libraries have failed. I mean, I do this all the time myself. How do I draw a rectangle in d3? Shit I don’t remember but ChatGPT sort of does. How do I get an async mumble whatever with a doohickey? Ok ChatGPT has ways to surface some things, many of which exist and a few it made up. But I have hit some bag bugs in generated code. I had ChatGPT help write a fairly complex function in deciding how to parse a number, and somewhere in there, it totally corrupted things—and I then spent days sorting it out. But still — the whole idea of coding as files and managing file paths and which files are where and doing this as all text is completely insane. I have nothing to sell in this vector; I have been annoyed about this for 25 years, but I couldn’t see a way to make money at it—or even lose money and change the world independent of a profit. Many have tried and failed. But maybe we will finally get there in the next 10 years.

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A Fortune 500 company saved millions with Outset. They were considering launching a new product and wanted to test public perception before going all in. Initially, they were going to send the product to ~400 people and have them give their thoughts to Outset interviewers. We ran a small test batch— just to ensure the research process went smoothly—and the results? Convinced them to scrap the entire idea: There was so little interest in this product, strictly from the 10 random participants we ran the test batch with, that the rest of the process was a non-starter. They saved millions in marketing, production, and distribution expenses, because they took the time to do qualitative research up front. Whenever I have to communicate the value of our product to prospects/customers, this is one of the value props I mention. A lot of people get the go faster and save money value props. That’s easier to quantify and predict. But the cost and time avoidance benefits can be even more massive. You can save an order of magnitude more dollars and time with Outset by choosing NOT to do something. 

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I'm conflicted about Paul Graham's post on Founder mode (https://lnkd.in/gxuWYX_y.) It is true that there are things that only a Founder can do that no one else in the company can accomplish. This is an odd combination of skill, deep expertise in the domain, and passion. And I've seen it in myself, when I build product for myself and in other founders when I work for them. But the denigration of #executives as 'world-class liars' was bit much. Yes, senior executives as a group tend to be very, very manipulative. It's a necessary skill to get work out of a diverse group of people. But, almost every #founder and #VC I've met are also 'world-class liars'. Just a different kind of liar. What advice does one give to the hapless executive, particularly a product management executive reporting to a founder who's operating in 'founder mode'? Having been on both sides, of the table, as a founder, and as someone reporting to a founder, here's my take on the subject: 1. Recognise that the tenure of most executives at a startup is around 18 months, often less. Treat all startup employment as a temporary gig. Plan to be replaced. This often means explicitly preparing the ground for a future successor, by say documenting your thought process and decision rationale. But it also means being prepared for sudden unemployment. Make sure your finances, and career will be able to survive loss of employment *before* you take the job. 2. Defer to the founder's vision, particularly on product strategy. Keep reservations to yourself. Being critical of the founder's vision will not end well. They won't change their vision, and you will be out of a job. Your job is to try and realise the vision they have. If there are clear difficulties that you foresee in executing a vision, then layout the problem to the founder, and the options they might have available to them. It really helps to take a consultant's attitude to these sorts of situations. You provide helpful advice and execution support, but both the benefits and costs of founder's vision must belong to the founder. 3. Don't let yourself be abused: Some founders will take Paul Graham's essay to be a license to be arseholes. If this happens to you, politely disengage from the situation and terminate the employment relationship quickly. Yes, this means being prepared to be unemployed on short-notice. See item one above. Once the relationship becomes an abusive one, there is no way to recover it. Be careful not to further antagonise the founder in the process of separation. Be kind to them, and understand the stress they probably are in. That will avoid unnecessary litigation. And finally watch Shreyas Doshi's advice on the subject. It's excellent. https://lnkd.in/gSRsMGmM

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