Tech for Starters Series 1

So here it goes! People ask us what we do and what "Tech" is to us? In response we decided to do a series of Informative tech-ish Blogs that will eventually be compiled into our E-Book. 

We decided to break up the series into different tech mediums and the roles that they play. 

Series 1: Tech Speak in the Startup Community? 

WHAT IS A MVP MODEL AND HOW DOES IT COME TO EXIST? 

The MVP Model: In product development, the minimum viable product (MVP) is a product with just enough features to satisfy early customers, and to provide feedback for future development. Some experts suggest that in B2B an MVP also means saleable: "it’s not an MVP until you sell it. Viable means you can sell it". (Thanks WikipediA)! 

In the "Startup" world the goal is to brainstorm and create a product or application (or as we call it an "APP" (not to be mistaken with the Mobile Apps) hence why I just refer to it as the Portal. Most apps are created to G2M (for all you savvy marketers out there we all know that means "Go to Market") We are all striving to create a "Native" or "Greenfield Development" project. (Something from scratch, no open source attributes, native features and functions). 

Whiteboard/Think-tank & Beta here we come: If you are here in Detroit, then you know these savvy acronyms very well. There is a lot going on in the Startup space here locally, and I can most likely speak for everyone by saying that it's pretty exciting. Entrepreneurs and bright like-minded people are meeting all over the place to share concepts, talk about potential and to form JV's (Joint Ventures or what I like to refer as "Strategic Partnerships"). What starts as an idea on a napkin can quickly turn into IP (Intellectual Property, the Brand, the Copyright ©). There are a slew of partnered resources from Co-Work Spaces like Bamboo, to Tech Meet Up's from Java to Girl Code, to Angel Investors like the Great Lakes Angels, to Code and Development Partners like Grand Circus and Girl Develop It, to Tech Partnerships like Tech248, and Tech funds like the Invest Detroit VC First Capital Fund and week long events based on Technology and local entrepreneurs like Detroit Dev Day and Detroit Tech Week. 

How Digital Marketing Plays a Role In Your Startup: The Digital Marketing Era has taken over! There are drones flying over your brain as we speak, extracting ideas, marketing plans and digital space to make room for you! Seriously though, with the help of a great Dig Marketing partner your conceptual plan can become a virtual sensation. Here is a great example; some people ask what "Growth Hacking" is. Simply put, have you ever looked at something online and it shows up on the right side of your email or Facebook page as a banner ad? This is just like when we go to Groupon or Amazon and it reminds us of items previously viewed.

By now you transcribed your ideas onto a whiteboard, entered a think tank, and formed a team. Built a MVP Model, made some great connections and presto achieved milestones, an exit, and end users. Now what? Great question, now you scale. We will spend an entire series on the various scaling options, and what options are available for each application. But for now, here is the elevator pitch, if you will. Most applications work within a specific framework, the CSR (Virtual Customer Support) along with ORM (Object Relational Mapping) and Databases. You will most likely start on a shared/semi-private or private local server until you reach a certain amount of concurrent multi-tenancy users/beta testers. The objective after that is to move to the ever-so infamous Cloud. Ta Da! There are several options and features to consider when selecting a Cloud based environment, but the most critical factor is the in and out charges. Meaning, when I load a new piece of data that is an "In" feature and when you, the end user extracts it from our database, it's an "out" feature. In and out charges can be very costly if this is not mapped out properly. 

In our future series we will cover the Digital Marketing role and the key attributes like Ms. SEO, Ms. Hashtag#, Ms. Hacker...  these gals are great, you get the gist. 

Were planning to elaborate on a series of topics in the Tech/Startup space and we are open to suggestions and ideas or contributors.