Startup focus framework - Keeping the main thing the main thing

Staying focused on the right things is a major challenge for every startup. This framework can help you understand where your focus should be by splitting the startup journey into four phases.

What’s the most important thing a startup should focus on?

Getting new users? Building the product? Raising money? Or are startups that hard precisely because you have to do all these things simultaneously?

It’s a question that regularly drives startups into failure and teams into burnout. Your available time and money are minimal. And when you build something new, dangerous distractions loom around every corner.

It’s a question that regularly drives startups into failure and teams into burnout.

Your available time and money are minimal. And when you build something new, dangerous distractions loom around every corner.

But if you can focus all your time and money on just one crucial goal at a time and set the goals right, you will increase your chances of success by a magnitude.

A startup, in order to be successful, needs to do one and only one thing right, and to increase the likelihood of doing so, it needs to say no to everything else
– Uri Levine

What’s the trick to finding the right focus? Operating in phases.

Every startup goes through the same phases, each with a specific focus (or goal). Understanding these phases and having the courage to say no to anything outside their scope will give you the laser focus you need to succeed.

And it is what the startup focus framework will help you do. It is based mainly on Uri Levine and Morgan Brown. But there is broad consensus about the phases and their order, even if their name and the scope sometimes differ. You can find all primary sources at the end of the page.

And it is what the startup focus framework will help you do. It is based mainly on Uri Levine and Morgan Brown.

But there is broad consensus about the phases and their order, even if their name and the scope sometimes differ. You can find all primary sources at the end of the page.

Remember that real-life journeys are rarely as linear and perfect as the framework suggests. In real life, we make mistakes, move back and forth, and even try to skip a phase. But understanding the importance of focus and phases can hopefully help you get close to your own ideal startup journey.

Remember that real-life journeys are rarely as linear and perfect as the framework suggests. In real life, we make mistakes, move back and forth, and even try to skip a phase.

But understanding the importance of focus and phases can hopefully help you get close to your own ideal startup journey.

Validating your assumptions

When you are just starting with an idea, the only thing you need to focus on is validating your assumptions with the market and adjusting them if needed.

Don’t worry about not having a product or a website or building your team. You don’t want to throw your time and money into something just to find out that people don’t need it.

That happens all the time. Startups even build entire products only to find out that nobody wants to use them.

Even better than just validating basic assumptions is creating a strategy. Define where you will play and how you will win, and use your conversations to validate or adjust your strategy.

When talking to people, focus on understanding their problems and avoid discussing your solution idea.

It is tempting to discuss your ideas, but people are biased toward telling you they are great just to avoid disappointing you.

Product-market fit

Once you have validated your assumptions and truly understand the problem you want to solve, it’s time to build the product that gets the job done.

This is the most important phase of any startup. Unless you can figure out what product the market wants, you will fail.

Take a look at the product-market fit framework for a proven method of finding your market fit.

In this phase, all your focus (and money) should be on product development and adjustment based on user feedback. Do this until you have a product that the people in your initial target market truly love.

Or, in metrics language, do it until you have a high retention rate (people continue using your product).

Sure, you will need some sales to get your first users. But having a few users who represent your market and are willing to give you feedback is usually enough. There are a few exceptions, such as network effect businesses or marketplaces.

Sure, you will need some sales to get your first users. But having a few users who represent your market and are willing to give you feedback is usually enough.

There are a few exceptions, such as network effect businesses or marketplaces.

Unfortunately, this is also the phase with the most lethal distractions. With some form of product, a few users, and possibly investors expecting you to show results, it is easy to start focusing on the wrong things.

Some of the things you will be tempted to do include:

Trying to start growing through more sales and marketing
Hiring more people
Expand your target market because you see potential interest
Trying to be at every conference or networking event

You need to resist these temptations. These things will be important later on but won’t be sustainable until you have product-market fit.

What’s the point of growing when all your new users churn again? And how can you find product-market fit if you continue to expand your market?

The good news is that once you find product-market fit, everything else will become much easier. Not easy, but easier.

Business-market fit

Now that you have a product, you can start building a business around it. This is where you lay the foundation for the coming scale phase.

As in the other phases, you have to experiment a lot to find out what works.

There are three things you need to figure out in this phase:

Your business model (who pays for what and how much)
How you can optimize your funnel
What sales and marketing channels work for you

To find your business model, you need to know who your customers are (it’s not always the user; think about social media), what they are paying for, and how much they are paying.

Especially in B2B, where every deal might be different in the beginning, this alone can take some time to figure out.

Next, optimize your funnel to ensure that you bring new users into your product efficiently. This means understanding how a potential new user interacts with you and removing all possible friction points.

This includes things like optimizing your website, simplifying your onboarding experience, or building up customer success.

With an efficient funnel and good conversion, you can test different sales and marketing channels. You want to find the ones that deliver repeated results.

Exploring channels is all about experimentation. When you’re testing channels, it’s like echolocation. You’re sending out pings — if I do a test here, do I get a response, if I do a test there, do I get a response.
– Morgan Brown

(Channels meaning things like emailing, social media, digital & physical ads, etc.)

A common mistake startups make is to throw money into commonly used channels (emailing and Google ads in particular) without deliberate testing.

Instead, list all possible channels for reaching your target audience and systematically test them in short iterations.

Scale

You have a repeatable business model, solid conversion through your funnel, and you know which channels deliver the most new users. It’s time to scale and aim for hockey stick growth.

According to Morgan Brown, senior growth leader and author, the key to scaling your growth is hiring specialists for your chosen channels and experimenting with other channels.

But that is only the sales and marketing side of things. In the scaling phase, you will have to scale all of your businesses simultaneously. If you’ve made it this far, congratulations!

But I’ll keep this chapter short because, at this point, there are other frameworks and experts who can offer you better advice.

But that is only the sales and marketing side of things. In the scaling phase, you will have to scale all of your businesses simultaneously.

If you’ve made it this far, congratulations! But I’ll keep this chapter short because, at this point, there are other frameworks and experts who can offer you better advice.

Sources

Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution – by Uri Levine
Lessons from a two-time unicorn builder – Lenny’s Podcast with Uri Levine
5 Phases of the Startup Lifecycle – by Lauren Bass about Morgan Brown
The Startup Lifecycle: From Garage to Unicorn – by Stephané Nasser
And many smaller sources, together with my own experience