The Cold Start Problem: Using Network Effects to Scale Your Product – A Review

So you wanna build a Network? ⏱️ Time to read: 12 minutes I have to say this is one of the best books I have ever read. Author @andrewchen (Andrew Chen) from a16z goes into depth from personal experience and research on what it takes to build a networked product and platform and more importantly what critical mistakes that people make and how to recover from them with actionable strategies and tactics. The book is long but worth it, but since I know you are busy (hopefully trying to build a network), let me give you the tasty bits. It's a Paradox Andrew writes an amazing insight at the end of the book that sums up the whole shebang: But here’s the paradox: To build a massive successful network effect, I argue that you must start with a smaller, atomic network. And use the success in the first set of networks to tip over the next set of small networks. I’m not convinced this step can be avoided. Pay attention to that last bit. 👆 Chen has spent a lot of time thinking about this an ... Read full article.