Interview Compilation Part 1 - Top things learned since starting your web app

I thought that it might be a good time to start looking at creating some compilation interviews based on the first 20 interviews here on CenterNetworks. So this is the first of a series and should provide you with some cross the board insights into some top web app founders. What is really interesting is how they all say basically the same thing (with individual twists.) You can click on each name to check out the full audio/text interview and if there are others you would like to see on CN, drop us a note.

What are the top things you have learned since starting your web app?

Ted from Dogster (full interview)

Once you start a big web project, once it gets live, is absolutely just day 1. You think that the whole endeavour is to just to get it live, but that is just the prelude, the whole endeavour is to get it all the way to the last chapter. If you are not willing to commit that time to it, it will stop after the first or second chapter.

Another thing I learned is that communities absolutely cannot manage themselves and the more research I have done there is just no example of an online community that has been able to take care of itself in the nature of the tools that the internet offers it just conflicts with a lot of human problems so running a community means being a caretaker and a guardian at all times. It is really a 24 hour job. The 6th person we hired was our community manager and the 5th person we hired was our systems administrator because we found that if the servers are down no one can use the site and we also found if the community is down as in having a big fight or is in a very emotional state then as well it is as if the site is down. some people don't notice but for some it is a tragedy so you really have to think of it as a garden and watch over it every day.

Third thing I learned is that it is pretty easy to run a business poorly or so-so. You can actually go for years running a business that is losing money or is breaking even or not losing much money. What I found is a lot harder is running a business that is actually successful. It is kind of obvious but the point is when you are able to make it profitable or successful it becomes that much harder because you cant screw up anymore because you cant blow things off that you could before when we were just losing a grand a month, so what if I want to go away for a weekend. But now if I go away for a weekend and there is a problem with an advertisers banners, when we first started out and could not afford staff, one bad advertiser experience could result in a 10% dip in revenues the following month so while anyone can run a business badly it is much harder to run a business well.

Bill from Spout (full interview)

All simple stuff really…

Not learned specifically from my Spout experience but definitely reinforced by it: business is business. I was at the Telluride Film Festival a few weeks ago and heard a great panel discussion - "What do actors require from directors to give great performances?" Forest Whitaker talked about his experiences as actor and director. I thought it was amazing. Great directors, he says, know how to bring in the right people, the right actors for the necessary performance…and then they get out of the way and let them do their job. Isn't that the same thing in every other business you know of? Isn't that the case with any truly great leader? If you pay too much attention to what is different (between industries, businesses, people) any given task can seem daunting. Looking for the similarities and common patterns can really help to simplify/clarify any situation.

Design is EVERYTHING. As my friend Kevin says, that's not design with a lower case "d" but with an upper case one. That means, everything needs to be driven by a problem solving process (Design). It should be obvious, but the goal of your business needs to be about creating the best possible solution or experience for your customers given whatever constraints naturally exist (time, budget, etc.). Ever had a poor customer experience? Shows that goal is easier said than done. Paying attention to and repeating your Design process will help you get there.
Geoffrey from Flock (full interview)

One thing that I have learned is that I find it very difficult to build successful products if you are not totally passionate about them or at least for me. I think with what Flock is trying to do we need to make sure we are always building a product that we passionately believe in and we believe will make an impact on the world.

The other thing I have discovered is that you really need to listen to what users are telling you. There are sometimes when others outside of the organization can really open your mind and we have gotten much better about it and in both getting feedback from users who love the tool but also those who hate it and uninstall it. It is important to speak to both sets of users.

The last thing I have learned is it is really difficult to build the right product. You have got to surround yourself with a great team. Hiring must be done well. My advice to anyone is that you grow your team with the right people. It is a lot more expensive to learn later on that you did not hire the right people.

Matt from Wordpress (full interview)

Probably the top thing is that you can't do everything yourself and you have to trust people. As an entrepreniur that can be a difficult concept to find someone that you are essentially giving control to and doing things that you previously did. I think the key there is finding the very best people you can imagine and that makes the task a lot easier to do.

I have learned a lot about the web and how web communities form. There is always a little bit of churn in a community but I think if you encourage the positives or shoo away the overly negative people you can maintain a pretty popular community.

I have learned a lot about spam. I would never have imagined the types of things that people are doing. Before my view of spam was pretty narrow and I thought of it as that e-mail I received. But now I know it is really an epidemic on Web 2.0 applications in that anything you put out there for public input will be spammed to no end. I think that is a huge challenge. I mean if you look at some of the blog search engines that have failed, I won't name them, I think that part of the failure was that so much of the time and engineering was spent on fighting spam that they were not able to focus on the user experience or creating a better search algorithm because they were focusing so much on fighting the spam. And I worry about some other Web 2.0 companies that I see if they don't consider that they will be spammed that might reach the same fate.

Chase from Pixsy (full interview)

That's a great question and a tough one. You just learn so many new things running your own business than working for someone else. When you are forced to do everything to create value from nothing, you learn what it takes to put the pieces together to prove value.

My skill is getting things off the ground and I have always hired people smarter than me. You have to give up control an let the smart people run things. Now the team is off and running and they are in their own control and destiny.

Andreas from Weekendr (full interview)

Positive: It is amazing how blogs are a successful PR tool and how easy it is to start something on the web right from your seat in your office from anywhere in the world. (Some parts of Weekendr were developed from my notebook during our holiday in Spain.)

Negative: If you don't know the right people, nobody will write about you and nobody will know about your site.

Richard from Reevoo (full interview)

Why didn't I do it sooner!