REFLECTION – LEARNING LAUNCH

Challenge

I want to develop handmade art marketplace like ETSY or FOLKSY where artists can sell their art online and  buyers can buy online. Business model is based on transactions fees. Currently in my country there isn’t any  similar art marketplace like ETSY or FOLKSY so I treat this as opportunity. But my challenge is that I don’t  have any proof that this business idea would work so I need to test this business idea before investing a lot of  money and my personal time. The project scope is to test hypothesis “Art lovers (buyers) currently don’t  have online marketplace to buy different art conveniently at one place so my platform would fill their  need better than art exhibitions”. Project teams consists of me and my brother. The project should not  exceed more than 30 days.

Selection

In order to prove or disprove my hypotheses we chose learning launch tool regarding the nature of our  challenge and necessity to get maximum confidence about our business idea. We believe that learning launch  will give the most truth about our assumptions’.

Application

We decompose our hypothesis to assumptions by making a long list of assumptions regarding customer,  execution, defensibility and scalability. Secondly we ranked assumptions and found out that there are 2 most  critical assumptions and they are both from customer side.

Key Assumptions  Who  How – Tests type  Timeframe  Cost

There are enough  art lovers (buyers)  who are willing to  buy handmade art  online

Me  Survey  2 weeks  0 $

Artists are willing  to sell their items  through our  marketplace

Me

Launch pilot  marketplace  platform

2 weeks  0 $

For our first learning launch, we focused to understand customers’ behavior by testing first assumption “There  are enough art lovers (buyers) who are willing to buy handmade art online”. We chose online survey as test  type for first assumption. In survey we asked questions to understand in general whether people buy  handmade art online and if yes how often they do this. We also wanted to understand the purpose of purchase  whether it was a gift for someone or was bought for a personal reason. Finally we wanted to understand  customers profile and their preferences by art categories. First learning launch took 2 weeks by getting 150  respondents answers. The final result of this first learning launch was to get data about people who are buying  art online and make a clear profile of customer who buy art online.

For the second learning launch, we focused to practically test second assumption “Artists are willing to sell  their items through our marketplace”. We chose to launch pilot marketplace by renting free trial marketplace  platform as test type for second assumption. After opening our art marketplace, we started to contact possible  handmade artists and invite them for free to open their account at our platform and list unlimited quantity of  items for sale. Second learning launch took 2 weeks by contacting over 100 artists from different art categories  including paintings, jewelry, glass art, sculpture, wood art and etc. The final result of this second learning  launch was to get data about artists who decided to join our art marketplace.

Insight

For the first assumption to be proved we created acceptance criteria “Not less than 50% or respondents buy  art online”. Sadly to say that results from more 150 respondents indicate that only around 20% of respondents  currently buy art online which means that first assumption at current stage was not true. The other 80% of  respondents are not buying online simply because they just simply does not have that need. The results  surprised us and led us to conclusion that currently market size for our business idea is too small is we focus  only in our country.

For the second assumption to be proved we created acceptance criteria “Not less than 30% of contacted artists  would join our marketplace as sellers”. The results indicates that 40% of artists joined our marketplace with  the next week. We make conclusion that second assumption was true.

To summarize our results at current stage we needed to disprove our hypothesis that art lovers  (buyers) currently don’t have online marketplace to buy different art conveniently at one place so my  platform would fill their need better than art exhibitions. Within 4 weeks and 2 learning launches we got  invaluable with no cost lessons about our possible customers.

We are not giving up with first learning launches and planning to take different type of tests for our first  assumption which turned out to be wrong.

Approach

Given the insights our learning launches provided for us we can confirm that it was suitable tool deal with our  challenge. The biggest benefit of learning launch tool was that this tool helped to develop key clear  assumptions about customers and practically test these assumptions in market. Regarding our nature of  challenge to understand whether will be demand for our art marketplace, neither storytelling nor visualization  would have provided as much data as learning launch to move forward with our business idea.


REFLECTION – LEARNING LAUNCH Challenge I want to develop handmade art marketplace like ETSY or FOLKSY where artists can sell their art online and buyers can buy online . Business model is based on transactions fees . Currently in my country there is n’t any similar art marketplace like ETSY or FOLKSY so I treat this as opportunity . But my challenge is that I do n’t have any proof that this business idea would work so I need to test this business idea before investing a lot of money and my personal time . The project scope is to test hypothesis “ Art lovers ( buyers ) currently do n’t have online marketplace to buy different art conveniently at one place so my platform would fill their need better than art exhibitions ” . Project teams consists of me and my brother . The project should not exceed more than 30 days . Selection In order to prove or disprove my hypotheses we chose learning launch tool regarding the nature of our challenge and necessity to get maximum confidence about our business idea . We believe that learning launch will give the most truth about our assumptions ’ . Application We decompose our hypothesis to assumptions by making a long list of assumptions regarding customer , execution , defensibility and scalability . Secondly we ranked assumptions and found out that there are 2 most critical assumptions and they are both from customer side . Key Assumptions Who How – Tests type Timeframe Cost There are enough art lovers ( buyers ) who are willing to buy handmade art online Me Survey 2 weeks 0 $ Artists are willing to sell their items through our marketplace Me Launch pilot marketplace platform 2 weeks 0 $ For our first learning launch , we focused to understand customers ’ behavior by testing first assumption “ There are enough art lovers ( buyers ) who are willing to buy handmade art online ” . We chose online survey as test type for first assumption . In survey we asked questions to understand in general whether people buy handmade art online and if yes how often they do this . We also wanted to understand the purpose of purchase whether it was a gift for someone or was bought for a personal reason . Finally we wanted to understand customers profile and their preferences by art categories . First learning launch took 2 weeks by getting 150 respondents answers . The final result of this first learning launch was to get data about people who are buying art online and make a clear profile of customer who buy art online . For the second learning launch , we focused to practically test second assumption “ Artists are willing to sell their items through our marketplace ” . We chose to launch pilot marketplace by renting free trial marketplace platform as test type for second assumption . After opening our art marketplace , we started to contact possible handmade artists and invite them for free to open their account at our platform and list unlimited quantity of items for sale . Second learning launch took 2 weeks by contacting over 100 artists from different art categories including paintings , jewelry , glass art , sculpture , wood art and etc . The final result of this second learning launch was to get data about artists who decided to join our art marketplace . Insight For the first assumption to be proved we created acceptance criteria “ Not less than 50 % or respondents buy art online ” . Sadly to say that results from more 150 respondents indicate that only around 20 % of respondents currently buy art online which means that first assumption at current stage was not true . The other 80 % of respondents are not buying online simply because they just simply does not have that need . The results surprised us and led us to conclusion that currently market size for our business idea is too small is we focus only in our country . For the second assumption to be proved we created acceptance criteria “ Not less than 30 % of contacted artists would join our marketplace as sellers ” . The results indicates that 40 % of artists joined our marketplace with the next week . We make conclusion that second assumption was true . To summarize our results at current stage we needed to disprove our hypothesis that art lovers ( buyers ) currently do n’t have online marketplace to buy different art conveniently at one place so my platform would fill their need better than art exhibitions . Within 4 weeks and 2 learning launches we got invaluable with no cost lessons about our possible customers . We are not giving up with first learning launches and planning to take different type of tests for our first assumption which turned out to be wrong . Approach Given the insights our learning launches provided for us we can confirm that it was suitable tool deal with our challenge . The biggest benefit of learning launch tool was that this tool helped to develop key clear assumptions about customers and practically test these assumptions in market . Regarding our nature of challenge to understand whether will be demand for our art marketplace , neither storytelling nor visualization would have provided as much data as learning launch to move forward with our business idea .