GigaOm talks about “What went wrong with Joost?” The lessons in there are not only valuable from a startup’s point of view, but even applicable in the context of any product strategy.

The product needs technology. Continuously!

You do the first things first, and release your product out there quick. Getting traction is a big worry, but at the same time, you don’t want to get too much of it so fast you are unable to respond to the needs that scale brings. You’ve gotta see your baby through to the stage where she’s walking!  How agile you are in this period can make or break your product.

Between the first few customers and the product settling down into a stable, popular state is a series of rapid changes, and even minor product iterations that must be executed fast and well so you keep the users you attract. The best way is to plan for at least a few of these so you’re ready to experiment with interfaces, functionality and respond to feedback real fast.  Of course you got to measure this, so a reasonable way of both collecting deep data, as well as analyzing at least some of it must exist from the word go.  Having at least a spike-solution plan for scaling is a very good idea. And of course, do not forget to take backups of important data

Finally, you need your best brains both analyzing the data, and making the changes needed.