Just finished reading MicroISV: From Vision to Reality and I have to say that this is one sensational book. If you are interested in starting your own software company, then this is one book that you need to get a hold of.
The focus of this book is starting a small product-based software company with a vision to grow it into something great. But by far the most valuable bit for me was the 50 or so interviews that the Bob Walsh carries out through the book. There interviews the startups of various sizes, their bootstrapping strategies, their marketing plan, how their product came into being, how they improved their sales, what kind of revenue you can expect and so on.
But the interviews aren’t just with software guys. There’s also interviews with editors of CNET on how to get a software review, legal guys on license agreements, eCommerce providers on how to organise credit card payment for your app, Google Adwords folks on how to improve your advertising, and even guys from Microsoft Acquisitions on how get bought!
Overall I’ve found this book invaluable. Some of the really important stuff he covers includes:
Overall a fabulous book chock full of helpful info. I’ve done a brain dump of about ten things that were really helpful to me. I’ll post it up here over the next week or so.
If you’ve got a vision to be a software entrepreneur, just go get it.
If you live in Australia, I recommend bookware - great folk to deal with.