No one wants to work on finding Product-Market Fit
Myth-busting the 4 most common excuses.
Hi there,
No one wants to work on finding Product-Market Fit.
It’s admitting: “Hey we haven’t got this right yet.”
It isn’t easy.
But in my experience, it’s really the missing puzzle piece with a lot of my clients.
They’ll have a great product with tonnes of features, but it doesn’t sell.
Why? Because they didn’t focus on finding PMF before growth, so their messaging doesn’t resonate with the target audience.
So let’s look at four excuses why companies don’t focus on it.
And get them out of the way once and for all.
Excuse 1:
“We will focus on Product-Market Fit once we are bigger.”
Solution: Finding PMF is not a chicken or egg debate; PMF definitely came before hypergrowth.
You don’t need a huge sample size or large budget to find PMF. The best way to find it is through user interviews, which don’t cost much.
Excuse 2:
“But then we can’t focus on growth!”
Solution: Sure, you can’t focus 100% on PMF. There are stakeholders to appease, employees to pay, and you do need a bit of growth to see if you are close to finding PMF.
But a balance between the two is needed. Suggest lower growth targets and use that growth to find PMF.
Excuse 3:
“We don’t have time to focus on PMF.”
Solution: The harsh reality is, you need to kill some of your other focus points. This is not the time to try out three new channels.
Align as an organisation on finding PMF - it is the catalyst that will make all your other growth efforts easier.
Excuse 4:
“We just need to release these new features and then we will look at PMF!”
Solution: Here’s the thing. You don’t find PMF; your customers do. Prioritising extra features over PMF is a waste of time.
Those features won’t sell if you don’t have PMF. Focus on understanding your target audience first, to know if more features will even help with finding PMF. Remember that it might not even be your product that is holding you back from reaching PMF!
Check for Product-Market Fit
If you haven’t before it’s time to ask this one simple question to your customers to find out if you have PMF:
“How disappointed would you be if you could no longer use the product / service?”
a) Not disappointed
b) Somewhat disappointed
c) Very disappointed
If 40% or not answer c, then congratulations, you have PMF!
Truth be told I always think if you aren’t sure you probably don’t. Other checks are looking at your retention rate and % of sales through word of mouth. If both are far below average that can be another signal.
Recommendation
In every edition of Growth Waves, I also share a related book, individual or newsletter to check out related to the week’s topic.
I’ve written a whole series on the various steps of finding PMF that was inspired by this article, you can find them here in my swipe file under retention.
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When it comes to finding PMF I believe the following:
You can start focusing on it at any point - the sooner the better.
You can focus on growth and PMF.
You don’t find PMF, your customers do, so it's time to start talking to them.
So don’t let these excuses get in the way of your growth. If you are struggling to growth month-on-month it might be worth re-visiting whether you really do have Product-Market Fit.
Chat soon,
Daphne