How to find product market fit (part 1)
You had this brilliant idea, an itch you just had to scratch.
Convinced you've got a golden nugget you sat down to build it. There was a tiny nagging voice in the back of you head telling you that you shouldn't just build this blindly without validation, but it was drowned in the sheer excitement of building something new and beautiful.
Now it's done.
You posted it on IndieHackers and even launched it on ProductHunt, but nothing is happening. Yes, a few well-meaning people left encouraging comments and a couple even signed up for a trial. But nothing beyond that. What a letdown.
Should you have done more market research and validation? Yeah, probably.
Is everything lost? Do you need to let this go and build something new?
I don't think so.
Any project you built to scratch an itch and put your heart and soul into has a chance to succeed, maybe even help you break free from ever needing a job again.
You just need to find product market fit for it.
"Just!" I hear you smirking.
The mythical Product Market Fit. This magical space where customers find you by themselves, tell all their friends about your amazing product and pull out their credit card without a second thought.
Variously described as stepping on a landmine, chasing a boulder down the hill instead of pushing it up, or simply as the entrepreneurial afterlife. The path to wealth, happinness, $10k MRR and that self-congratulating book on Amazon about how anyone can succeed if they just follow in your footsteps (and have the same kind of luck).
The ultimate reason we’re all here.
Is there a structured way to find it? Let's find out.
In Obviously Awesome, April Dunford describes a process to find optimal positioning and product market fit. It starts with getting your entire team in one room - developers, sales people, marketers, customer support. That part is easy for an indie - all of those people are just you.
The next step is harder. You need to already have customers, preferably a lot of them. Finding positioning through the April Dunford method means realizing that “although the product was created with a certain market and audience in mind (you), it may no longer be best positioned that way”. You then figure out what people actually use your product for and double down on that.
The seminal Superhuman article How Superhuman Built an Engine to Find Product Market Fit, takes a similar approach of analyzing the current customers to find a key trend and doubling down on them. Instead of getting the whole team together and brainstorming, they get all the data in one place and analyze it.
The core idea for both approaches is the same:
- Have lots of customers
- Figure out who are the best ones
- Double down
A bit of a problem here. You don’t have lots of customers. In fact, the whole reason you’re looking for product market fit is to find customers in the first place.
You also don’t have the time, money, or inclination to randomly throw things against the wall for months or years. You’re not a VC-funded mega startup like iRobot who tried 14 different business models before finding success with the Roomba.
You also aren’t ready to drop your product, start from scratch and find an audience as Arvid Kahl would have you do in The Embedded Entrepreneur.
Is there another way?
Yes, there is. Part 2 coming soon.
Here's a little hint:
I write a bunch about finding PMF and early paying customers on Twitter @finereli, come follow me there and DM me if you need help.
