What defines product market fit for a consumer internet startup? via Quora
Marc Andreseen writes an awesome post on product market fit hat Sean Ellis’ references in his post. He paints a picture of when product market fit isn’t happening to give an insight into the concept.
“You can always feel when product/market fit isn’t happening. The customers aren’t quite getting value out of the product, word of mouth isn’t spreading, usage isn’t growing that fast, press reviews are kind of “blah”, the sales cycle takes too long, and lots of deals never close.”
Conversely, when the opposite is happening, when you customers get your value proposition, when word of mouth is spreading, when usage is growing fast etc – you’ve got product/market fit.
However, one crucial point that Andreseen addresses that is overlooked when people talk product/market fit is the importance of the “market” itself.
“Product/market fit means being in a good market with a product that can satisfy that market.”
Andreseen defines a good market as a market where the number and the growth rate of customers is large. MBA grads would talk Porters five forces, industry lifecycle analysis or Blue Ocean Strategy, but regardless of which tool you use, picking an emerging, large and (relatively) unsaturated market will gives your startup the best chance of reaching product market fit.
As Adreseen explains:
The #1 company-killer is lack of market.
When a great team meets a lousy market, market wins.
When a lousy team meets a great market, market wins.
When a great team meets a great market, something special happens.
Therefore when trying to define product/market fit, it’s important to establish if the market is even worth addressing in the first place. If you believe there’s real opportunity, getting the right product to the market and growing the company around that demand is the essence of product/market fit.
Full article: http://pmarca-archive.pos
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