Finding PMF

There is a lot of good literature on how to go about finding PMF. While useful, much of that is a tactical set of how-to guides when most of the challenges for me were on the softer aspects- the emotions, the people and the state of being in constant uncertainty.

There is no single point of PMF. I got asked “have we met PMF” so many times for which I didn’t have a straightforward answer. This lack of ‘aha’ moment or a clearly measurable milestone creates a constant? state of anxiety on where the product currently is and what should be the next step. The reality is that even when the product has PMF, there are so many things yet to be fixed and done that it feels like we are still not there.

As a result, all PMF journeys are unique and nothing prepares us for being in the arena. You need the theory, but 90% of the calls you make in the arena are judgment calls.The journey is an emotional roller-coaster. There will be moments of highs and lows on a daily basis. One of the biggest challenges is managing your emotions.

Another equally challenging area is to keep the team’s morale. The nature of a 0-1 journey is that there will be several periods of uncertainty and setbacks. You need to know how to manage the team’s morale, who have bet on your vision.

There are going to be a lot of people who would say you’re doing something stupid. The nature of any innovative product is that it is either a non-obvious problem or a non-obvious solution. It’s a unique insight you have that you chose to pursue. This implies that a significant majority are not going to believe in your vision and again something you need to get comfortable with. You need an incredible level of conviction.

In short, it’s a game of resilience. You need to outlast your hurdles. Having said that, this isn’t a journey of shooting in the dark. While each journey is unique, here were some broad-stroked approaches that helped reduce some of the ambiguity.

[1] Have a set of metrics- qualitative and quantitative, that’s measured at the appropriate frequency for the product category. Both growth and retention are important. In retention, we measured short term retention as well as long term/ steady state retention.

[2] The best sense of state of the product for me came more from qualitative insights- feedback and discussions from the users or potential users. We had an internal understanding- if the qualitative insights disagreed with quantitative metrics, we need to investigate the metrics first and fix them. This was probably the hardest thing to pull off because of our psychological comfort with something definitive like a number.

[3] Be wary of investments you’re making to achieve growth or retention. For habit building products, you may need to invest in promotions and incentive schemes, but know that the numbers you see during this stage don’t reflect the PMF.

[4] Regularly communicate with the team on these metrics and user interactions. Prepare well before such meetings. While you need to convey the truth, it is important on how you want to convey the message (there will be many times when it wouldn’t be good news). Having a view on what should be done next is a must even if you’re seeking inputs from the team.

[5] PMF encompasses not just the product (as measured by usage and feedback) but also distribution and monetisation. Have a clear plan on all 3 of these in your vision document from day 1. Some of these strategic aspects may evolve or even change drastically during the journey but it’s important to have an answer to these at any point in the journey. “Just get users, money will follow” doesn’t work except for a few exceptional cases.

[6] There will be many moments when you have to question whether a particular feature or product attribute is working or do you need to pivot. Sometimes, this question can be about the entire product. Unfortunately, there is no easy answer to this- when do you continue to iterate vs when do you pivot vs when do you stop. Constantly talking to users helps; however, it requires a certain product sense to figure this out.

[7] When in a constant pitching mode, there will be a tendency to create a narrative (by torturing the numbers enough) that you start believing to declare a win. It requires an immense amount of courage, discipline and self-awareness to stay in the truth seeking mode at all times rather than trying to declare a win.

I conclude with an analogy of a sport that I pursue- boxing. While practice sessions teach me the techniques and approaches, in the arena there are too many variables, lots of judgment calls, many punches taken and all we can do is try to create openings hoping for that few decisive, lucky punches.