How to Achieve Product-Market Fit: Help Desk Software as a Contributing Tool

Did you know that Slack was originally a hastily built internal communication channel for its developers working on an online game? Today it is an instant messaging platform for workplace communication used by thousands of companies. 

How did it happen? The developers noticed that their product solved the problem of employees like them who do not have a secure, simple channel for internal communication. They weren't afraid to turn 180 degrees to achieve product-market fit and, eventually, success.

Still, achieving product-market fit does not always mean dramatic changes as many companies come up with good ideas that just need to be adapted. And while this process is lengthy, it’s entirely possible. 

So, if you have something that you think might lead your company to success, read on. We will share with you everything we know about product-market fit, its importance, and ways of achieving it.

How to know if you’ve reached product-market fit?

Product-market fit means that a company creates and sells a product satisfying the market's target customers. In other words, you know your customers' pain points and ways to solve them.

Importance of product-market fit

All the fuss about product-market fit is for a reason: if you don't have enough customers willing to pay for your product, you won’t have the opportunity to grow. Here are some reasons why:

If people don't want your product, you won't be able to engage them in other ways. For example, advertising pushes a person to try your customer service system. Still, they won't pay for the next month if its functionality doesn't make their working processes easier. So, you will spend money on advertising but will not increase sales.

Customers who have found a product that solves their problem are the best promotional assets. We’re sure you have done this many times. When you find something that makes your life better, you annoy all your friends, even if it's as tiny as an automatic trash can. To the point that they may tease you about having changed jobs to sell these cans.

That's how product-market fit works: companies don't have to ask users to recommend their product; they do it of their own free will. Considering that in 2020, 93% of people trusted recommendations from friends and family, compared to 38% who trusted advertising, product-market fit is a good marketing tool itself.

Investors will not give you money. Whether you are a startup or a young company expanding your business, you need money and turn to investors. You need to convince them that your product can be profitable and compete in the market. But if you don't have a product-market fit, you most likely won’t match your core advantage and your customers' pain points. So, you will not convince anyone and so lose possible investments.

If your product does not match the market, you deprive yourself of growth. That's why it's better to double-check your product-market fit.

How to understand that your product does not fit the market?

No one can give you exact indicators to determine product-market fit. But there are some signs and metrics that you can use.

Customers won't be upset if you disappear. A simple method to find out your value to customers is to ask how they would feel if they could no longer use your product. If most of them don't care, you need to re-evaluate your ideas.

Low Net Promoter Score (NPS). NPS shows how many people would recommend your product to their friends. Calculating this is simple: subtract the percentage of people who dislike your product from the percentage of people who like it. Let’s take an app on the Play Market for example. The latter group is the people who gave 4-5 stars, and the former group is those who gave 1-2 stars. If your NPS is below 60%, you have problems with product-market fit.

Low retention rate. Clients come, but they don't always stay. If you have a low retention rate, your product is probably not suitable for customers. Although bear in mind that a low retention rate is a relative concept: in 2021, the retention rate for the insurance industry was 84%, while edtech retained only 4% of users. External reasons may explain these figures: people often drop out of studying due to lack of time or motivation, but insurance is vital for their health security. So, before you get frustrated, check the average for your industry recently.

A wrong ratio of growth rate and revenue. If you have heard of the rule of 40, you might be happy looking at your numbers. Everything corresponds to this rule: growth rate plus your profit margin should be equal to or exceed 40%. But it is a bit more complicated. For example, if your profit is 38%, and the growth rate is 2% in the first months of operation, this may indicate that your target market is too small and your prices are too high. So, you have no scaling potential.

Of course, all these indicators are relative and might also reflect marketing, customer support service, and reputation problems. So don't forget to consider all aspects influencing your business when evaluating your product-market fit.

How to improve product-market fit?

You must know your customer to achieve product-market fit. That's why the first thing you should do is collect and analyze data about your target audience. You can choose one or more of the following methods.

Conduct interviews. First, you need to identify the ideal customer for your product to capture a market segment. Ask your customers, "How would you feel if you could no longer buy our product?" If at least part of the customers answer they would be very upset, ask them why. These reasons are the pain points of your ideal customers and the advantages of your product. Use them.

Use surveys. You can create simple social media or email surveys based on your ideal clients' needs. This time, ask users who aren't your ideal customers about their expectations, pain points, and capabilities to understand how to expand your target market.

Test alternative options by A/B testing. This approach is often used in software development because it works. Offer two sets of users different features and see how they react. The one with the best reviews should be in your product.

Collect reviews. People love to share their opinions, and you should use this passion. Collect feedback from all available sources — marketplaces, social networks, forums, and specialized sites — and analyze what you are missing. 

Analyzing the reviews of your competitors will also help you find your customers' pain points and close them with your product. Considering that 79% of customers value online reviews as much as personal recommendations, this analysis can provide critical highlights.

This data analysis will help you understand your customers' problems and how they would prefer to solve them. As a result, you will receive:

• Customer pain points that you should target with the product
• Preferences of a narrow group of ideal clients who might become your greatest advocates
• The broader audience's preferences for product scaling purposes

The more universal pain points you relieve and the more universal methods you offer, the broader market segment you can cover, which is the goal of the product-market fit.

It is only necessary to collect the data correctly to get accurate results. Help desk software can help you with this task.

How a help desk can improve your product-market fit search

With its automation capabilities, help desk software can make customer support processes more organized and convenient. Plus, because it’s your main point of contact with your customers, it’s also a perfect tool to improve your product-market fit. Let's see how.

Use chatbots or artificial intelligence (AI) to collect feedback. Most help desks offer chatbots that send short messages with questions, choosing the most appropriate reply depending on the client's answer. They do it all the time, don't forget, and don't get tired. So, your database is always full enough to analyze.

Moreover, if you use AI chatbots, the response rate increases. For example, Zoho Desk has Zia, Zoho's AI-powered assistant, which can recognize customer reactions by scanning messages. Zia rates customer satisfaction after the interaction and chooses the right survey and the moment to send it. So the client is more likely to respond.

Set up automatic mailing. Customers get annoyed if you send them surveys all the time. That's why you need to choose an appropriate mailing scheme for your employees to remember and apply for each client. It's very easy to get confused.

Many help desks can do all this automatically. For example, it can send a customer a survey after a week of use to see what they like about your software. Or send a message after a month of inactivity to find out why they stopped using the app. This way, you have enough information to evaluate, and customers do not skip your surveys out of annoyance.

Systematization of data for reports. If you're serious about collecting data, you receive hundreds of customer response emails daily. Your employees can use a shared inbox to receive messages, sort them, and form reports manually. Although this way seems cheaper, it is time-consuming and risky due to human error. So, it might cost you more in the long run.

That's why it’s smarter to move from a shared inbox to a help desk system that receives data and systematizes it depending on the algorithm you choose. This way, you reserve your employees’ time for customer service but receive automatically formed reports in a convenient form, including tables, charts, comparisons, and visualizations. 

As a result, two things change, affecting your market position. First, the quality of service improves, as your employees make fewer mistakes and have more time to focus on the customers. Secondly, the help desk constantly collects and analyzes customer feedback.

You might think, "Why is this important for finding product-market fit?" After all, I can collect reviews once and not spend money on a help desk."

No, you can't. Product-market fit doesn't last forever because the market and your customers' needs change. For example, if Netflix were still renting DVDs as it was in the early days, it would have disappeared from the market long ago.

That's why you need to constantly re-evaluate your product-market fit based on data. Help desk software is an excellent tool in this scenario.

Do you need a help desk tool for reaching product-market fit?

Product-market fit is crucial for your company's development. Of course, you can earn some money or grow your business without it at the first stage, but that won't last long. Your customers know what they need and will leave if they cannot get it. So, don't try to attract them with ads or free stuff only, offer them products and customer service that solve their problems faster and efficiently. 

Moreover, your customers want to tell you about their pain points, and it's your job to help them by collecting feedback. A help desk system can assist you by sending surveys, managing responses, and forming reports automatically to make this process less time-consuming and confusing for support reps. 

All you need do is use this information continuously to maintain your product-market fit and grow your business.