People argue about Product-Market fit.

What it is. What it isn’t. When you should claim you have it.

Often we’re just talking about different points on a spectrum.

For person A, its means we can sell the product.
For person B, its means we have a product that will scale to $20M+.

In a sense, they’re both right. That said, I think most of us in tech are after scalable products with exponential revenue growth.

Given that, we’re better off thinking in those terms.

———-
Take this example….

Do you have PM-Fit when 10 customers buy your product?

Sure…in a sense.

Unless, of course 3 of then churn, 2 rarely use it, and 1 only renews with major feature commitments in the contract.

It doesn’t make those 10 customers meaningless.

But, it probably means your growth trajectory will be impacted.

———-
I prefer to simply evaluate, where do we have readiness to scale and where don’t we?

Here are the four signals I watch:

  • Revenue – Are prospects buying at market prices from reps (not founders)?
  • Usage – Are customers using the product?
  • Impact – Are customers seeing a quantifiable impact from usage?
  • Renewal – Are customers making ‘no-strings-attached’ renewals?

The answers will always be yes, no, sort of. We live in reality and launching new products is hard work. But it’s a useful diagnostic. It shows you where to focus.

After all, these are ultimately the factors that flatten growth trajectories (or keep them growing up and to the right).

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