Product Market Fit Playbook
5 Stages for Launching and Growing Your Collaboration Technology Startup Strategically
The journey of building a successful collaboration tech startup is no easy feat. It requires navigating through uncharted territories, identifying pain points, and delivering solutions that not only meet user needs but also exceed their expectations. In the ever-evolving landscape of collaboration technology startups, research plays a pivotal role in steering your company toward success. In this Playbook, we will delve into the significance of research, how and when to use it, and the stages of the entrepreneurial journey where it can make a substantial impact.
Why Research Matters in Collaboration Tech
At its core, research is the antidote to uncertainty and misguided assumptions. It is the process of collecting and analyzing data to uncover insights, validate hypotheses, and make informed decisions. In the collaboration tech space, research is paramount because it guides you away from "shooting in the dark" and wasting precious time on endeavors that lack solid grounding. Without research, startups often fall prey to developing products that do not align with user needs, leading to lackluster outcomes.
Moreover, the collaboration tech landscape is marked by rapid innovation and fierce competition. To stand out and succeed, you must deeply understand your users, identify their pain points, and deliver solutions that cater to their specific needs. Research empowers you to learn from the successes and failures of others, avoid reinventing the wheel, and build products that genuinely resonate with your target audience.
Research at Different Stages of the Entrepreneurial Journey
Embarking on the entrepreneurial journey in the collaboration tech space involves distinct stages, each requiring a different approach to research. Let's explore these stages and their corresponding research strategies.
1. Picking a Problem Space
Objective: Define a valuable problem to solve within a chosen market.
At the start of the stage: You have a market or broad space that interests you (e.g. DAOs) but haven't defined yet what would be a valuable problem to solve.
At the end of the stage: you have selected a problem to explore, and might have some ideas for a solution. But, if you can not write an insightful article about the problem yet, you need to go deeper.
Estimated time to complete:
Close to full-time: 3-4 weeks
On the side: 4-8 weeks
Research Approach:
- Gain Context: Immerse yourself in the industry by following thought leaders and reading industry publications to understand existing problems and solutions.
- Build Relationships: Join relevant communities, engage with members, and conduct 1-on-1 calls to learn about their experiences and pain points.
- List Problems: Conduct interviews with leaders and compile a list of potential problems based on their priorities and frustrations.
- Prioritize and Choose: Create a ranked choice survey to validate potential problems and select one that aligns with your expertise and market demand.
2. Problem Research
Objective: Gain in-depth clarity about the chosen problem.
At the start of the stage: you have selected a problem to explore, and might have some ideas for a solution. But, if you can not write an insightful article about the problem yet, you need to go deeper.
At the end of the stage: you have significant clarity about the problem. You can talk with precision about what causes the problem, who suffers from it, what their key frustrations are and what solutions currently exist, and why they fall short.
Estimated time to complete:
Close to full-time: 2-4 weeks
On the side: 4-8 weeks
User Research Approach:
- We frame problems in the powerful “Jobs to Be Done” (JTBD) Framework: Understand customers' motivations, goals, obstacles, and investable efforts through user interviews. The power of the JTBD concept and technique: It helps the innovator understand that customers don’t buy products and services; they hire various solutions at various times to get a wide array of jobs done. If your product doesn’t get that whole job done, it’s not valuable. So you need deeper research to uncover the root cause of the problems you saw at first.
Henry Ford didn’t think about the “job” as a “faster horse” but as “getting from Point A to Point B as quickly as possible.”
- Conduct Desk Research: Explore academic literature and online resources to enhance your understanding of the problem space. There are two different types of JTBDs:
- Main jobs to be done, which describe the task that customers want to achieve.
- Related jobs to be done, which customers want to accomplish in conjunction with the main jobs to be done.
Then, within each of these two types of JTBDs, there are:
- Functional job aspects — the practical and objective customer requirements.
- Emotional job aspects — the subjective customer requirements related to feelings and perception.
Finally, emotional job aspects are further broken down into:
- Personal dimension — how the customer feels about the solution.
- Social dimension — how the customer believes he or she is perceived by others while using the solution.
Someone's JTBD can be summarised using a series of statements that follow this format:
[customer persona] is trying to accomplish [outcome they want] but [encounters problem] which makes them feel [feeling]
e.g. an entrepreneur is trying to build a successful product and to feel like a great leader but doesn't know if the customers will pay for it, which makes the entrepreneur feel scared and worried their team will lose faith in them.
- Craft JTBD Interviews: Prepare interview guides, reach out to users, and conduct structured interviews to gather valuable insights.
Outreach Message Example:
“Hey XXX
Hope you’ve been well
We are doing research with leaders on the role of community in Web3 product and protocol communities. We currently see a gap between the expectations leaders have for the community and what is being achieved in reality, and we want to dive deep into this, in conversations with web3 leaders.
Would you be up for a 30-minute interview on this?
Pro tip: after the interview, invite your participants to join a telegram group.
- Synthesize Data: Analyze interview data to identify patterns and gain a comprehensive understanding of the problem.
- Share Insights: Create an article summarizing your findings and share it with your user community and the wider ecosystem.
- Use the Mom Test: The "Mom Test" is a concept introduced by Rob Fitzpatrick in his book titled "The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you." The core idea behind the Mom Test is to help entrepreneurs and product developers gather honest and valuable feedback from potential customers without falling into the trap of biased or overly positive responses from friends, family, or even strangers.
3. Sharing Research Insights
Objective: Position yourself as an expert on the problem and engage with the community.
At the start of the stage: you have significant clarity about the problem. You can talk with precision about what causes the problem, who suffers from it, what their key frustrations are and what solutions currently exists and why they fall short.
At the end At the end of the stage: you have started to position yourself as an expert on the problem, showing both potential customers and the wider ecosystem that this is something you're committed to work on and are a good person to talk with about it.
Estimated time to complete:
Close to full-time: 1 week
On the side: 1-2 weeks
Approach:
- Share Article: Craft an article highlighting your research findings and insights about the problem. Share it within your user community and through public channels.
- Build Authority: Establish yourself as a thought leader by contributing valuable insights and engaging in conversations about the problem.
- Attract Contributors: Attract potential collaborators and team members who resonate with your research and mission.
- Strengthen Relationships: Use the article to initiate conversations with potential clients, journalists, and event organizers.
It's counterintuitive to share publicly the research we just spend so much effort gathering, but the benefits are huge:
- The users feel they received value back and feel their time led to something
- You start to position yourself at the center of the conversation about that problem. This leads to attracting potential contributors and positioning yourself as an expert in this problem. The article will also be useful to onboard future team members.
- When it's time to sell, you can start by sharing the article with potential clients, which adds value to them from the start, so they're likely going to be a lot more receptive to having a conversation.
- You can also share the article with journalists and event organizers, and offer them to give a talk or share more about the topic.
4. Apply for Grants
Objective: Secure funding to support the development of a solution.
Approach:
- Leverage Your Research: Use your well-documented research insights to bolster your grant applications and demonstrate the significance of the problem.
- Highlight Impact: Emphasize the potential positive impact of your solution on the collaboration tech ecosystem.
- Craft Compelling Proposals: Tailor your grant proposals to align with the grant provider's objectives and showcase your research-backed solution.
5. Problem Validation
Objective: Validate that users are willing to invest time and resources in solving the problem.
At the start of the stage: you have started to position yourself as an expert on the problem, showing both potential customers and the wider ecosystem that this is something you're committed to work on and are a good person to talk with about it.
At the end of the stage: you have validated that your users have a pain point that's important enough for them to dedicate time and budget to having it solved.
Estimated time to complete:
Close to full-time: 1-3 weeks
On the side: 2-4 weeks
Approach:
- Propose Solution Offerings: Share potential solution ideas with users and gather feedback on their relevance and feasibility.
- Engage Users: Initiate conversations with potential users to gauge their interest, concerns, and preferences regarding the proposed solutions.
- Iterate and Refine: Use feedback to refine your solution offerings and ensure they address users' pain points effectively.
Conclusion
In the rapidly evolving collaboration tech space, research is a guiding light that empowers startups to navigate uncharted waters, understand user needs, and deliver impactful solutions. From picking a problem space to prototyping your solution, each stage of the entrepreneurial journey benefits from a tailored research approach. By embracing research as a fundamental aspect of your startup strategy, you increase your chances of success, establish your credibility, and build solutions that change the lives of your target audience.