When you have just released a new product or business, there is always a chance that it won’t last long. The reasons could vary, but one of the most prominent reasons is the lack of a market.
Having a great idea for your product is, of course, important, but not enough. The product has to "click" with the market for things to really grow stronger. And that’s something that maybe you’ve heard of: a product/market fit.
The idea of "product-market fit", or the benchmark your product must meet to be deemed "product-market fit," is a vague one.
In general, it refers to how well your product and its value proposition align with the needs of your target audience.
Getting product-market fit requires the cooperation of everyone within the organization. Starting with the product manager, the team in charge of product marketing, the designers, the researchers, etc. To do this, everyone should work together and keep each other's backs.
The research team should, for instance, carry out research to learn what the market actually wants. Then the insight would be beneficial to those who design and build the product. Now that you have a product, it needs to be well-marketed so that many people will be aware of it.
Product-market fit happens when the solution you offer, combined with the functionality of your product, has successfully met the underserved needs of your target customer.
Marc Andreessen, the founder of Andreessen Horowitz, in 2007, stated that a business went through two stages: before product-market fit and after. He also further said that we can always feel when the product/market fit stage is happening, when:
“The customers are buying the product just as fast as you can make it—or usage is growing just as fast as you can add more servers. Money from customers is piling up in your company checking account. You’re hiring sales and customer support staff as fast as you can. Reporters are calling because they’ve heard about your hot new thing and they want to talk to you about it.”
To achieve the product-market fit, according to a lean product process, some of the steps you should take are:
Identify your target users
Seek for the underserved users’ problems and needs
Define your value proposition → how can your idea and product bring a solution to your users?
Choose your Minimum Viable Product feature set → It’s the core of your product
Create your MVP prototype
Test your MVP
One key for your product to achieve product-market fit is the product-user fit or to what extent you have built the right product for the right user. To achieve this, conducting proper research in the beginning and user testing are really important so that you can determine what users really need and what pain points they face.
Then once you have achieved the MVP stage (getting your idea validated), product-market fit will come when you have found a constant, repeatable, and scalable model that drives demand.
The team behind Pintu, a crypto trading app, reached out to the Natuno team to support their early-stage product design. The market for cryptocurrency trading is currently in high demand, and Pintu offers to make the experience easier and faster.
However, they face challenges in how to make the user experience feel more friendly, as crypto trading can feel intimidating, especially for first-timers.
First, we determine the value that Pintu wishes to provide to its users in order to address this issue. We created the prototypes and tested them with 10 users to identify Pintu's user-experience pain points. Then we used the testing results to answer the users' needs into a design.
From the test, we gathered some critical insights, such as how users would love to have easy and fast trading. It is something that Pintu actually offers but hasn’t really reflected in the app design.
Having a deep understanding of the issue, we then provided a compact design and highlighted the notable features, so it would be more accessible for users. For example, is a feature that allows users to deposit and withdraw funds instantly anytime and anywhere.
With the proper research and testing with real users to really find out their needs, we managed to improve Pintu’s design and create something that fit the target users’ underserved needs.
Based on users' reviews on the Playstore, Pintu is considered to have a better user experience compared to other similar applications. It turns out that, besides cheaper transaction fees as Pintu’s main value, the user-friendly app has become another important factor that attracts users.
We’re able to simplify the crypto trading experience in mobile apps just like what Pintu’s users are looking for as we follow the following procedures: starting from identifying the users’ pain points right from their perspective, building the prototypes, and testing them again with real users.
It’s the user-centric approach that we use in order to create an MVP that will lead to product-market fit.
