2. Determining if Your Product is MUST HAVE Flashcards
What do all fast-growth companies have in common?
They make a product that a large group of people love.
What is the baseline requirement for rapid and sustainable growth?
Building a must-have product.
What common mistake do start-up founders often make?
They try to drive customers to a product that isn’t loved or understood.
Name two examples of innovative products that failed due to lack of consumer interest.
- Google Glass
- Amazon’s Fire Phone
What was the fate of the Microsoft Zune?
It never generated more than a single-digit share of the market and was discontinued in 2011.
What must growth teams know before pushing for growth?
They must know their product is must-have, why it’s must-have, and to whom it is a must-have.
True or False: Marketing can make people love a substandard product.
False.
What are the two opportunity costs of pushing for growth too soon?
- Spending money and time on wrong efforts
- Making early customers disillusioned critics
What is a common misconception about growth hacking?
That it is primarily about building virality into products.
What is the ‘aha moment’?
The moment when the utility of the product really clicks for the users.
What was Yelp’s initial struggle against?
Stiff competition from Citysearch.
What feature led to Yelp’s growth?
The ability for users to post reviews of local businesses.
What does an ‘aha experience’ contribute to a product’s growth?
It is too remarkable not to value, to return to often, and to share.
Fill in the blank: For Uber, the aha moment was _______.
You push a button and a black car comes up.
What did Twitter discover about user engagement in its early days?
Users who followed at least 30 other users were more engaged.
How many responses did Qualaroo find necessary for trial users to see value?
50 responses.
What threshold of messages sent and received did Slack identify for user engagement?
2,000 messages.
What is a vital step in determining if a product has aha potential?
Seeking out truly avid fans by mining user data and feedback.
What can sometimes lead to further product development or a substantial pivot?
Identifying what a product’s aha moment is.
What is the primary purpose of seeking out avid fans of a product?
To determine the product’s ‘aha potential’ and uncover value differences in usage
This helps identify features that may appeal to less enthusiastic users.
What is the first question in the Must-Have Survey?
How disappointed would you be if this product no longer existed tomorrow?
Response options include ‘Very disappointed’, ‘Somewhat disappointed’, ‘Not disappointed’, and ‘N/A—I no longer use it’.
What percentage of ‘very disappointed’ responses indicates sufficient must-have status?
40 percent or more
This threshold allows the team to proceed with growth efforts.
What should be the focus if less than 25 percent of respondents answer ‘very disappointed’?
Identify if the audience is the wrong fit or if the product needs more substantial development
This indicates a need for significant product improvement.
What question helps identify the chief competition for customers?
What would you likely use as an alternative to [name of product] if it were no longer available?
Responses can reveal competing products and their appealing features.
What is the retention rate?
The percentage of users who continue to use or pay for your product over time
It is tracked monthly or weekly, depending on product usage frequency.
What is a common retention rate for mobile apps after one month?
10 percent
The best mobile apps retain more than 60 percent of users after one month.
What is the typical annual retention rate for SaaS products?
North of 90 percent
This indicates strong customer loyalty in business products.
What should be done if the product hasn’t achieved must-have status?
Conduct deeper user interviews and understand objections and barriers
Avoid guessing potential features; focus on user feedback.
What is feature creep?
The addition of unnecessary features that complicate the product
It often detracts from core value and user experience.
What is essential when conducting customer interviews?
Be dispassionate about your product and focus on listening
Selling during interviews can lead to unhelpful feedback.
What did Etsy do to understand customer needs better?
Sent a team to craft fairs to meet with prospective sellers and customers
This approach helped Etsy identify community needs and motivations.
What is one benefit of taking a product into the marketplace for testing?
To observe how users interact with it and gather real feedback
This can reveal usability issues or unexpected user needs.
What is an effective method for gathering user feedback?
Conducting additional customer surveys and market testing
This helps refine product offerings based on direct user insights.
What is the role of data analysts in the growth team?
To analyze user behavior and provide deeper insights beyond basic metrics
Their analysis aids in understanding user engagement and retention.
What should teams do to maintain retention rates?
Continue working to improve retention rates over time
This is critical for sustaining growth.
What is the relationship between new user acquisition and churn?
A company can gain new users while simultaneously losing earlier adopters
Monitoring churn helps identify retention issues.
What role did early adopters play in Etsy’s market development?
They acted as recruiting boards for new sellers and hubs of discourse around the feminist crafting movement.
Early adopters provided feedback that guided Etsy’s strategies for growth.
What was the primary driver of Etsy’s growth strategy?
Promoting organic, word-of-mouth and online community building.
This approach was favored over expensive traditional marketing campaigns.
What tools and resources did Etsy build to help sellers succeed?
- Forums
- Seller Handbook blog
- Tools for customer communication
- Order management resources
These resources were designed based on early adopter feedback.
What percentage of Etsy’s traffic came from organic channels as of recent years?
87 to 91 percent.
Paid ads accounted for only 2 to 7 percent of traffic.
What was the growth of Etsy just before its IPO in 2014?
Over 54 million members and $1.93 billion in sales.
How did Tinder manage to grow its user base rapidly?
By focusing on college fraternities and sororities for initial growth.
This approach targeted tightly networked groups to speed up word of mouth.
What unique challenge did Tinder face compared to Etsy?
Users were only interested in finding dating prospects nearby.
This localization influenced Tinder’s initial growth strategy.
What was the result of Tinder’s focus on college campuses?
Growth broke out organically as users shared the app with friends and family.
What community did PayPal target for insights to improve their service?
eBay sellers.
They analyzed how eBay sellers were using PayPal and how to promote it.
What tool did PayPal create to enhance its visibility on eBay?
AutoLink, which added the PayPal logo and a call to action for buyers.
What is the benefit of conducting surveys and interviews for product feedback?
They can yield clear insights with moderate numbers of responses.
Simple questions can often reveal deep insights.
What are minimum viable tests (MVT)?
The least costly experiments that can be run to adequately vet an idea.
What is A/B testing?
A method to compare two different messages or designs to see which performs better.
It helps identify effective messaging strategies.
What was the outcome of Highrise’s A/B test changing the sign-up page language?
200 percent more sign-ups.
What is the limitation of A/B testing tools?
They often rely on surface-level metrics rather than long-term customer loyalty.
What should A/B testing encompass beyond marketing promotions?
The entire customer experience funnel, including activation, retention, revenue, and referral.
What is a multivariate test?
A test that compares every possible combination of each element of a message.
What is essential for effective data analysis in growth teams?
The ability to parse data for useful insights and connect data sources.
This involves collaboration between marketers, data scientists, and engineers.
What type of metrics should teams track beyond surface-level data?
Metrics that reveal deeper insights into customer interactions and values.
What approach should teams take for significant product changes?
Prioritize adjustments that improve results and enhance user experience based on strong hypotheses.
What balance should teams strike in their experimentation efforts?
Between big, moonshot bets and incremental improvements.
What is the purpose of tracking user behavior?
To analyze how people are using your product versus how you have planned for them to use it
This involves collaboration between marketers, data scientists, and engineers.
What is a data lake or data warehouse?
A single location where all customer information is stored for analysis
It allows for exploration of user behavior and product use.
What is event tracking?
The process of tracking key actions of users or customers
Examples include clicks, video views, and form submissions.
What should growth teams look for in customer behavior?
Behaviors that differentiate repeat customers from one-time users
This includes features most used by avid users.
Why is it important to divide customer data by attributes?
To discover correlations between customer attributes and behavior
Attributes include demographics and usage patterns.
What insight did Netflix gain from customer data?
The popularity of Kevin Spacey films and political dramas led to the development of House of Cards
This illustrates how data analysis can drive content creation.
What did RJMetrics discover about user behavior during trials?
Users who edited a chart were more likely to convert to paying customers
Editing two charts increased conversion likelihood even further.
What unexpected insight did Yelp discover?
Its most avid users were drawn by the ability to write reviews
This was discovered through data analysis of user behavior.
What pivotal change did Instagram make based on user data?
Redesigned the app to focus solely on photo sharing
This change led to significant growth in users and revenue.
How did Pinterest pivot its business model?
Changed from a mobile commerce app to a discovery and sharing site
This decision was based on user behavior indicating a preference for collecting items.
What was the original concept of Groupon?
A fundraising site called The Point
It pivoted to daily deals after analyzing user behavior.
What did HubSpot discover about customer training?
Customers who underwent product training were retained longer
This led to making training mandatory for new customers.
What is the significance of the ‘aha moment’?
It is the experience that drives customer retention and engagement
Companies aim to help users reach this moment quickly.
What strategy did Facebook implement to enhance user experience?
Focused on helping users find friends quickly
This was based on data showing that adding friends increases user activity.
What did Twitter determine to be its core value?
Discovering news from friends and respected individuals
This insight led to changes in the user sign-up process.
How did Qualaroo improve user engagement?
By suggesting survey types that could achieve a higher response rate
This was based on data linking responses to user activity.
What is a common investment for companies to achieve user experience goals?
One-third of a company’s engineering time
This highlights the importance of optimizing the new user experience.
What happens after achieving product/market fit?
Companies can build a high-powered, high-tempo growth machine
This sets the stage for systematic growth strategies.
