Product Managers: What's in your software stack? What do you use to organize your roadmap, track personal todos, write specs, brainstorm, communicate, etc.?
The 4 steps of bottom-up B2B growth: 1. Find design partners (through friends, former colleagues, investors) 2. Close impressive logos (through former colleagues, warm intros, cold outreach) 3. Scale PLG through founder-led warm and cold outreach + WOM 4. Layer on a sales team
Types of projects you'll experience at work, as taught to us by Kurt Vonnegut: 1. Man in Hole: The project starts off OK, but you quickly find a huge issue, which you are able to recover from, and it ends up a big success. More in 🧵 pic.twitter.com/uwbLeemHHY
New post: Top 5 reasons marketplaces fail 1. Lack of demand-side PMF: Not enough customers badly need what you’re selling (e.g. Zimride, Kitchensurfing, Neighborrow, Sharingear, Design Inc, Mapudo, Wydr) Read on 🧵 lennysnewsletter.com/p/why-marketpl…
Low-frequency marketplaces can work. You just need the math to work. You have 2 paths: 1. Near-zero CAC (through SEO or virality): @thumbtack, @BookCameo, @PinduoduoInc, @fiverr, @zillow, @Zola 2. Large AOV: @Airbnb, @Outdoorsy, @officialgooddog, @Opendoor, @Hacker0x01
An underappreciated benefit of working at a large company: Access to a ton of product strategy memos, to help you build your own strategic thinking muscle. There are very few examples of great public product strategy docs (because obviously they include sensitive information)
Strategy #7: Increase engaged users One final strategy for increasing viral growth is to increase the number of engaged users — users who in turn will bring in new users. You’re essentially putting more fuel on the fire.
Strategy #6: Increase experiential serendipity This form of virality is when people see the product in action during the normal course of events. Examples: Citizen, Hotmail, Tinder, Superhuman, Dropbox
Strategy #5: Generate content that users want to share with friends This form of virality comes from content generated through the product, which your users can’t help but share with their friends. Examples: Spotify Wrapped, TikTok videos with watermark, Pinterest boards
Strategy #4: Make the product *only* useful when using it with friends or colleagues This includes products that are utilitarian, and is even harder to engineer after the fact. But it is worth thinking about this when you’re in the idea stage. Examples: Calendly, DocuSign, Zoom
Strategy #3: Make the product better when more friends or colleagues use it This is the most classic way to create viral growth and is hard to engineer after the fact. But there are certainly ways to optimize it. Examples: Figma, Datadog, Snapchat, Signal, LinkedIn
Strategy 2: Incentivize word-of-mouth and inviting People respond to incentives — what’s it in for them to spread the good word about your product? Examples: Dropbox, Paypal, Pinduoduo, Robinhood
Strategy 1: Nurture organic word-of-mouth Word-of-mouth is primarily driven by remarkable experiences (an experience worth remarking about), so start there. Examples: Tinder, Clubhouse, Airbnb, Levels
7 ways to increase your product's virality: 1. Nurture WOM 2. Incentivize WOM 3. Make the product better w/ friends/colleagues 4. Make the product only useful w/ friends/colleagues 5. Generate sharable content 6. Increase experiential serendipity 7. Increase engagement Thread 🧵
User researchers: What's in your software stack? What software/tools do you use most regularly to do user research?
One way to find a startup idea: 1. Pick something people do often 2. Find a way to make it *much* easier to do e.g. Buying groceries (@Instacart), designing (@canva), working out (@onepeloton), accepting money (@stripe @PayPal @Square), emailing (@Superhuman), odd jobs (@Upwork)
The 7 distinct types of product virality (aka how your product can spread): 1. Online WOM: Learning about products through mentions on social media (e.g. @joinClubhouse) 2. Offline WOM: Learning about products while talking to friends or colleagues (e.g. @Airbnb) Read on 🧵 pic.twitter.com/FNGHbS4I1Q
Why you shouldn't become a product manager: 😬 You're known as the “shit umbrella” 😬 Many people don’t actually want you on the team 😬 Tons of meetings 😬 No one knows what you do all day 😬 Hard to know if you are doing well 😬 Little to no appreciation (there's more 👇)
Take rates of 40 marketplaces, platforms, and more. Takeaways and surprises in thread 👇 pic.twitter.com/xtdInea3Tk
The job of a Product Manager: Deliver business impact by marshaling the resources of your team to identify and solve the most impactful customer problems.
Peek at this week's post pic.twitter.com/POce56nQP6
Real-life take rates: • Real estate agent: 3% • Movie agent: 10% • Income tax: 10% - 66% • Waiter: 15-20% • Divorce: 50%
Love this (by @wes_kao) pic.twitter.com/oR0JsF6fpD
Eight ways to make money: 1. Sell a thing 2. Rent a thing 3. Take a cut 4. Charge a subscription 5. Charge based on usage 6. Sell a service 7. Advertising 8. Charge on % of assets More in 🧵 pic.twitter.com/vXnKMpd50S
The job description for a Product Manager, based on reviewing PM career ladders at 20+ companies 🧵 pic.twitter.com/b7e3Udclv5
Much more, including stories from each of these founders, in today's post lennysnewsletter.com/p/time-to-prod…
It takes longer to find PMF than you may expect. Here's how long it took some of today's fastest-growing startups to feel like "this is going to work!" after launching: ✔️ @DoorDash 9-12 months ✔️ @Uber 1 year ✔️ @BookCameo 1.5 years ✔️ @Hipcamp 2 years ✔️ @Thumbtack 5 years pic.twitter.com/hTRjU7qvdh
"You think writing is communicating your ideas to your readers. It is not. It's changing their ideas." —Larry McEnerney
this seems like it would be a @Fritinancy thing twitter.com/tilbots/status…