Justin Wilcox’s 5 step framework to evaluate Product Market Fit
Jul 21, 2022 . 3 min read . 398 views
Product Market fit in simple words is making something someone wants.
There are generally 3 parts to it:
- Someone has the problem you want to solve
- Someone is actively looking for ways to solve it
- Your solution solves the problem
Justin has developed 5 experiments that help founders evaluate the above. He calls it the FOCUS framework.
Experiment: 1 - Find Early adopters test
Can you easily find early adopters for the problem that you are trying to solve?
Early adopters are people who have a problem and are actively searching for ways to solve it.
Once you have found a few early adopters(3-5), pay close attention to how they describe their problems (your marketing copy) and where they are looking for potential solutions (your marketing channels).
One way to look for early adopters is by analyzing users’ externally observable behaviours.
- Is the user posting on Twitter about his problem?
- Are they leaving a bad review on the app store for competitor/similar apps
- Are they posting about the problem on Reddit?
Experiment: 2 - Offer test
Are you able to reach out to these people and describe the problem in a way they would consider your solution?
The purpose of this test is to evaluate if potential customers/users are engaging with your offer and reiterate your marketing outreach based on that.
Experiment: 3 - Currency test
Are people willing to pay you for the solution?
This test helps us understand if the user has the said problem. This could be tested via landing page pre-sales or letters of intent.
Experiment: 4 - Utility test
Does your solution solve the said problem?
At this point, Justin suggests we build a basic Manual MVP to evaluate if our solution solves the user problem. Justin suggests keeping the MVP manual as it’s easier to take feedback from customers if your solution is manual rather than automated.
Experiment: 5 - Scaling test
Can your solution be automated and scaled?
Only, once you have validated the above 4 tests Justin suggests building software. By this point, if all goes well, you have already found your early adopters, marketing pitch, and marketing channels and validated the solution.
At this point, you should also broader your reach out by including customers from the Early majority bucket.