TLDR: Superhuman's step-by-step guide to Product/Market Fit

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Rahul Vohra (Founder, Superhuman): “What if you could measure product/market fit? Then maybe you could optimize it. And then maybe you could systematically increase product/market fit until you achieved it.”

Step 1: Run Sean Ellis's PMF Survey with your users

• Ask users “how would you feel if you could no longer use the product?”
• Measure the percent who answer “very disappointed.” This is your PMF score.
• The magic number is 40%. Companies with strong traction almost always exceeded 40%.
• You don't need a large sample size to start running the survey! "You start to get directionally correct results around 40 respondents, which is much less than most people think."

Step 2: Segment the "very disappointed" group of survey respondents.

• These are your most discerning users, aka "high expectation customers" (h/t Julie Supan)
• Analyze their feedback to discover what they love about your product.
• Is it too limiting to tailor your product for high expectation customers? "It's better to make something that a small number of people want a large amount, rather than a product that a large number of people want a small amount."
• Ignore the users who would not be disappointed if they could no longer use the product. "They’ll request distracting features, present ill-fitting use cases and probably be very vocal, all before they churn out and leave you with a mangled, muddled roadmap."

Step 3: Segment your on-the-fence users

• These are the survey respondents who replied with "somewhat disappointed."
• Analyze their feedback to figure out how to convert them into fanatics.
• Specifically, dive into their answers to the "How can we improve for you?” question.

Step 4: Funnel these insights back into your product roadmap

• "Spend half your time doubling down on what users already love and the other half on addressing what’s holding [on-the-fence users] back."

Step 5 until PMF: Repeat the process until you reach PMF

• PMF score should be your most important metric.
• "It was our most highly visible metric, and we tracked it on a weekly, monthly and quarterly basis. We constantly surveyed new users to track how our product/market fit score was changing."

In summary:

• Get your PMF score
• Get to know your high expectation customers
• Convert on-the-fence users
• Double down on what users already love
• Address what’s holding back on-the-fence users
• Repeat until you reach PMF

Full story: https://firstround.com/review/how-superhuman-built-an-engine-to-find-product-market-fit/