🚦 3-2-1 Traction: vibes ≠ data
Also in this issue: chronically underpriced B2B SaaS; the startup death trap; interrogating certainty; and the value of confusion.
Hey friend 👋
This is the last issue of 2023. There are holidays; you’re busy; I’ll keep this brief.
Welcome to 3-2-1 Traction — 3 ideas from me, 2 quotes from others, and 1 question to help you focus in your startup journey.
3 ideas from me
one: you’re underpricing your B2B SaaS.
A lot of founders price from insecurity.
But if you’re solving a problem that’s severe and urgent — i.e. if you’re creating value — your product is worth a whole heck of a lot more than $10/mo!
But there’s an extraordinarily impactful flip side to pricing experiments:
Pricing tells you if your offer isn’t valuable enough yet.
two: by default, failure isn’t data.
Failure is only data if we learn something from it, and that requires intentionality.
To learn, we must ask 3 questions:
What do we need to learn? Ask a question before the test.
What did we learn? Reflect on the failed test.
What will we do differently? Transform the data into a change in behaviour.
Fail quickly, fail cheaply, fail forwardly.
But don’t fail epically.
three: the high severity, low urgency death trap.
This is where startups go to die.
Customer discovery reveals the pain — it’s a big pain! All of your validation shows they want to solve it, and that they like your solution. On the surface, it looks like an amazing opportunity!
But… no one buys. Why?
Because no one has only one problem, and no one pays to solve the 4th most important problem in their life*.* We want to solve it… but someday.
It doesn’t matter how big a problem is if there’s no urgency to solve it.
Great companies are built on solving severe problems people need solved right now.
For a deeper dive, check out Slow Startup Suicide: how to kill your startup and never know why.
2 ideas from others
Paraphrasing Saul Justin Newman’s recent paper on the accuracy of birth records:
The number of supercentenarians (people who live past 100 years of age) in an area tends to fall dramatically about 100 years after accurate birth records are introduced.
Vibes ≠ Data
Seth Godin on facing complex problems:
Confusion shared often leads to the learning we need to become productive as we move forward. “I don’t understand this part,” is a great thing to say before someone helps you understand it.
On the other hand, certainty is almost guaranteed to maintain your confusion, particularly when the thing you were sure was going to work, doesn’t.
1 question for you
What’s one thing you feel more certain about than the data warrants, and how specific can you get about what you don’t yet know?
That’s it for this week, and for this year.
I’ll see you in a less vibes-y 2024!
—jdm