14 Signs You’ve Found Product Market Fit

What is one sign that indicates you’ve found a product-market fit?

Here is what 14 thought-leaders had to say:

• Reviews and Testimonials
• Natural Word of Mouth Marketing
• Customer Satisfaction
• A New Audience Emerges
• Consumers Want to Pay in Advance
• Organic Traffic Increase
• Customer Referrals
• A Gap in the Market
• Customer Dependency and User Engagement
• Repeat Business
• Actively Engaged Customers
• Expansion of Your Team
• Repeatedly Acquiring New Customers
• Brand Recognition on Relevant Platforms 

Reviews and Testimonials

Sales alone can only tell you part of the story. The happier customers are with your products, the more likely they are to leave a review singing those products’ praises. Such customer testimonials are a sign that you’ve found the right product-market fit. They help you know that people are not only buying what you sell but are loving what they’ve bought.

Vanessa Molica, The Lash Professional

Natural Word of Mouth Marketing 

If your customers love your product or service so much that they are actively talking about it online, discussing it on social media, recommending it to others, endorsing your product, leaving you glowing testimonials on online review sites – particularly without your encouragement, then they are clearly in love with your product/service and you have reached product/market fit.

Additionally, if you build accessibility and inclusion into your product or service from the very beginning then you will also have the support of that community and naturally create brand advocates and ambassadors. The accessibility market is a very large and loyal sector.

This was seen with Zoom which has supported accessibility and inclusion for the blind and vision-impaired from the very beginning and quickly built a reputation as the most accessible video communication platform.
Dale.

Dale Reardon, All Accessibility Matters

Customer Satisfaction

It’s simple. How is your customer satisfaction? If your target audience is happy with your product or service, then you’ve found a product-market fit. Your marketing team’s efforts have paid off. They’ve successfully marketed your product to the right audience if your customers have not only purchased your product but are satisfied with it as well.

Katie lyon, Allegiance Flag Supply

A New Audience Emerges

If you find you’ve gained a brand new audience, then you’ve found The FCC story. Not only do they value your products, but new customers can also help publicize your products by telling their friends about them. When you have the attention of a new audience, make sure to treat them well. It also doesn’t hurt to send them special offers or at least a welcome email.

Shaun Price, MitoQ

Consumers Want to Pay in Advance

A strong indicator of product-market fit is when consumers are willing to pay for the product immediately, and in some instances, in advance. This demonstrates the value that the customers are confident they will derive from the product you are selling. It’s also a sign that your product is in alignment with your customer needs.

Patrick Crane, Love Sew

Organic Traffic Increase

An increase in organic traffic tells you that people are specifically looking for your company when they go online or at least encountering it early on when searching. This traffic is not coming from paid ads, which means you’re either using the right keywords or selling the right products –– likely it’s both. There’s a good chance, too, that organic visitors have already heard about your business from another source.

Eric Blumenthal, Zoe Print

Customer Referrals

Word-of-mouth recommendations are a powerful influence on consumer behavior. It is incredibly gratifying when new patients come to us saying that they heard about our products and services from a friend. Customer referrals are essentially free marketing, so if people are sharing our brand with others all by themselves, it helps us know that we’re on the right track.

Henry Babicheknko, Stomadent

A Gap in the Market

Based on my 15+ years of experience as a brand designer, a gap in the led me to develop an easy-to-use logo maker to help businesses level up their design. Whether an early start-up with a non-existent budget or a well-established company wishing to update its image. The Mojomox brand identity builder allows users to easily create a basic wordmark, or a logo made with a brand name in a modern and clean font, and get a custom color palette based on best practices of color theory.

Saskia Ketz, Mojomox

Customer Dependency and User Engagement

From my point of view, If your measurements show that customers are spending more time than normal using your products and exploring new features, it simply means that they rely on your product to solve a problem and want to engage with it more.
On the other hand, if you receive a succession of emails or phone calls from consumers to escalate an issue during a minor outage, it means that users are strongly reliant on your product to conduct business. This also demonstrates that there is a large potential for retention and that any issues that may have an impact on the quality of user engagement should be addressed as soon as feasible.

Gerrid Smith, Joy Organics

Repeat Business

Repeat business is a key indicator that you’ve found your niche. I don’t believe there’s a better way of showing love for a business than continuing to buy from them. If you’re selling products that people love, they’ll keep coming back for more. Every instance of repeat business is proof that you’re doing something right!

Nataly Vanunu, Boho Magic

Actively Engaged Customers

In the world of social media, you know you have a viable product when your customers start doing your advertising for you. Today that means your customers are actively sharing, liking, and posting about your product. Active engagement like this means that your product is working and is something your followers are excited about. Your customers are an integral part of your team and brand.

Ann McFerran, Glamnetic

Expansion of Your Team

Team expansion, in my opinion, is an often disregarded statistic when verifying your PMF, but it clearly shows that you’re growing as a firm and will need more smart people on your team. This is a classic example of product-market fit with SAAS products in the market when they began to recruit more support personnel and business reps in different countries outside of their launch or core market.

Kathryn Smithson, PathSocial

Repeatedly Acquiring New Customers

One of the most obvious signs that indicate you’ve found the product-market fit is when you can repeatedly acquire customers for less than how much they spend with your company. Simply put: each customer’s value should be greater than the cost of attracting them to buy your product. This shows that there are enough customers interested in purchasing your product and that you are efficiently drawing them in.

Brett Sohns, LifeGoal Investments

Brand Recognition on Relevant Platforms 

When you’ve done thorough research on your target audience and have centered on a product-market fit, it’s time to measure how your brand is perceived–and how relevant it is to your audience. Do you see your company mentioned on social media and on the platforms that best represent your demographics? How would you rate your brand recognition? In the end, there is a lot more to consider in regards to a product-market fit than your incoming revenue.

Carter Reum, M13

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