Most startups don’t fail because they can’t build. They fail because they build something the market doesn’t actually need, at least not enough to sustain adoption, retention, and willingness to pay. CB Insights’ analysis of startup post-mortems consistently surfaces market demand issues (“no market need”) as a leading failure driver, alongside other execution and team risks.
That’s why product-market fit (PMF) isn’t a “nice milestone” you celebrate after launch. It’s the foundation you validate before you scale effort. At Desilo, our Strategy & Ideation work is built around this exact problem: start lean, talk to users early, then ground positioning and channels with market sizing and competitive reality, so your roadmap survives first contact with the real world.
What PMF actually means
Marc Andreessen’s definition remains the simplest and the most useful: product-market fit is “being in a good market with a product that can satisfy that market.”
Notice what’s missing: “we shipped v1,” “we have a nice UI,” “we got some press,” “we can run ads.” Those can all be true without fit.
PMF shows up as pull, the market pulling the product forward through repeat usage, retention, referrals, and a growing willingness to pay. Andy Rachleff (who helped coin the term) puts it bluntly: organic growth comes from word of mouth, and word of mouth comes from delight, not from clever marketing.
And PMF isn’t always a single dramatic moment. a16z’s PMF guide warns against the myth that it’s a “big bang” event you can’t miss, or that once you have it you can’t lose it, markets evolve, competitors react, and fit needs active upkeep.
PMF as a system: the Strategy & Ideation loop
The fastest teams treat PMF like a system, not a vibe. They turn assumptions into testable bets, run structured learning loops, and only invest heavily in engineering once they see repeatable signals.
That’s the logic behind Desilo’s Strategy & Ideation offering: we help you define your ideal customer profile (ICP), value proposition, and business model, then design experiments and metrics to convert ideas into testable product bets. (Desilo)
Here’s the loop we use (and the one you can apply even if you’re a two-person team):
- Start with a focused problem and hypothesis (not a feature list).
- Validate the “job” behind the behavior with real conversations (JTBD).
- Ground your idea in category reality (competitors, substitutes, pricing expectations).
- Model reach + viability (how you’ll acquire users, and what the economics must look like).
- Run experiments with clear success metrics (so you can decide, not debate).
- Translate learning into a roadmap that reduces risk first, then scales.
Now let’s break down how this becomes a practical PMF sprint.
Step 1: Stop guessing, write down the riskiest assumptions first
Every early-stage product has assumptions hiding inside it. Who exactly is the user? What do they believe? What triggers the need? What are they doing today instead? What outcome would make them switch?
A Strategy & Ideation sprint starts by making those assumptions explicit and ranking them by risk. The goal isn’t to create a “perfect plan.” It’s to identify what must be true for PMF to happen and test those items first. Desilo’s framing is clear: fast learning, testable bets, and a roadmap that can survive reality.
This matches Lean Startup thinking, which argues that new ventures succeed by learning quickly through evidence, not by executing long plans based on untested beliefs.
Step 2: Use JTBD interviews to find the “why” behind the purchase
If you want PMF, you need more than demographics. You need the underlying progress someone is trying to make.
Jobs-to-Be-Done (JTBD) interviewing is designed to uncover the trigger, the alternatives, the anxieties, and the decision criteria that cause someone to “hire” a product. dscout’s JTBD primer highlights exactly the kinds of questions that reveal switching behavior: what started the search, what alternatives were considered, what pushed them away from the old solution, and what finally convinced them to choose something new.
This is also why Desilo includes JTBD research inside Strategy & Ideation, because PMF starts with understanding the job, not polishing the interface.
In creator-economy products, JTBD matters even more because “success” is emotional and economic at the same time: creators are trying to earn, but also protect identity, community, trust, and time.
Step 3: Map competitor reality
Most founders underestimate their true competition. It’s not only other software. It’s spreadsheets, DMs, WhatsApp groups, Google Drive folders, an agency assistant, or “doing nothing.”
A proper competitor map answers three practical questions:
- What do users do today, and why does it feel “good enough”?
- Where are they over-served (too complex, too expensive, too heavy)?
- Where are they underserved (missing a reliable outcome)?
This is one of the most actionable points from the a16z PMF perspective: fit isn’t only product quality; it’s also the market context and what it already expects.
Step 4: Size the opportunity and the reach path
PMF doesn’t live in slides. It lives in reality: can you reach enough people who have the problem, at a cost that makes sense, with a value proposition they actually believe?
Desilo’s Strategy & Ideation explicitly brings in market sizing and competitive reality so the positioning and channels aren’t fantasy.
This step is where many teams quietly break: their “market” exists, but they can’t reach it efficiently, or the value proposition isn’t strong enough to justify switching. A reach model forces you to choose: which channel can you test fast, what message belongs there, and what would a first repeatable acquisition loop look like?
Step 5: Turn the value proposition into a buyable offer
A lot of “PMF confusion” comes from vague promises. Users don’t buy “a platform.” They buy a specific outcome: fewer hours wasted, more revenue predictability, simpler workflows, less anxiety, clearer results.
In a Strategy sprint, your value proposition should become a concrete offer that can be tested. That doesn’t always mean charging on day one. It means structuring a test where the market can clearly signal intent, signup, waitlist conversion, demo-to-commitment rate, pilot agreement, preorders, or paid beta.
Step 6: Measure PMF with signals that are hard to fake
One of the most practical PMF heuristics in the industry is the Sean Ellis survey question popularized through Superhuman’s approach: ask users how they’d feel if they could no longer use the product. Benchmarking suggested a powerful threshold, when ~40% say “very disappointed,” growth becomes much easier.
That metric matters because it measures must-have-ness, not polite satisfaction.
But it’s not the only signal. Rachleff’s word-of-mouth emphasis adds a second “truth test”: if people aren’t naturally recommending it, you may be manufacturing growth rather than earning it.
Use a simple PMF scorecard (choose what fits your product model):
- Must-have score: % “very disappointed” (aim toward ~40% as a heuristic).
- Cohort retention: do cohorts flatten (good) or decay to zero (not yet)?
- Pull: direct traffic, referrals, organic signups, “my friend told me…” moments.
- Willingness to pay: conversion without heavy discounting; expansion/renewals if B2B.
- Sales friction: does your pitch keep shrinking because users “get it” faster?
If your metrics are improving, your roadmap is working. If not, your roadmap should change, not your ad budget.
Step 7: Build a roadmap that burns down risk before it scales features
This is where many teams accidentally waste months: they turn “learning” into a feature backlog instead of a risk reduction plan.
A better rule: your roadmap should prioritize the riskiest assumptions and the fastest learning loops first, then expand scope after you see a signal.
This is also how leading product studios describe discovery work. Thoughtbot, for example, frames discovery sprints as a way to minimize risk, use user research to test ideas, and end with a clickable prototype or proof of concept plus a roadmap.
Desilo’s Strategy & Ideation aims for the same end state: clarity, testable bets, metrics, and a plan you can execute confidently, especially in complex markets like creator tools, where adoption depends on trust and repeat value, not novelty.
Conclusion:
PMF isn’t luck. It’s what happens when you repeatedly do three things well:
- Identify the real job and the real buyer
- Offer a believable outcome with a clear reason to switch
- Measure truth signals (retention, must-have, pull) and let them shape the roadmap
If you’re building in the creator economy or any market where behavior, community, and monetization loops define success, the fastest way to PMF is a strategy system that forces clarity early and keeps you honest with metrics.
Desilo exists to run that system with you: lean discovery, JTBD research, market and competitor maps, experiments, and PMF metrics, so what you build next is based on signal, not hope.
