I have a confession to make.
I’m guilty of having built products without really knowing how viable my target audience – aka customers – was.
Most of these products failed.
I’m not alone, and while an astounding 95% of products end up failing, the #1 cause for failure – 42% – is no market need, according to global think tanks like The Diplomatic Council.
So, yes, many product teams don’t pay enough attention to whom their customers are and what top-of-mind problems they’re facing.
Consequently, they fail at aligning customer problems with their business vision – or lack thereof – and core competencies.
In the past year, I wrote a bit about what product teams can do to break that failure cycle and some of the principles to apply.
But, even if you’re doing a great job at trying to understand your customers, there are four conditions your audience needs to meet. I call them IPSA:
- I: Your audience must be Identifiable. Go beyond demographics and be specific about the key common denominator. It could be their function, role, hobby, or whatever is uniquely defining them.
- P: They must have or enable spending Power. I assume most of us are building products for a profit, so make sure your audience has the disposable income or budgets needed.
- S: Going to a niche is acceptable and even advised at first. But, make sure your audience Size is a large enough business opportunity.
- A: Last but not least, they must be Accessible within your means. If it takes a $100M advertising reach for your startup to make an impression, it won’t fly! Understand what’s influencing your customers and assess if you can make a difference.
You’d better validate your IPSA conditions before you start developing your product or service.
You’ll save yourself a lot of sweat and tears!