The Real Reason Nobody Is Buying Your Startup’s Product
A founder I was meeting for the first time was telling me about her startup. She spent the first 15-ish minutes of our meeting describing her project. Then, once she’d told me everything she wanted to explain, she asked a question that, to her, seemed simple. She asked: “Why is nobody buying my product?”
It wasn’t the first time I’d been asked that same question by a founder. In fact, I get asked that question almost weekly. But something was particularly jarring about the way this founder asked. She did it in the same way she might ask me to name my favorite color. In other words, she asked me to identify the fundamental problem with her startup like it was the most basic question in the world.
Of course, it’s anything but a basic question. Sure, it seems simple, but it’s actually an absurd question because every startup is different. Maybe the product is priced too high. Maybe the marketing strategy isn’t good. Or maybe the marketing strategy isn’t being properly executed. Maybe the quality of the product is bad. Maybe the product needs to be a different color.
An infinite number of potential reasons can prevent a product from selling. If the founder can’t figure out the reason on her own, how the heck is someone outside of the company going to be able to diagnose the issue in a 30 minute meeting?
