Growth During the Pandemic: Use Product-Led Growth to Your Advantage

This post discusses important lessons that all of us – not just business leaders but the general population as well – can learn from the high-impact ripples that the coronavirus is sending across global markets.

As the world reels from the economic, social, and medical fallout of the coronavirus pandemic, the news seems to be predominantly bleak and every developing story seems to be a grim reminder of how unprepared we all have been for such an event.

Thousands of lives have been lost, and millions are without work.

Businesses large and small are shuttering, and global supply chains have been shaken. Even well-planned redundancies and stockpiles of vital resources are projected to run out a lot sooner than we would like.

There is a bright side, though.

We are now less likely to take for granted the things we enjoyed freely in the past. We will get through this with a better sense of what we need to do, and how.

Using the data, we will plan better, work more efficiently, improve our processes, and focus on value-added must-haves rather than unimportant nice-to-haves.

And perhaps most importantly, we now realize the stark reality that many widely accepted approaches to doing business only worked in a perfect world; when there is uncertainty, doubt, or chaos in the market, projections lose much of their value, and you must accurately assess and deeply understand the need of the moment if you are to make a difference.

It is in this regard that product-led growth (PLG) has emerged as a winner in terms of the right way to do business.

When implemented correctly, Product-led Growth helps to remove indecision about the trajectory a company should take since the end-goal is always to design the product that users want.

Delivery times can be reduced, thanks to a focus on delivering features that meaningfully improve the product for your users rather than adding features that are not as important, and drop-out and churn rates are also lower with a PLG approach, provided you combine PLG with an effective onboarding system that quickly showcases your product’s value proposition to your users and reduces the time and the number of steps needed for the user to enjoy the benefits of the service that you provide.

Implementing a Product-led growth strategy involves more than simply knowing the advantages of doing so.

It requires the gathering of primary data and customer feedback via automated, low-touch channels that are efficient and easy to use so that you know exactly what your users want. It involves an alignment of your hiring, marketing, and messaging initiatives with product placement and design so that everyone on your team is working toward a common goal.

It requires investment in a simple and intuitive yet engaging UI so that you minimize the costs of having to educate your users about how your product works while simultaneously giving them the power to use it and learn by doing on their own.

Above all else, PLG has helped us realize the importance of a single fact: it doesn’t matter how lean or efficient you may seem to be; if you have the wrong strategy in place, if you rely on data sources or projections other than those that come directly from your users, and if you cannot deliver you’re your customers want when they want it, then macro events that simultaneously impact multiple aspects of your business can occur, and it will become difficult, if not impossible, for you to overcome them on your own.

PLG was born out of the idea that the customer knows best.

This is a great way to do business, but many people fail to look beyond the benefit of giving the customer what they want.

Not only does PLG help you create the best version of your product possible, but it helps you do so more quickly and more efficiently than other modes of product design and development. A great product that delivers a great UX via seamless user onboarding and ease of use leads to satisfied customers, and satisfied customers are your most loyal promoters.

They sell to their friends and relatives on your behalf. They help you build traction within their social circles and communities.

These are facts that are of critical importance today.

Never before have we been so physically isolated while being so connected via technology, and many stories in the news showcase how people are using technology to get the job done and how a certain app or service saved the day thanks to design and support that was well above and beyond the market benchmark.

These are the things we aim for: product-led design, a smooth and flowing onboarding process, and a data-driven understanding of what customers want and who your best promoters are so that even a global economic recession would not dent your growth as much as it might do otherwise.

Retain your users; interact with them, right now.

If you are seeking to retain your existing users during these days, you need to ask your users what they need.

A lot in their lives has changed; their lifestyles, jobs, work environments, concerns, and more. It is crucial that you learn whether the place of your product in their lives has changed too.

If it has and it wasn't a positive change, you will experience churn. If your product doesn't add value to your users anymore, they won't use it.

You must engage with your users(with a customer feedback tool for example) and gather data on how much they were affected by the outbreak, did their relationship with your product change, and what you can do to help.

You must learn what your users need and want, improve your business and product accordingly, and act fast to adapt.

Toward this end, we recently unveiled our net promoter score (NPS) feature to help decision-makers more comprehensively understand the features their users want, which users help your bottom line more, and how feedback and effective onboarding play into perfecting your PLG approach to doing business.

Click here to easily create a free UserGuiding account and implement PLG to your business, without coding!

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