Hello there
This is the #12 Issue of Weekly Dan.
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Every Tuesday, I deconstruct one framework for Indie Entrepreneurs.
Learn the new model and apply it to your product in 5 minutes.
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Why should you bother? 👀
Imagine browsing Twitter (procrastinating that dreadful task) when you see an excellent product for your startup. It’s a tool to get testimonials from your customers.
Great, just what you needed!
You go to the website expecting a free plan to play with the tool. Instead, you are being nudged for a 1-hour long welcome sales call.
Bummer.
You don’t want to talk to people. It’s a testimonial tool, not an ERP system for Fortune 500.
The monetization channel is not aligned with the product nature. That’s why potential customers (like you) are not clicking the CTA button.
Hopefully, the Growth Model Menu solves this problem. Shout out to Elena Verna for creating that great framework.
How does it work? 💡
Elena outlines three growth strategies:
Product-led (e.g., Black Magic, Testimonial.to, Notion)
Marketing-led (e.g., HubSpot, MicroAcquire, Ahrefs)
Sales-led (e.g, Webflow / Ghostwriting / SEO agencies)
And three areas for differentiation:
Acquisition (How do we acquire users?)
Monetization (How do we convert users?)
Retention (How do we nudge to use our product more?)
Now let’s examine each growth model in detail.
Product-led
This is 80% of Indie products. Build something cool and let your users promote it.
Word of mouth is often the primary acquisition channel. That is sometimes reinforced with a referral program. Other channels are usually ignored because a team is focused on building the product.
You can buy a product without talking to the sales team. Even the support team works asynchronously. The product is designed to be self-explanatory.
The better users are hooked, the more they use the product. Customers are nudged to invest time and effort into the product to build a habit of using it daily.
Indie Entrepreneur’s dream.
Marketing-led
Product-led growth often has its limits. So the next step is to rely on marketing.
If your users love TikTok, you create short-format videos. If they prefer long-reads, you invest in a product’s blog. You go where users are.
Usually, this model mixes self-serve checkout and a sales team. The key goal is to increase the awareness of paid plans and their benefits for users.
Educational content is the key driver for users to understand and use the product more. Usually, these products have free courses and thriving communities.
This model requires a lot of investment — both time and money. But with the proper execution, it can bring a great ROI.
Sales-led
But sometimes marketing and product are not enough. In this case, you need to leverage direct sales to your users.
Leads don’t just pop up in your CRM. You need to master cold outreach and customer development. Usually, companies seek Fortune 500 corporations, startups with recent funding, and flourishing agencies.
The only way to buy your product is to have a chat with a sales representative. It can be a product demo or a discovery call. The better you negotiate, the more money you get.
Customers understand the value of your product because you remind them. It can be done with Quarterly Business Reviews or Customer Success Managers.
Challenging models for Founders who are ready to grind.
What’s next? 🛠
Your product strategy depends on the growth model you choose. Likewise, your marketing mix, onboarding process, and support team rely on it.
You need to choose one model and stick to it.
Your funnel will be consistent and effective if you pick the right mix of acquisition, monetization, and retention leverages. If not, it will be harder to grow the product.
But should you stick to it forever? No.
Leverages tend to work less efficiently in the long term. So get ready to switch from Product-led growth to Marketing-led growth. And from Marketing-led Growth to Sales-led growth.
But nail the current model first.
Define your model
Understand your current leverages
Search for best practices from startups in your model
Define criteria for upgrading to the next growth model
That’s it!
What do you think about this issue?
I would love to hear your thoughts. Hit me with a reply.
And see you on Friday with the usual 5 golden nuggets for Indie Makers.
Absolutely not a CTA 🙃
1) Learn more marketing frameworks with MakerBox Framework.
Only for Founders who care about marketing.
2) Let me roast your landing page.
It will be painful. You will get more paying customers from it.
Hola un gran saludo de ante mano , escribir es como tener alas te sientes libre al expresarte y muestras al escritor que llevas dentro, dejar fluir las letras es algo maravilloso ser escritor es un privilegio de una mente sin miedo a lo desconocido.