Product market drift

When a new product or service is made companies optimise for product market fit. Getting all the pieces aligned to make a product that meets the needs of the customer, at a price point they can afford, and can be delivered profitably by the company.

Over time customers needs change (as do market forces) and a gap starts to appear between the product you have and what the market now wants. If left unchecked this gap grows and leads to product market drift.

There are a few reasons this happens. The inertia of organisations makes change difficult even in the face of changing customer needs. Risk aversion of making a change to a product that “used to work well”. The complexity of scaling organisations means they spend more time working on the company than with their customers.

How do you combat product market drift?

It all comes down to having a beginners mind, not clinging to the past and accepting that changes are going to be needed to your product continually.

Go back to basics and setup continual customer feedback. Data tells you what happened, not why. Setup a culture to find the why, with the understanding that this is a continual process, not a one off event.