If your customers don’t like your product, no amount of sales people or engineers can save you for long.
When the founders Laying off employees and cutting costs in the face of failure may seem like an odd time to tell startups to take their product as seriously as ever. In failure, do users really care about the product experience? Yes, says Mighty Capital, whose portfolio includes companies like Airbnb and Amplitude.
The San Francisco-based VC firm has a core thesis: The best product wins. And changed macro conditions won’t spoil it. Conversely, the founding managing partner of Mighty Capital; SC Moati, “It’s probably more relevant than ever,” he told TechCrunch.
SC Moatti is a former Facebook executive with a passion for all things products. In addition to her role at Mighty Capital, she is the founder and CEO of an extensive network of product managers that highlights the benefits of product-led growth.
Product-led growth means all the change at the bottom line: if the product itself is doing the hard work, it means spending more on sales and marketing. This makes efficient product-driven companies both more likely to grow faster and be more profitable, which investors like to hear these days.
But there’s a catch: you can’t be product-driven without a great product. However, entrepreneurs understandably worry about making the kind of investment required when their burning pace keeps them up at night.
To understand how SC Moatti thinks about the product-cost controversy, we asked her a series of questions that founders might have if they’re considering taking the product-led leap. Her answers follow below, edited for length and clarity.
