🪴 Does pivot make sense for me?

Many startups have pivoted and experienced massive success. This can however, create a bubble of naivety. Naivety, where pivoting solves all your problems.

This Monday I wrote a post on how to pivot efficiently. I deliberately split posts on pivoting into more than one, just to cover it as broadly as possible.

In this edition we look at the reasons why one might consider pivoting as an option👇🏻

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Plateau of growth

The biggest trap of growing a startup is what I call a "gap of suffering”. It is seeing just enough growth to think it might be working, neither dying nor seeing exponential growth.

It’s usually this plateau that leads you (especially if you are a first-time founders) to think you’ve finally achieved a product-market fit. If your mind hasn’t been blown how fast you are growing, that’s not a PMF you reached.

Part of an over-crowded market

Fighting a couple of competitors can be healthy. Competing against a monopoly like Amazon isn’t. They highly out-resource you, making your marketing costs skyrocket.

Since you don’t have much say in this — you might be better off just exploring other opportunities.

You are always playing catch-up

If your startup is progressing too slowly, despite all the work you’re putting in — you may need to change direction. The startup may be fine, however something needs changing. This can be your product-market fit, revenue model, market, or something completely different. You have to change it.

Doubling down on what’s working

In some cases, only some of your product might be working. This one minor part brings most of your revenue (in most cases it isn’t 80/20 principle, it’s just the fact that most of your product is utterly redundant). 

It might be worthwhile to double down on that one feature and remake your entire product around it. Not only you are focusing on what your users actually want, your team’s morale will increase with seeing results as well.

Your values completely changed

If you’ve been running your startup for a while, you might experience a misalignment in your goals, vision, and values. The company stands for something you wanted in the past, yet this feels like an alien concept to you now.

Your values completely changed

If you’ve been running your startup for a while, you might experience a misalignment in your goals, vision, and values. The company stands for something you wanted in the past, yet this feels like an alien concept to you now.

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