To start and then grow, B2B startups must convince a maximum number of customers in a minimum amount of time … Should they say yes to all requests for customization and risk losing the product focus?
Convincing the first major clients to improve the product
By definition a start up is a young innovative company able to operate quickly. Once the business model has been approved, the operational plan must be ready for implementation immediately. The goal for startups who offer SaaS B2B solutions is to be able to onboard the first customers very quickly and then to inject the money gained into improving the proposed product in parallel. This is how they can face competition from long-established companies in the sector, that are often less flexible and responsive to the market demand. Thus, the stakes are high: without these customers ready to bet on young companies, the product is doomed. The challenge is even greater for a startup offering a product designed for the general public, which is required to be a optimum efficient solution, ready for immediate use.
In the specific case of B2B startups, the obligation to sign new contracts quickly leads some teams to adapt their solution to each of the first large customers who are willing to trust them. The objective: to please and win the case. And it is after all quite understandable: what a pity it would be to miss a good business opportunity when a simple feature can be added to the existing solution!
Beware of personalising SaaS B2B solutions!
While this attitude is useful at the outset, as it helps to convince and demonstrate the technological and adaptive capacities of the startup, it has medium and long-term limits.
The risk is that as the product develops it will lose its core product focus that met the needs of the greatest number of clients, and instead will respond to a collection of diverse and inconsistent client demands. This lack of standardisation will not allow the product to develop a certain competitive advantage and excel in the initially chosen segment. The commercial and marketing pitch will therefore be impacted due to the vague positioning of the company. This is the beginning of a vicious circle for the startup because it will be very difficult to go back. How can we justify to our major customers the disappearance of such and such a feature, which was created especially for them but did not meet the need of anyone else? How can you justify to so many features that with irregular relevance to a prospect?
B2B Startupers: learn to say no for your survival and the good of your customers
Co-building your product with your first customers is the guarantee of a match between the product and the target market, because the prototype will respond directly to a need expressed. Thus, adapting to the demands of the first major customers is tolerable and even desirable during the first few months of operations. It must nevertheless quickly cease in order to maintain a solid and coherent value proposition. The first customers that a startup will say no to will no doubt be lost for a long time. But despite the pressing need to grow, it is also necessary to build the product and customer base with a long-term vision, a direction. This approach will also benefit to customers themselves as advantages of the SaaS-model – reliability, scalability, universality – can reveal their full power only in a “one-fit-all” context. This is exactly why SaaS is a total technology revolution, sending on-premises softwares to the stone age.
Examples of companies that have imposed their philosophy and standards exist.
To excel in your market, don’t yield to the temptation to please at all costs and learn to say no when the time comes!
