Product-market fit
Aussi : PMF, Product/Market Fit, Market fit, Adequation produit-marche, Adequation produit/marche
The moment your product genuinely solves a real problem for a well-defined market, so users retain, refer and pay willingly.
What it is
Product-market fit (PMF) is the state where a product satisfies a strong demand in a clearly defined market. It is not a launch date or a feature list; it is evidence that a specific group of customers keeps coming back, tells others, and pays without heavy persuasion.
Coined and popularized by Marc Andreessen, PMF describes the transition from "we think people want this" to "people clearly want this." Before fit, growth is fragile and expensive. After fit, demand often pulls the company forward.
Why it matters
Most products fail not because they are badly built, but because they solve a weak problem or target a fuzzy market. PMF matters because it is the precondition for efficient scaling:
- Retention stabilizes instead of decaying to zero.
- Referral lowers acquisition cost through word of mouth.
- Willingness to pay validates real, not imagined, value.
Scaling spend before PMF burns cash and hides the underlying problem. Reaching PMF changes almost every downstream decision: hiring, budget, positioning, and roadmap.
How it is used in practice
PMF is inferred from signals rather than declared. Common practices:
- Cohort retention curves that flatten (a stable plateau of returning users).
- The Sean Ellis test: at least 40 percent of users say they would be "very disappointed" without the product.
- Net revenue retention above 100 percent for B2B.
- Organic pull: inbound demand, unsolicited referrals, shrinking sales friction.
- Qualitative depth: users describe a specific pain the product removes.
Teams triangulate these signals, define the target segment narrowly, then iterate the value proposition until the numbers hold for that segment.
Concrete worked example
A startup sells an invoicing tool to "all small businesses." Retention decays: 100 signups, 20 active after 8 weeks, few referrals. They narrow the segment to freelance design studios and add automated tax categorization for that group.
Result after two months:
- Week 8 retention rises from 20 percent to 55 percent (a flat plateau).
- 48 percent say they would be very disappointed without it.
- Referrals now drive one third of signups.
The product did not change dramatically; the market definition and one high-value feature did. That is PMF: a tight loop between a real problem and a specific market that retains, refers, and pays.