Articles by Lenny Rachitsky
How today's fastest growing B2B businesses found their first ten customersLenny shares strategies that 20 fast-growing B2B startups used to find their first 10 customers. Many tapped their personal networks of friends, investors, and colleagues. Companies like Figma and Gusto leveraged their networks from Y Combinator. Some startups like Stripe and Square went directly to local businesses. Getting press coverage helped companies like Twilio and Slack attract early users. Lenny outlines the top three strategies as tapping personal networks, finding customers where they spend time online/offline, and obtaining press mentions.
Leading a PM team meetingLenny walks through the typical goals of a PM team meeting (understanding, alignment, and connection), how often to meet, how to collaborate on the agenda, and how to make it fun.
- How to find and win your first 10 B2B customers
Lenny interviewed dozens of successful startup founders to provide data-driven advice on finding a company's first 10 B2B customers. He recommends starting with personal networks to find initial customers who are a good fit and will provide feedback. Going outbound through strategic channels like LinkedIn can also work. Building an online following through helpful content is another option. Getting press coverage, especially around funding news, may bring in early users. Trust is important, so beginning with close connections first helps validate the product before reaching more broadly. Ultimately, the goal is to decrease levels of trust needed as more customers are acquired.
- The Power of Performance Reviews: Use This System to Become a Better Manager
Lenny provides a comprehensive 3-step performance review system that he used at Airbnb: 1. Prepare: Gather direct feedback, capture their accomplishments, describe their “superpower”, write a short high-level summary of their performance, identify 1-2 development areas, share a career milestone timeline 2. Deliver: Schedule it, prep the narrative, bring paper copies, share their rating, walk through the details, share compensation, create a follow-up plan, leave time for discussion 3. Follow-up: Schedule a one-hour monthly coaching chat, review action items together, adjust as things progress, capture and share examples of what’s going well and isn’t throughout the year
- How today's fastest growing B2B businesses found their first ten customers
Lenny shares strategies that 20 fast-growing B2B startups used to find their first 10 customers. Many tapped their personal networks of friends, investors, and colleagues. Companies like Figma and Gusto leveraged their networks from Y Combinator. Some startups like Stripe and Square went directly to local businesses. Getting press coverage helped companies like Twilio and Slack attract early users. Lenny outlines the top three strategies as tapping personal networks, finding customers where they spend time online/offline, and obtaining press mentions.
- The Secret to a Great Planning Process — Lessons from Airbnb and Eventbrite
Lenny provides a process that navigates difficult planning touch-points between executive leadership and individual teams. Importantly, Lenny and Nils share templates used at Airbnb and Eventbrite which help with each step of the process. This is also the longest and most-in-depth article in this learning guide.
- A Three-Step Framework For Solving Problems 👌
Lenny provides a process for how to construct problem statements, with examples for good and bad versions. He then provides insights on how to build alignment across teams around the problem statements, and how to make sure you continuously pay attention to the problem and whether you're solving it.
- What is good retention?
Lenny worked with Casey Winters to reach out to twenty of the most experienced growth practitioners and had them two questions: • What do you consider GOOD and GREAT user retention (at 6 months)? • What do you consider GOOD and GREAT net revenue retention (at 12 months)?
- What it feels like when you've found product-market fit
Lenny interviewed the founders of 25 iconic technology companies, and discovered that there are 3 ways that PMF can be "felt": 1. Sudden and significant pull by the market 2. Gradual but compounding pull from the market 3. Hitting a milestone that proves it's working
