成功科技產(chǎn)品的三大支柱丨雙語(yǔ)

原文作者：Nir Eyal

譯者：李哲

關(guān)鍵詞：業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)，客戶(hù)參與度，變現(xiàn)

核心提示：初創(chuàng)公司如何邁出成功的第一步？本文觀點(diǎn)認(rèn)為，對(duì)創(chuàng)業(yè)者來(lái)說(shuō)，最重要也是最難的是如何分清工作的主次順序，正確分配資源。本文教你用GEM框架——“三位一體”，集中精力做好最重要的事。

如果你開(kāi)科技公司是為了賺錢(qián)，那么很可能你的數(shù)學(xué)不好，或者是妄想癥發(fā)作。因?yàn)閺臄?shù)據(jù)上來(lái)說(shuō)，你成功的幾率在“零”和“幾乎為零”之間。

92%的初創(chuàng)公司不出三年就會(huì)倒閉。Apple應(yīng)用商店里，只有1%的應(yīng)用賺到了錢(qián)。即使是那些成功獲得風(fēng)險(xiǎn)投資的少數(shù)幸運(yùn)兒，75%產(chǎn)生不了投資回報(bào)率。

對(duì)創(chuàng)業(yè)者來(lái)說(shuō)，最難的是分清工作的主次順序。幫助創(chuàng)業(yè)團(tuán)隊(duì)專(zhuān)注于最重要的事情，有一個(gè)非常有用的模型，叫做GEM框架。

公司的職責(zé)是為客戶(hù)、員工和股東創(chuàng)造持續(xù)的價(jià)值。為了實(shí)現(xiàn)這一目標(biāo)，公司一定不要忽視它的GEM：業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)（Growth）、客戶(hù)參與度（Engagement）和變現(xiàn)（Monetization）。

業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)

公司要實(shí)現(xiàn)業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)，關(guān)鍵是要獲取新用戶(hù)或者新客戶(hù)。根本上，就是給那些需要公司產(chǎn)品的人群傳達(dá)正確的信息。我把這些信息稱(chēng)為“外部觸發(fā)器”（external triggers）?！巴獠坑|發(fā)器”可以通過(guò)不同的渠道傳達(dá)，包括電視廣告、銷(xiāo)售人員、電子郵件或者口頭宣傳。

“外部觸發(fā)器”無(wú)所謂好與壞，關(guān)鍵看它適不適合你所在的行業(yè)。病毒式增長(zhǎng)（viral growth）很好，但是難以實(shí)現(xiàn)和維持。而媒體宣傳可以產(chǎn)生源源不斷的客戶(hù)興趣（customer interest），但成本高。公司需要回答的問(wèn)題是：“我們?cè)谖龑?duì)公司產(chǎn)品有需求的人群的注意力上，做的夠不夠好？”然后把這一問(wèn)題的答案進(jìn)行量化，也就是不斷追蹤新用戶(hù)或客戶(hù)的數(shù)量，以及獲取他們的關(guān)注所付出的成本。

還要認(rèn)識(shí)到，業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)是一種過(guò)程和實(shí)踐，而不是最終狀態(tài)。所以，那些對(duì)自己的增長(zhǎng)戰(zhàn)略沾沾自喜的公司，可能正在面臨流失客戶(hù)的危險(xiǎn)。我熟悉的那些高成長(zhǎng)公司，一直在瘋狂地尋找新渠道，評(píng)估潛在客戶(hù)的數(shù)量和獲客成本。

客戶(hù)參與度

一些產(chǎn)品和服務(wù)不需要很高的客戶(hù)參與度，例如房地產(chǎn)和假期旅行。另外一些行業(yè)則需要經(jīng)常性、習(xí)慣性的客戶(hù)參與，像Facebook、Slack、Salesforce和Snapchat一類(lèi)的應(yīng)用，需要培養(yǎng)用戶(hù)的使用習(xí)慣，否則它們無(wú)法存活。

維系客戶(hù)意味著保持他們的活躍度。為了追蹤客戶(hù)參與度，公司需要計(jì)算那些使用產(chǎn)品或服務(wù)的頻率達(dá)到“留存客戶(hù)”（Retained Customer）標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的人群百分比。對(duì)一些產(chǎn)品來(lái)說(shuō)，這個(gè)標(biāo)準(zhǔn)可能是一年一次，而對(duì)于另一些產(chǎn)品，可能是一小時(shí)一次。

變現(xiàn)

最后，公司需要把它們創(chuàng)造的一部分價(jià)值變現(xiàn)，否則公司很難存活。變現(xiàn)的方法有很多，如收取訂閱費(fèi)等等。

然而，不僅僅要看公司的現(xiàn)狀如何，還要了解產(chǎn)品未被發(fā)掘的需求有多大。這是判斷公司能否在短期內(nèi)維持下去，以及預(yù)測(cè)未來(lái)公司能做到多大的唯一方法。

然而，這就需要些運(yùn)氣了。因?yàn)轭A(yù)測(cè)未來(lái)是如此之難，自以為聰明的人反而容易為聰明所誤。聰明人試圖通過(guò)閱讀行業(yè)報(bào)告、設(shè)計(jì)模型、分析統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)據(jù)等方法預(yù)測(cè)未來(lái)，殊不知，大家參考的信息都是類(lèi)似的，得出的結(jié)論也都類(lèi)似。這就是為什么只有正確的預(yù)測(cè)還不夠。如果你的預(yù)測(cè)是對(duì)的，所有人都同意，那么你的競(jìng)爭(zhēng)者也會(huì)看到機(jī)會(huì)，然后進(jìn)入市場(chǎng)，吃掉你的利潤(rùn)。

因此，至于長(zhǎng)期的變現(xiàn)，實(shí)現(xiàn)方法只有一個(gè)：你得看到一個(gè)其他人還沒(méi)看到的未來(lái)市場(chǎng)。接下來(lái)，正如巴菲特所建議的，你要在它周?chē)蛟煲坏馈盁o(wú)法突破的護(hù)城河”（unbreachable moats）。保護(hù)市場(chǎng)的方法只有五種：規(guī)模經(jīng)濟(jì)、網(wǎng)絡(luò)效應(yīng)、監(jiān)管保護(hù)（regulatory protection）、品牌（brand）和習(xí)慣（habit）。

“三位一體”

業(yè)務(wù)增長(zhǎng)、客戶(hù)參與度和變現(xiàn)是相互聯(lián)系的，單靠任何一個(gè)都不夠。

某一產(chǎn)品即使有非常高的用戶(hù)粘度，如果只有少量的人花極少的錢(qián)使用，它也會(huì)失敗。同樣，不能持續(xù)和變現(xiàn)的增長(zhǎng)也是沒(méi)有意義的。最后，如果不能爭(zhēng)取到客戶(hù)并成功變現(xiàn)，市場(chǎng)潛力也只是空談。

正如紅點(diǎn)投資的合伙人Tomasz Tunguz所說(shuō)，這三個(gè)標(biāo)準(zhǔn)能夠幫助公司團(tuán)隊(duì)正確地分配資源。對(duì)于定期監(jiān)測(cè)和傳達(dá)什么才是最重要的事情，GEM框架是非常有價(jià)值的。

英文原文：

If you’ve started a tech company to make a lot of money, chances are you’re bad at math — or simply delusional. Statistically speaking, your odds of a big-time payday are somewhere between zero and almost zero.

Ninety-two percent of startups fail within three years. Only?1 percent of the apps?in the Apple App Store are financially successful. And even for the fortunate few companies that raise venture funding,?75 percent will fail to generate a return?on investors’ capital.

Perhaps the hardest part about running a new business is knowing what to prioritize. There are hundreds of decisions to make, and keeping sight of what’s important and what’s not is a constant challenge. But when it comes to helping teams stay focused, I have found one model to be extremely useful: It’s called the GEM framework. The origin story of the framework is uncertain, but I’ve heard a similar model?was first used during the early days of LinkedIn.

A company’s job is to find a sustainable way to deliver value to customers, employees and shareholders. To do this, the company must never lose sight of its GEM: growth, engagement and monetization.

Growth

Growth is all about how a company finds new users or customers. Fundamentally, it’s about getting the right message in front of people who need what you have. I call these messages “external triggers.” External triggers are delivered through various channels, including television commercials, salespeople, emails or word of mouth.

Some external triggers, like one satisfied customer telling another about your product, cost you nothing. Others, like running ads on Google or buying billboards along the highway, can cost big bucks.

There’s nothing inherently better or worse about one external trigger versus another. What matters is whether the trigger fits your business. Viral growth is wonderful, but difficult to engineer and sustain. Meanwhile, buying media can produce a steady stream of customer interest, but can be expensive. The growth question to answer is: “Are we getting better at drawing the attention of people who need our product?” Quantifying the answer to that question means tracking the number of new users or customers over time, as well as the cost of earning their attention.

It’s important to recognize that growth is a process and a practice, not an end state. Companies satisfied with their growth strategy are at risk of losing customers to their competitors. The growth hackers I know manically look for new channels and relentlessly test how many potential customers can be found and for what cost.

Growth question:?“Are we getting better at drawing the attention of people who need our product?”

Growth metric:?Number of new users or customers, and the cost of finding them.

Engagement

With some products and services, customer engagement is naturally infrequent — think of the way people buy real estate or book vacation travel. Other businesses require constant, habitual engagement to survive. Apps like Facebook, Slack, Salesforce and Snapchat need to become?a habit, or else they go out of business. If the service isn’t used often, these products become less useful, and eventually customers never return.

Retaining customers means keeping them engaged, whether they’re checking in on an app or checking out of a purchase. Some businesses depend on repeat customer engagement more than others. But most critical for investors, founders and employees is to understand what brings people back.

To track engagement, companies should calculate the percentage of people using their product or service frequently enough to be classified as “retained.” For some products it’s once a year, for others it’s once an hour. The question “Are we getting better at engaging people who need our product?” is answered by calculating the growth in the percentage of retained customers.

Engagement question:?“Are we getting better at engaging people who need our product?”

Engagement metric:?Percentage of retained users or customers.

Monetization

Finally, companies need to turn some of the value they create into cash or they go out of business. There are many ways to capture value. Companies can charge a subscription fee, sell a one-time purchase or create marketplaces where they take a share of the transaction between buyers and sellers.

When it comes to monetization, the most crucial question is: “Are we getting better at capturing the value we create?” The metric here is profits. But it’s essential not only to ask how the company is doing today, but also to understand how much untapped demand exists for the product. This is the only way to predict whether a company will be sustainable in the near term and to make bets on how big the company can get in the future.

This is where people get “l(fā)ucky” with startups. While skill, diligence and process drive user growth and product engagement, predicting future markets is notoriously tough — so much so that being smart can actually be a disadvantage.

Smart people tend to try to predict future markets by reading industry reports, designing models and running numbers. However, with access to similar information, people tend to come to similar conclusions. That’s why being right isn’t enough. Paradoxically, if you are right and everyone agrees with you, competitors will see the opportunity too, enter the market and eat away at your profits.

Therefore, when it comes to monetization over the long term, there’s only one way to achieve it: You’ve go to see a future market others don’t. Next, if you can spot the big untapped market on the horizon, you’ve got to, as Warren Buffett?advises, protect it with “unbreachable ‘moats.’”?There are only five ways to?defend your market?from competitors: economies of scale, network effects, regulatory protection, brand and habit.

Without a big unseen market and a way to hold on to it, future profits are no sure thing.

Monetization question:?“Are we getting better at capturing the value we create?”

Monetization metric:?Profit.

A necessary trinity

Growth, engagement and monetization are interlinked, and each is insufficient on its own.

The most highly engaging, habit-forming product will fail if it’s used only by a small number of people who pay too little for the service. The overwhelming majority of apps in the App Store are never found by a critical mass because the companies behind them have failed to find a way to profitably draw users’ attention.

Similarly, an amazing growth strategy using the latest viral hacks is pointless without a way to retain and profit from the growth. Viddy, the video-sharing service and Snapchat predecessor, shocked Silicon Valley in the spring of 2012 by acquiring nearly three million users in a month. But shortly after investors ploughed $30 million into the company, it became clear the app was a leaky bucket that could not retain its users.

Finally, huge market potential is useless without a way to profitably reach and engage customers. For example, music-streaming services like Spotify and Pandora are a daily habit for millions of people, but if song owners manage to extract all the value by imposing stricter copyright terms, they have the power to destroy the streaming services.

Of course, businesses have to worry about all sorts of other things (see Alex Osterwalder’s?Business Model Canvas?for a more detailed analysis). But thinking through the GEM framework is extremely effective for keeping teams on track.

As?Tomasz Tunguz, a partner at Redpoint Ventures, told me, these three criteria “help make sure the team is allocating resources correctly.” When it comes to monitoring and regularly communicating what matters, the GEM framework is precious.

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