Welcome to Week 2 of the Advanced Accelerator Program!
Last week, we clarified your primary user personas. Now it’s time to focus on something just as important: understanding your market.
Here’s why this matters:
Your market is the foundation of your business. Without a deep understanding of your audience, their problems, and their goals, it’s impossible to create something they’ll truly value.
There are two types of entrepreneurs we’ll focus on today:
- Experienced entrepreneurs (typically 45+): These individuals have a deep knowledge of their industry, which is a huge advantage. We typically invest in these types of operators as they are simply the better bet. They have already been BUILDING IN the world they want to fix or improve. For experienced builders, it’s all about validating your experience against market trajectories and market movements. You essentially need to back up what you already know to be true.
- Younger entrepreneurs: If you’re younger, your edge comes from curiosity and passion. You can gain market expertise by immersing yourself in the space and learning everything you can. For the entreprocurious, here’s how you can better understand your market:
- Talk to your audience: What are their biggest challenges?
- Study your competition: What are they doing well? Where are the gaps?
- Stay curious: Markets evolve—so should your knowledge.
This week, your homework is to:
Conduct market research.
- TAM - Total addressable market - tell me about your market - how large is it?
- What industry reports do you have? What google trends are we seeing in your market?
- What is the growth potential in your market? What’s the trajectory of growth looking like?
- Identify market trends
- Identify emerging technology and innovations
- Are there shifts in consumer behavior or preferences?
- ID market drivers
- Competition analysis - product comparison - direct vs indirect competitors
- Your strategic positioning? - what is your differentiation? How will you play defense? How will you play offense?
Use your user persona.
- Describe your ideal customer in detail and how they fit in the market.
- Include traits like age, interests, goals, and the specific problem they need you to solve. You should already have these, however, they can change based on what your market research tells you!
Remember: The better you know your market, the better you can serve them.
This is the foundation for creating products and services that people actually want.
Take this week seriously—it will pay off in ways you can’t even imagine yet!
Make sure to put your notes down in the community! We want to see your progress of building in public!