During my career I’ve been working on multiple green-field products, and quite often, when we were prioritising jobs-to-be-done and evaluating a market opportunity, we ended up choosing a generic value proposition appealing to a wider audience, not a narrow laser-focused option.

As an example from launching a marketplace, we dropped the idea of starting with a single Babycare or Petcare category (like early Amazon with books, or Dollar Shave Club with shaving products) and mobile-only product. Instead, we proceeded to a generic marketplace covering all product categories and all devices because we feared that it will be harder to scale later.

Over the time I’ve become adamant that choosing a broad and generic value proposition over a narrow and focused one can hinder product success. Starting small, but deep, with a specific use case and perfecting it, can result in greater growth and a better end product. In this article, I’ll explain why this approach is more effective and share examples from the industry.

The pitfalls of overestimating the market and underestimating complexity

When developing a product, it’s crucial to have both a product-market fit and growth opportunity (thoroughly covered in the famous Paul Graham’s essay Startup = Growth). Focusing on a narrow and uniform market makes it easier to achieve the fit and come up with a solution. However, people tend to favor the larger growth opportunity, leading them to address a wider audience and create a complex product, making two mistakes.

The first mistake is the overestimation of the growth for a wider market. What might be held for a small market in reality is just the “glass ceilings” – and instead of fearing that it’s too narrow and the goal is not ambitious, it makes sense to fill a specific need perfectly first and then expand step by step, rather than trying to tackle everything at once. Eugene Wey described this approach in his great article Invisible asymptotes, citing Amazon, Instagram and other companies.

The second mistake is that people rate too high their ability to deliver the complex product and spend too much time building and bringing it to market, in the end being late to the party. And when they choose a broader poorly defined market, the product often ends up a generic “one-size-fits-all” Frankenstein.

Examples of starting small, but deep

Below I want to mention a few cases from the industry that I consider as an proof of how starting with a narrow, but core use case, and mastering it perfectly results in the greater growth.

Telegram started as a simple messenger, but its unique selling point of secure, encrypted destructible chats that weren’t stored in the cloud quickly gained a following. Over time, Telegram expanded to include file sharing, video conferencing, bots, and even its own crypto platform.

Klaviyo began as a targeted solution for Shopify merchants looking to improve their email marketing. Its value proposition of better revenue and ROI set it apart from generic email platforms, and its integration with the Shopify API allowed for better insights and execution. Klaviyo quickly became a leader in the e-commerce email marketing space and later expanded into SMS marketing and general marketing automation.

Conclusion

Starting with a narrow, but core use case allows a product to focus on solving one problem extremely well before expanding to tackle related problems. This approach also provides valuable feedback from early adopters and allows for more cost-effective development and marketing. By starting small, but deep, a product has the potential to achieve greater growth and success in the long run.