Introducing Ian Johnson's Notes

Exploring the Journey to Product Market Fit - Strategy, Experimentation and Growth

Oct 05, 2023

Starting a business is the worst decision you'll ever make—but if you've decided to do it anyway, then finding product market fit is your life now.

Based on my past posts, you’ll see I’ve been knee-deep in the trenches of product-market fit for years. Thousands of user interviews, countless experiments, and too long spent living in pivot hell.

However, if you are new, here is some background info about me.

I'm an experienced founder in the SaaS and GrowthTech space. I've led product and marketing initiatives at Google via Accenture, spearheaded a JV with Alibaba Pictures as VP of Product, and helped build the tech that powers Shopify Markets. My products have powered 1 billion emails, segmented 800 million customers, and process over $250 million in weekly orders. Now that we have gotten the icky social proofing out of the way, we can get to the point of this email.

So, what's changing?

Originally, this was a place to share what I was up to—a digital window into my workspace. But it felt more like a diary entry than something people could leave with something actionable. So, going forward, I will be writing for people who fit any of these:

You're a founder, VC, or exec obsessed with the mechanics of getting to product-market fit and growth.

What will it look like?

Deep cuts

User interview insights, market analysis, and experiment-based case studies. Here are a sample of the topics on the content roadmap;

Framework for finding new ideas

Artifax

Behind the scenes of building a productised service for executive ghostwriting

THIQUE Passion project case study

Launched a massively successful Grilled Cheese and Wine pop bar in less than three weeks.

Stuff I'm digging

Whether it's a podcast, a tool, or a noteworthy read, you'll hear about it if it’s cool and useful.
- Podcast - Building Moats in the World of AI - Acquired
- Podcast - Product Strategy and AI - Intercom
- Tool - ColdClose - scrape followers from profiles on X for outbound sales
- Tool - AudioPen - convert voice notes into succinct text

What are you interested in?

The goal is to curate information that makes your life easier; respond to the poll below or reply to this email with the type of content you can’t get enough of online.