How to Finally Be a Painkiller Product
And not just another vitamin
Hi there,
Some exciting news! I’m hosting a webinar for RevenueCat on how to be a painkiller product rather than just another vitamin.
I’ll be speaking with Asya Paloni, VP of Strategy at Welltory and Ekaterina Gamsriegler, Head of Marketing at MyGroove (previously at Mimo), all about how to make sure you are a painkiller, an unmissable product for your customer, even in this crowded market. It’s free to sign up, so hurry and get your spot!
I’m really looking forward to this webinar, as I’m a nerd who just loves chatting about growth. So, I decided to do a little pre-deep dive into what painkillers and vitamins are and how to ensure you are a painkiller as a D2C brand.
Don’t worry; I won’t cover everything, so there’s still plenty to discover in the webinar.
What is a painkiller product?
You want to be a painkiller product, not a vitamin, but what does this exactly mean?
Painkiller products tend to have a higher PMF, whereby a higher % of customers say they would be very disappointed if they couldn’t use this product anymore.
The highest PMF I’ve ever seen was 78% for a previous client who did a gastric bypass survey, which is definitely a painkiller for their customers.
Your product might be a vitamin if you see:
Inconsistent time before orders
Lower Lifetime Value
Less engagement with your brand
Being a painkiller is key to strong Product-Market Fit and driving profitable customers.
Now, the good news is most brands are a painkiller for part of their audience; the trick is figuring out which ones and focusing on them.
Finding painkiller customers
Segment your customer basis down to the following customers:
With the highest LTV (top 10%-20%)
Have ordered recently
Have come back multiple times (if repeat purchases apply to your brand)
Then I’d recommend reaching out to them and asking them the following:
What led you to try [brand name]?
How long had you been struggling with [problem]?
How did you realise this was a problem?
Can you describe when you first thought about solving [problem] and what led to that decision?
How did you go about finding a new solution for [mentioned JTBD]?
Where did you look for solutions?
What other solutions did you try out before that to solve [problem]?
What did you like and dislike about [each solution mentioned]?
What made you decide to try us?
Could you walk me through how you came across it?
What was your first impression of it?
How do you feel when you’re using [the product]?
This helps you to really dive deep into the problem you are solving for them.
Once you understand what problem you are a painkiller for, you can test angles related to this in your marketing to see what hooks in more of those painkiller customers.
Recommendation
It’ll come as no surprise that I’m going to recommend the painkiller vs vitamin free webinar RevenueCat is hosting and I’m leading the panel on. This is an excellent way to hear from other brands how they ensured they were a painkiller rather than a vitamin
Another helpful resource is an article I wrote on ‘What drives your users to pay?' Jobs to Be Done has the answers.’ It is focused on subscription apps, but many of the learnings and insights will apply to other DTC brands.
It’s easy to assume you are a painkiller, but not everyone is. If your average LTV is lower than you would like, it’s worth taking this approach. It may also be fundamental product issues, but those recent spenders will still be invaluable to talk to so you can work out what to improve.
Until next week,
Daphne
P.S. On a completely different note, if you want to speak about growth or experimentation, we are looking for speakers for our online Women in Experimentation Summit in July (female and male speakers welcome!). You can find out more here. Deadline to apply is 10th March.