Essay

I'd Segment That...

Elena Verna, Elena's Growth Scoop Freemium Advanced

Elena Verna draws the line between a broad product usage ICP and a narrower sales ICP, and shows how to build both from behavior data you already have instead of assumptions. If you have paying customers using the product differently, this essay gives you the vocabulary and method to split them into segments worth treating differently. It is written for someone with real usage data, which is exactly your situation, though the back half of the piece is gated for paid subscribers.

  • Your self serve ICP and your sales worthy ICP are usually not the same group
  • Segment by actual product behavior, not just firmographics
  • Use segment data to decide where human sales effort actually pays off

The question it answers

  1. How do I use the customers I already have to sharpen my ideal customer profile instead of guessing?

Read with it

  1. The single best thing ever written on customer conversations. It teaches you to ask about the customer's life and past... momtestbook.com Book · ~130 pages The Mom Test Rob Fitzpatrick
  2. Market size is meaningless until you know exactly who you're for, and Lenny turns that into a concrete, repeatable ICP exercise... Lenny's Newsletter Article · ~15 min read How to identify your ideal customer profile (ICP) Lenny Rachitsky
  3. The best book on positioning against competitors by understanding the alternatives customers actually consider. Directly turns... aprildunford.com Book · ~200 pages Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It April Dunford
  4. Video · ~25 min How to Talk to Users Eric Migicovsky
  5. Seibel's whole point is that a market only counts once real customers are grabbing the product as fast as you can make it and... Michael Seibel (Y Combinator) Essay · ~4 min read The Real Product Market Fit Michael Seibel
  6. If you would rather hear the thinking than read it, this is Rahul Vohra on Lenny's Podcast talking through the same... Lenny's Podcast Podcast Superhuman's secret to success: ignoring most customer feedback, manually onboarding every user, and positioning around one attribute | Rahul Vohra Lenny Rachitsky
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