In Search of Product-Market Fit Inside the ‘Buffercelerator’
Rocket Report July 2016
Rocket is a “startup within a startup” here at Buffer, just like Respond. (A really awesome product if you haven’t checked it out yet.)
Each month we’ll share more and also reflect later on the whole experience and journey of Rocket.
We’re excited to share some July updates from the project, though so many things here are still taking shape!
What is the Buffercelerator program?
The Buffercelerator program gives the Rocket team 9 weeks to build out a product and get as close to product-market fit as possible. At the end of the 9 weeks, if it seems as though there’s enough traction with the product, the Rocket team will continue building the product.
If there isn’t much traction, the Rocket team will return to focus on the core Buffer product.
The primary focus of the first few days of Rocket was to validate whether there was an opportunity for a new social ads product.
In the weeks after that initial sprint, the Rocket team designed, tested and iterated on over a dozen ideas. With enough signals that there might be potential for this project,Buffer cofounders Joel and Leo proposed a 9-week accelerator program.
The story of Rocket (so far)
July represents the middle chunk of our 9-week accelerator program. Over the past few weeks, Rocket has gone from an idea to a working prototype.
The working prototypes have also changed dramatically. At the start of July, Rocket was a browser extension that generated Facebook ad reports. Currently, Rocket is a web app that features campaign dashboards.
The product continues to evolve beyond pure analytics—we’re now exploring features that act much like a personal Facebook ads assistant, answering important performance questions on top of providing the analytics piece. Much of this focus can be summed up in one quote —“Information is cheap, meaning is expensive.”
We started recruiting beta-testers for our product using (you guessed it) Facebook ads. We currently have nearly 100 testers who will provide us with helpful feedback about how to improve Rocket.
Rocket team happenings
Non-work highlights include:
– James started running and hitting the gym. We’ve got Arnie v2 on our hands! ??
– Phil recently purchased a Playstation 4. So far, no 24-hr PS binges! ?
– Roy is now a TV mount installation expert having spent a full day putting up a flatscreen in his house. ?
Over to you!
Is there anything you’d love to learn more about? Anything we could share more of? We’d love to hear from you in the comments!
Check out more of our July 2016 monthly reports: