Question
I'm told better to build something at least a few people love, rather than something many people simply like, as it's easier to scale a loved product to the masses than it is to get even a few people to adopt one that they merely like.
My concern regarding this approach is that I worry my product may not have even the potential to become mainstream (i.e. ability grow out of it's user base of early adopters to the early majority).
What are some good ways to gauge whether a product that's loved (albeit by few) has the potential to grow outside of it's initial (somewhat niche) market?
Answer
In my experience every product or feature finds traction with 1%-5% of users - indefinite retention, express strong satisfaction in surveys etc. For paid products the number is usually much lower. The questions you must answer are:
1. What's special about these people? Don't assume they are "techies" or "early adopters" - these answers are too generic and often wrong. You need to reach out to your best users and interview them. If you do enough of these a profile will start emerging - single parents living in suburbs, <50 person companies in the transportation sector ...
2. Why do they love it? What job is it doing for them?
Once you have the answers to both you'd be in a good place to answer the question you're asking - is this a seed of a much larger market that's will grow significantly over the next few years.
