Growth by Design ยท free eBook and workbook

Product-market fit is something you design.

“If you build it, they will come.” Yeah, right. This is a complete PMF operating system: ten pillars, a scorecard, and the canvases to run them, so you stop guessing and start collecting evidence.

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Growth by Design by Eric Weiss

The problem

You can build anything now. You still can’t fake demand.

It has never been easier to build software nobody wants. You can ship in a weekend what used to take a team a year. So can everyone else. The noise is up and the signal is down.

It feels like progress. You launch features, push campaigns, and create a lot of output, and the customers don’t convert. The ones who do churn in a few months.

So you do more. More features, more outreach, more pivots. You’re moving fast with no idea whether you’re moving toward fit or away from the last dead end.

That’s the startup death march. Most startups die from a lack of evidence, because the founder bet the company on assumptions nobody tested. Stop hunting for fit by gut feeling. You need a system.

The system

Ten pillars. Five build the product, five own the market.

Together they become an operating system that tells you exactly where fit is breaking down, and what to do about it.

Build the right product

  1. Persona. Who you’re building for.
  2. Problem. The pain worth paying to remove.
  3. Product. The solution to their problem.
  4. Experience. The journey they take to get the outcome.
  5. Promise. The outcomes you deliver.

Own the market

  1. Positioning. Your unique selling point and 10x factor.
  2. Messaging. How you say the value in their language.
  3. Pipeline. How you own a channel and meet them where they are.
  4. Model. How you price and package.
  5. Timing. How you spot a market window and take it.

Get the book

The eBook and the workbook, free.

The book teaches the system. The workbook is where you run it on your own company: rate each pillar honestly, then go find the evidence. One pillar and one exercise per page.

Both land in your inbox in about two minutes. You’ll also get my Thursday newsletter. Unsubscribe in one click.

What’s in the workbook

  • The PMF Scorecard
  • The Persona Canvas
  • The Empathy Map
  • The Beachhead Market Canvas
  • The Pain and Gain Canvas
  • The Jobs-to-be-Done Canvas
  • The Validation Canvas
  • The Yellow Brick Road Diagnostic
  • The Experience Canvas
  • The Goal and Outcome Canvas
  • The Feature Prioritization Matrix
  • The Differentiation Canvas
  • The Competitive Intelligence Map
  • The Messaging Canvas
  • The Channel Positioning Canvas
  • The No Brainer Business Model
  • The Price Testing Canvas
  • The Market Timing Canvas
  • The PMF Milestones Checklist
  • The Growth Hacking Framework
  • The Weekly Metrics Scorecard

What founders say

“Having Eric as my executive coach has been more valuable than my Harvard MBA.”

Justin WielandFounder and CEO, Reach Technologies

“Eric connects technical excellence to leadership effectiveness in a way that makes immediate sense to engineering and product minds.”

James HeathTechnical Director, OneUp Sales

“Eric got me more energized with less stress, which means more value for my company and our customers.”

James McKernanSVP Technology, Pathpoint

“Eric is an absolutely incredible mentor, coach, and friend. If you get the chance to work with him, do it.”

Jack BurlinsonCEO, Stageglass
Eric Weiss

About the author

I watched good products die for want of evidence.

I’m Eric Weiss, a former founder and CTO who built the PlayStation Network. I spent nearly three years inside OpenAI helping operationalize GPT-3 during its rapid expansion, and I’ve coached more than 75 technical founders and teams, including Heap, Sendlane, Tealium, and Sempre Health. Before coaching I filled nearly every seat myself, from software engineer to data scientist to CTO, so I write from inside the role.

I’ve seen great products get found because someone made fit a discipline. Growth by Design is that discipline, written down. My second book, Above the Chaos, covers the leadership side of the same problem.

More about EricHow coaching works

FAQ

Questions founders ask first.

Is this only for software startups?

No. It’s written for founders and CEOs taking a product to market, with examples from SaaS and AI. The Ten Pillars apply to any industry and product type.

I already have customers. Do I need this?

Probably more than you think. Fit isn’t a finish line you cross once. It has to be re-earned at every stage, and the Scorecard shows you where yours is slipping before the numbers do.

What’s the difference between the book and the workbook?

The book teaches the system and the thinking behind it. In the workbook you run it on your own company, rating each pillar and pairing every score with real evidence on the Scorecard. They’re built to be used together.

Is the eBook really free?

Yes. The full eBook and the workbook are free when you join the list. The paperback is on Amazon if you want a print copy or want to leave a review.

Is there a deeper way to work with Eric?

Yes. I coach founders one on one and run the AI OS Bootcamp. Book a free Clarity Call.

The market doesn’t grade on effort.

Walk into your next stage with a Scorecard full of evidence instead of another quarter of expensive guessing.

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