Chicken & Egg Problem
This is a challenge with a two-sided network. You want to get both the customers and the producers onto the platform, but the producers won’t come there until the consumers do and vice versa.
How to Solve This Problem
- Slow and steady: Build the two sides together in lockstep
- Focus on a single city or area
- Start with a narrow value proposition with high-impact use cases
- Start with anchor customers
- Jumpstart: Get one side up quickly, and then build the other
- Partner with someone who already has a large user base
- Leverage an existing customer base or adjacent market
- Make it easy, low-cost and low-risk for one side to come on board
- Subsidize initial adoption for one side
- Bait & switch: separate growth from monetization
- Build a user base on one side with a focused (different) offering, then introduce the multi-sided offering
- Delay aggressive revenue expectations to prioritize adoption, data accumulation, and performance proof