Decreasing Time To Value

There is a metric in the world of SaaS onboarding called time to value.

Time to value (TTV) is the time between a customer's first interaction with your product (like a site visit or purchase) and the moment they achieve their first meaningful outcome.

Here’s an example of what good looks like from Google:

I use the product and get value in < 2 seconds for free by typing a query and getting an answer.

I then want to use the product again & again whenever I have a question to answer.

The best companies bake their product into the value the customer receives without them knowing.

Every time you use Google, you create more value for the company as it trains its algorithms and large language models to serve ads.

Here’s how you can do the same for your business:

1. Ask yourself, if a potential customer came to me today, what value could I give them that no one else could in < 60 seconds?

2. Then ask what the digital version of this would look like?

3. Then ask, “How would I capture value from this for my company?”

Every time someone visits our website, we collect their data using advertising pixels and then serve them ads.

It’s a win-win: the person gets value, and we get data that may turn into a paying customer down the road.

Outcomes Over Outputs

Something I’ve repeated to my team ad-nauseum is to focus on outcomes not outputs.

It’s easy to tick-off tasks and think you’re being productive. Like getting a quote or sending an email.

But you only create value i.e. be productive when you’ve reached an outcome not complete activities leading to that outcome.

Obviously the activities need to be done, to get to the outcome, but the outcome is the finish line. And it’s only when you’ve got to the outcome, that you’ve achieved something and created value.

So instead of get a quote, it’s receive the product or service.

Or instead of send email, it’s complete a call or book the call.

Outputs = doing things.

Outcomes = creating value.