By Hiten Shah · medium.com · @hnshah on X · LinkedIn
Hiten Shah recounts how his analytics startup KISSmetrics went from a near-breakthrough to a stalled company. After two failed products, the team did customer research and found a strong market, building features that customers loved and getting a multi-year lead. Shah then blames his own erratic, idea-dropping leadership, which he calls 'Hiten Bombs,' for distracting the team and losing focus. Competitors like Mixpanel and Heap then copied, improved, and surpassed them. The essay argues that repeatable product processes built on customer research, prioritization, and speed matter more than any single good idea.
01Key takeaways
- Validate who has the problem and whether they will pay before building anything substantial.
- Filter incoming ideas through a clear framework so the team is not whipsawed by every new suggestion.
- Treat competitor moves as market signals and learn from them rather than dismissing them.
- Build a repeatable product process based on continuous research, not one-off wins.
- As a leader, provide consistent direction; drive-by ideas erode team trust and slow execution.
02Key sections
- Failed starts and the turn to customers
- Two early products failed because the team guessed at problems and targeted the wrong buyers. Talking to users of Google Analytics revealed online marketers as a paying, high-need segment.
- Early success built on research
- Once grounded in customer needs, the team shipped standout features like funnel reports and a live debugger, and ran ahead of the market for years.
- The Hiten Bomb problem
- Shah's habit of dropping unvetted ideas on the team created chaos, eroded trust, and was finally called out in an internal memo that made him change.
- Competitors who passed them
- Rivals copied their strengths, moved to mobile and free tiers, and used sales-friendly features the company had ignored, outpacing them in funding and customers.
- Root cause: lost process
- Shah concludes the company abandoned the research-driven process that produced its success, and that speed and continuous innovation are needed to stay ahead.
03From the post
“Back in 2008, I co-founded KISSmetrics, an analytics company. There were so many times when I thought about giving up during the early days. Over and over again, I felt… Keep reading The post My Billion Dollar Mistake appeared first on Product Habits.”
Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.