First I would try to figure out why your conversion is not great. Also a level deeper finding out what a normal conversion rate in your market actually looks like. There are markets that have naturally low conversion rates - are you sure that yours is below market standard?

If yes - this would be my first point of action. Increasing conversion to or above market standard. As long as you haven't done this you are not playing the market to its potential. If you are playing close to potential it might actually make sense to put more pressure on the pipeline because you seem to have a product that at least is average. If conversion is below market standard I would look deeper into the offering itself - it does not make sense to put pressure on the pipeline for a below average product.

Whether diversification makes sense is a complex question. Production capabilities, costs per unit, cross & upselling potentials with your core offering etc. all needs to be taken into account. I personally prefer to establish the core product (the product I can produce and sell with a reasonable margin) first and then move on vertically. First step here is to iterate the offering (product core + services around it + pipeline leading to it....) to a good product-market fit.

Last but not least - just talk to your customers. Why did they drop off? Whom did they choose and why? etc. etc.

In the end everything you do is communicating with "the market" so the best thing you can focus on is to learn "how to properly listen to what the market tells you".

From there you can derive most of the answers for your business.

Hope that helps.

Feel free to reach out in case of follow up questions or need for elaboration. All the best with your venture!

Karl

Hello,
your question is nearly impossible to answer properly without more context. Pricing is a crossroad for many companies and navigating the waters is not easy. Mistakes can be costly and put a lot of pressure on the company as a whole. Sweet spots are tiny. Hard to find and even harder to fortify. I assume that you don't have a pricing expert in your team - otherwise you wouldn't ask this question. Get professional help if you are unsure about this. Its a very influential factor for your success.

That being said. There are some rather standard questions you can answer that should help you to answer that question on your own or at least to start thinking into the correct direction. They are quite abstract because your question lacks specificity and context. Feel free to contact me for more tailored advice.

1. What is your current pricing model?
2. Are you able to deliver value repeatedly?
3. Are you aiming at growth or monetisation?
4. How are the competitors priced?
5. Price sensitivity of your target group?
6. What is cheapest way to the same value for your pot. customer and what is their most convenient way? Where are you positioned in between those?
7. How much runway do you have until you need to break even?
8. How many ways of monetising your services can you see? Upsell, crossell potential? Would it make sense to subsidise the entry level drug?

That is all from the top of my head. I hope it helps your endeavours!

Feel free to get in touch with follow up questions.

Have a great day!

I have three somewhat connected points on that one.

1. Ideas are overrated.
Everyone has ideas. Heck, I believe if we two would sit together for 30min we could produce 5-10 really reasonable ideas for a business. Unfortunately ideas don't do anything. They just sit around and rot. Execution is where the game gets real. How to bring an idea to life? Many services you are using where tried countless times before they succeeded. Bottom line. You can have all the great ideas in the world - what you need is the expertise, grit and angle to play them out to their potential.

2. Timing is everything
Trying to hit a small moving target with one arrow in your quiver. Thats about it. The target is your timing slot. Identify it.

3. How to generate ideas?
I use two active methods (besides reading and contemplating constantly) to generate ideas if I need to:

a. Talk to smart people. Listen. Listen more. Ask smart questions. Connect the dots.

b. Force yourself. Train your idea muscle. I came across that line of thought while following James Altucher. I believe he still sits down every morning and forces himself to write 10 Ideas down. Every morning 10 ideas. That would give you 300 a month. 3600 per year. The quantity alone should ensure that there is something of value for you or others. The trick is that it will be very hard in the beginning. Torturous. But over time easier. You'll get used to it. Its like training a muscle essentially.

Side effect: You will think a lot about ideas and over time get very good at identifying edge cases, bottlenecks etc. So you will learn to answer your initial question all by yourself just by doing that.

Hope that helps!

Map the industry down to individual level. Talk. Verify your idea. Have a good pitch ready.

Regarding documents:
1. webpage with clear UVP and CTA
2. one liner for the "aha" moment
3. one pager pitch - number focussed.
4. three pager pitch - if the one pager was interesting.
5. blog posts, long content for people to dive in.

In this order:

1. Track record
2. identification with your app
3. Personal fit with you
4. Location
5. Costs

Protection of your success is paramount. The moment you stick out your head a bigger, fiercer, more experienced, deep pocket players comes around and clones you. Right? Unfair!

Your question is a good one. In my experience there are several things that make it hard to duplicate success even if the app itself is easy to clone. Four come to my mind immediately. On different abstraction levels and certainly interconnected.

1. Protection by IP
Intellectual property. Hard to get. But pretty solid. Often not applicable. Beware of lawsuits against big guns.

2. Protection by user
In essence a speed advantage. Consider switching costs. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/switchingcosts.asp
Luring users away from the original can be freakishly expensive

3. Protection by talent
I would always bet on the better team. Often companies get acquired just for talent. A well oiled machine can out-innovate, out-speed, outwit even the biggest opponents.

4. Protection by insight
Markets need to be played constantly. Adjust. Be nimble. Just copying one already working angle does not mean that it will work for long. A team with insight into the dynamics of the apps surrounding can react properly and over time even intuitively.

5. Protection by feedback
Not a very clear distinction to the other points here - its more a practical example of speed (2) and insight (4) - but i want to elevate one point. If you get ahead on the user base you can collect feedback better (quality and quantity) which allows you to react more precisely - giving you the edge.