5 Ways to Make Money Before Finding Product-Market Fit

Here are some creative monetization moves your startup can make right now.

Illustration: Adobe Stock

Like Christmas movies that all have the same plot, stories of startups scaling too quickly typically contain, “We moved before the product was ready,” “We hired too fast,” or “We ran out of runway.” Scaling too fast, however, isn’t the cause of failure. It’s a symptom. It’s the predictably sad ending that comes after the boardroom scene where the founder declares, “We’ll figure out monetization later.”

AI funding hit $189 billion in a single month this past February (the highest amount on record), but 83 percent of it went to three companies: OpenAI, Anthropic, and Waymo. Investors aren’t entertaining decks and dreams the way they used to. Bootstrapping is back, but inflation-fearing friends and families are clinging to their cash.

So, what can you do if you haven’t found product-market fit yet—or if you’re worried that it’ll vanish with the next technology or market change?

Take a page out of the Jerry Maguire screenplay. Whenever someone normalizes operating while underfunded, jump up and say, “Show me the money!” and start brainstorming ways to generate revenue in the ballpark of your product-market fit. If you can’t get paid to pitch yet, sell popcorn in the stands.

How Anthropic's Claude AI Became a Co-Founder

Charging money early provides valuable information you can’t get from surveys, interviews, or focus groups because tire-kickers lie (out of indifference, laziness, confusion, and sycophancy). Buyers tell the truth. Payments show you what is trusted, wanted, and worthy. Usage shows you what is confusing, bothersome, and delightful. Both help you build a better product.

Side products can even become main events. Basecamp was a web design shop with important things slipping through the cracks. When they built an organizational tool, their clients loved it and wanted access. Within eighteen months, the tool was outselling the agency.

Here are five moves to monetize before you’ve fully figured out your PMF.

Try doing it by hand first. If your product automates something, offer that thing manually to a handful of early customers. I had a client that built an app for team building. As soon as the core process was mapped, they found corporate clients who would pay them to do that process for them manually. It was incredibly tedious, but it funded the project and completely reshaped the app because it revealed all the friction points in advance.

Sell early access. Charge to be on a waitlist or to be a founding member. Set up a beta or a pilot with a few clients as soon as possible. LootCrate had a weekend hackathon, set up a landing page, took orders, and then bought their goods with the proceeds. Taking money in advance is a solid strategy that provides proof of concept and money to keep the lights on while you work things out.

Charge for what you know. If you’re building something your customers will need, you probably have expertise they can use right now. Offer workshops, audits, or advisory retainers before the MVP. These are high-margin, low-overhead revenue generators that produce customer conversations that will help you build a better product or pull off a crucial pivot.

Crowdfund like you mean it. Kickstarter isn’t just for gadgets. Use it as a market test disguised as a fundraise — a free and honest focus group that can finance your growth. Pebble Watch raised $10 million before the product existed, and learned who their buyers really were, what they were willing to pay, and why.

Offer a free or cheap floor with a paid ceiling. Brainstorm features and benefits that sit above and below the problem and product scope of your offering. Look for something popular that can be given away or sold cheaply to grow your audience and distribution, then charge for premium, higher-order features. GitLab left individual contributor features open source but put executive features like security, compliance, and governance behind a paywall. The free tier built distribution; the paid tier captured value.

“When do we monetize?” is the wrong question. It assumes revenue will come when the real work is done. The right question (and one you might consider tattooing somewhere) is, “What would someone pay for right now?” The answer might fund your runway, point you toward the right product, and determine whether you end up with an epic growth story, or a sad saga.

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