Three questions decide it. Here is what answers each one.
Whether you’re taking a product into a new market or going for more share in one you’re already in, the same three questions decide it. Every one has tools behind it; where a tool is still in build, the question still gets asked and what you assumed instead gets written down.
“The customer said they'd buy it.”
The needs, ranked by how badly they're served
each one carrying its own evidence — or standing marked as unproven
“It's a big market — billions.”
A size you can defend, not the biggest one you found
several methods reconciled against each other, every figure traceable to its source
“We're better than what's out there.”
What it's worth to the customer, in money
quantified against the alternative they'd otherwise buy, and turned into a price
“We’ll go direct and see how it lands.”
A decision the evidence can carry
Launch, Enter small, Reshape, Wait, or Don’t enter — with what argues for it and against it on one page, and the scale trigger and kill trigger set before the data arrives.
Same questions either way. The only difference is whether the answer was earned.
What answers each one
Then you decide
The three questions give you a reading — Go, Conditional Go, Hold or No-Go — and the most committing decision it supports. You pick from five: Launch · Enter small · Reshape the entry · Wait / fast-follow · Don’t enter. What argues for and against sits on the same page. The decision is yours; the evidence bounds it.
The decision the three are for
- The evidence endorsed — the need, the market and the edge, carried forward as one case rather than three answers
- A decision recorded against what the evidence supports — and the reason, if you went past it
- The scale of the commitment it asks for — a soft launch through to full entry — and the resources that means
After the decision
Deciding is the end of the analysis, not of the project. What comes after is the build, the money and the proof: can we make it, what it costs, and whether it is working once you have moved. None of it is a question you answer before deciding. All of it is written down against the decision, and it recurs rather than completes.
The build
The proof
Easier to follow when it’s one real decision.
The same three questions and the decision, worked through on a single move — including what was assumed rather than analysed, written down where you can see it.