I wrote an article for Post Status about a month ago, it was just published to their blog.
In it, I discuss how the WordPress product market is a lot different than it used to be.
People started making real money building for the platform around 2008, when there was high growth and low competition. Companies like iThemes, Gravity Forms, and StudioPress got in early and have become some of the most profitable since then.
Today, in 2017, we see competition in almost every product category. There is less room for new entrants, and it’s harder to carve out a piece of the pie.
Here are a few points I highlight in the article:
- Both the theme and plugin markets are now saturated.
- Your product is a commodity, or will be soon. What are you going to do about it?
- Bringing a product to market now requires more time, effort, and risk than ever before.
All this really means is that WordPress used to be an easier space to make profitable products, but it’s not anymore.
Now it’s the same as many other markets. It’s going to take more than coding skills to build a real brand that stands out from the competition, good luck out there.
Here’s a link to the full article.
Comments
2 responses to “The WordPress Product Market is Saturated”
This.
I’d argue that the #1 priority for anyone trying to start a business should be brand/awareness over coding. We built awareness for 8-months before one line of code was even written. Only after did we spend ~4 months building the product. This was when we were certain of a market and our ability to attract daily customers.
I approached this differently with Event Espresso. I started off with a minimum viable product, discovered product-market fit by releasing the MVP on WordPress.org, then built a brand and established brand awareness via WordCamp attendance/sponsorships and making network connections inside and outside of our niche. However, when I started, there were less than 5,000 plugins available, so it’s almost impossible to go the same route in today’s market, especially with the saturation of WordPress plugins, for even the tiniest of niches. Therefore, I can see where building brand awareness should be a #1 priority to entering the WordPress marketplace at this stage.