Opportunity Velocity Traction
jasonleow • 4 Mar 2025 •
Saw this framework on LinkedIn and felt it was useful even for indie hackers:
Opportunity Velocity Traction (OVT)
- Opportunity - How big is the problem and (critically) how well does the proposed solution address it?
- Velocity - How much has the team actually gotten done? Is it just slides or do we have a polished product ready to go?
- Traction - Is anyone actually using it already? Or are people just saying they’re interested but with no actual deployments yet?
The table is especially illuminating, as it gives levels to each factor that you can grade, and discuss over. In my past life as a UX designer in corporate, this would be gold at aligning stakeholders.
It’s not just for organisations but also great for solo indies too, to help us think through things -
Opportunity is market size and demand.
Velocity is how fast I can ship, if I got the skill to do it.
Traction is customer feedback and daily active users.
Business viability.
Technological/Skill feasibility.
Customers’ desirability.
Just to score my two ideas and see:
For Canned Support App:
- Opportunity: 3 or 4 (not many existing competitors to compare with)
- Velocity: 4 (only auth feature left)
- Traction: 3 (I’m only user at this stage)
For book writing SaaS:
- Opportunity: 4 or 5 (many existing competitors with high revenue)
- Velocity: 1 (not started on it yet)
- Traction: 1 (no users committed yet)
The framework is more useful if I had already started work on it, not so useful if it’s just a proof of concept. I guess this is a more pragmatic, action-oriented framework.
What do you think? Do you find this useful?
Comments
I actually think it’s very useful even if you haven’t started on it. If it scores low, it doesn’t mean there’s no opportunity. It shows you the progress you’ve made towards the opportunity. In fact, a 5 in opportunity and 1s in velocity and traction can create some tension in trying to capitalize on the opportunity. But the framework is reflecting reality.
Also I think being the only user should score you a 1 with Canned Support. You have to get users to climb higher on that criteria. 😬
@therealbrandonwilson Hahah not wrong. I would too.
@haideralmosawi Hmm good point re: Canned Support. I should launch a MVP first.
Good ol’ LinkedIn–the last refuge of the unemployed scoundrels and pressure-cooked recruiters. You mentioned the operative word, “corporate,” and I immediately tuned out. 🤣