Benjamin Lauzier, former VP of Product and Growth at Thumbtack, discusses Toptal's stringent quality vetting model with host Lenny Rachitsky on Lenny's Podcast.
“There's, they advertise something like maybe like a three percent you know, sort of pass rate for their talent, so they only, like, on board, like, three percent of the people who apply, and allegedly their actual pass rate is even lower than that, but they thought that if they actually advertised the actual number, it would sound fake and so they actually, like, they actually say three percent because, like, one percent would sound, like, too ridiculous, and it would discredit, sort of, like their talent”
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More from Benjamin Lauzier
Insight
Thumbtack pros hated direct bookings because they preferred the thrill of sales
“We knew we're going to improve the ROI by something like 20%, maybe. And we lost this and pros hated it. They hated it because they actually subconsciously, like, they liked the spill of the sale, right? They loved this contact with customer. And they sometime…”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 38:23How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
Insight
Product-market fit can exist independently of functional marketplace dynamics
“Maybe this is a hot take, but I feel like product market fit is independent of your marketplace dynamics. You might have, like, you know, a great product, and it provides amazing value to both sides, but you have yet to crack the, you know, the flywheel on the…”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 21:59How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
Insight
Granular user feature toggles can unintentionally fragment marketplace supply
“People who build marketplaces tend to want to give a lot of control to the users because this is what users want, or this is what comes up oftentimes in user feedback. Like, oh, we have those two distinct group of users. Those ones, they really want new cars. …”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 29:09How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
Insight
Ignoring supplier needs leads to catastrophic churn due to lagging network decay
“Many large, you know,
Marketplaces only thinking about their demand side funnel. So they run ads, they get clicks, they turn those clicks into dollars, and they try to get enough supplies that intuitively the experience is good enough for users. And my advice…”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 33:59How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
AssertionNot checkable as stated
Peer mentoring let Lyft match Uber's footprint with a fraction of resources
“This allowed us to match most of Uber's footprint with like, you know, a 10th or a 20th of the resources that you know, I, incredible speed, I guess.”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 51:08How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
AssertionNot checkable as stated
Lyft peer driver recruiters outperformed the company's trained professional sales team
“Those guys were outperforming our very best, like, trained salespeople, because it's not like, hey, it's Ben from Lyft, like, hop on the road, please.”
Benjamin LauzierSep 29, 2024▶ 52:56How marketplaces win: Liquidity, growth levers, quality, more | Benjamin Lauzier (Lyft, Thumbtack)
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