korrents

← People and their mental models

Albert Cheng's mental models

2 claims Albert Cheng made fit 2 mental models. Most often: Compounding, Lock-in and switching costs. Everything they said here.

Models they name

Their own words name the idea.

Compounding

Small gains that build on themselves beat big one-off wins; so do small losses.

For a daily-frequency product it is existing-user retention, not new-user retention, that compounds — and mature companies should put most of their energy there.

  1. Albert Cheng Head of growth at Chess.com I think especially if you have a product that has daily frequency like that's actually the retention that matters the most is that like of your existing user base that has developed a habitual pattern how sticky is your product and it's that retention rate that really compounds and build that builds that daily habit. Finding hidden growth opportunities in your product | Albert Cheng (Duolingo, Grammarly, Chess.com)youtube.com · 5 Oct 2025 · 0:30:47 into the videoAll korrents from this video
    I think especially if you have a product that has daily frequency like that's actually the retention that matters the most is that like of your existing user base that has developed a habitual pattern how sticky is your product and it's that retention rate that really compounds and build that builds that daily habit.

Lock-in and switching costs

People stay with what they would not choose again because leaving costs more than staying; watch who sets that cost.

Reverse trials work where a product accumulates lock-in, which is why they suit B2B tools and rarely beat an ordinary free trial in consumer products.

  1. Albert Cheng Head of growth at Chess.com I think if you have especially a B2B feature where you may have some lock in reverse trials can be super powerful. You just want to get people in there. You don't need to ask for their credit card because they're using your CRM or they're investing quite a lot of time in like building out, you know, material and content. And so by the time that window drops, you actually like feel, oh man, I probably should keep this and and start paying. I think for a lot of consumer products, it's a little bit harder for that to work. And so I've typically seen more just normal free trials be be the norm. Finding hidden growth opportunities in your product | Albert Cheng (Duolingo, Grammarly, Chess.com)youtube.com · 5 Oct 2025 · 0:27:30 into the videoAll korrents from this video
    I think if you have especially a B2B feature where you may have some lock in reverse trials can be super powerful. You just want to get people in there. You don't need to ask for their credit card because they're using your CRM or they're investing quite a lot of time in like building out, you know, material and content. And so by the time that window drops, you actually like feel, oh man, I probably should keep this and and start paying. I think for a lot of consumer products, it's a little bit harder for that to work. And so I've typically seen more just normal free trials be be the norm.