Intro

What am I promising?

A guide to building useful products. But what does that mean exactly?

• “Build” = 0 to 1, from idea to a working product.
• “Useful” = solves a real human problem; someone is better off with than without your solution.
• “Product” = solution. My experience is mostly in the software space but the high-level principles from this guide can be generalized to solving any problem regardless of the medium. This guide could equally well read as: ‘How to design solutions to any problem’.

What are my credentials?

My knowledge is based on 7 years of building products (some as contributor and some as cofounder), thinking about it day and night, a basic understanding of human psychology, design thinking and intuition. If you think my understanding is off, please let me know as I’m always open to being wrong.

Where does my advice end?

• Knowing doesn’t mean succeeding. For example, we all know that in order to be healthy you must exercise, and yet most people struggle to exercise. My point is that one can know the theory but fall short of executing on it, and that doesn’t make the theory any less valid. This guide gives you good odds to building useful products if you follow it, but doesn’t guarantee it because there will always be factors outside our control, like luck.
• A useful product doesn’t equate to a profitable business. For example, there are many products out there that solve user problems but don’t generate big revenue. My point is there are many factors other than usefulness that determine if a product will turn into a profitable business. This guide focuses on building useful things, which is the foundation of a profitable business. Turning a product into a profitable business is like taking it one step further, and that deserves its own guide, which I am no expert at.

How do I use this guide?

A good analogy is to treat it like a map. Imagine that you’re navigating unknown territory when building a product, and that this map tells you whether you’re on track of building something truly useful or not. Whenever you’re lost, check this map and find your way back to the path to building a useful product.

1. Research and define the pain point

Pain point, friction, obstacle…. they all refer to the same thing here. People have various goals on an everyday basis and in life, and they experience obstacles on their journey towards those goals. The promise of products is to remove obstacles so the journey feels more effortless.

Therefore, the most foundational question you must ask yourself is: What obstacle / pain point am I trying to remove / solve?

It’s the foundation for everything that comes after. You should be able to easily and clearly trace every future discussion and product feature back to the pain point. Whenever you feel lost or when decisions feel overwhelming and complex, return to this question to make sure you’re still solving the original pain point. I cannot stress enough how being clear and aligned on the pain point makes every future decision smoother.

Use this framework to define it:

“When [insert scenario], I feel [insert negative emotion] because [insert hypothesis]”.