Be careful with the selection process for user interviews: You might end up picking those that will support your vision – it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy trap.
Beware of false positives in user interviews.
Never start writing a single line of code before an appropriate number of customers signed up. (For clarification: Customers are paying users.)
Never spend money on developing a prototype when you’re not working full-time on growing the user-base and increasing customer value.
Be patient and give your product the time it needs.
Always make branded t-shirts and wear them later regularly to preserve the recollection of the disaster. (See below.)
Age of Product’s Food for Thought on October 25th, 2015 on: Holacracy w/ Tony Hsieh of Zappos, customer value driven product design, what is “success” w/ Jerry Colonna & Brad Feld, slaves of the feed, how Bigcommerce started, 2015 Pacific Crest SaaS Survey, Software Eats Healthcare and how Expensify doubled its customer base.
TL;DR: Four Lessons Learned From Making Customer Value Your Priority
Building a valuable, usable and feasible product does not happen overnight. These are my four core learnings from focusing on customer value, looking back at the projects I have been pursuing over the years.
Age of Product’s Food for Thought on October 18th, 2015 on MVP best practices, agile failure patters in organizations, the rule of notifications, success and being yourself, the Failure of Everest, bubble talks and what it takes to build an entrepreneurial ecosystems:
Age of Product’s Food for Thought on October 11th, 2015 on the end of the Unicorn, the bubble in Silicon Valley, how to build great teams (by building a great culture), and lessons learned from building a hardware startup:
