So you want to launch a product people will love?
by Kasper Friis, robustUX.com
You have an idea for a new product. It is actually great and you think to yourself: ‘If I find this useful surely others will too. People even say they can’t wait to get their hands on it. Lets do this!’. That is great, and I am rooting for you, just be prepared to hit some speed-bumps on your way to success. And they will definitely affect your mood.
In my experience you will go through 5 stages before you see orders rolling in:
- Naive enthusiasm when you see the opportunities
- Concern when you see the near infinite number of competing products already on market
- Confidence when you realize that most of these products offer no real value to the user, and are horrible to use. Your product will be so much better!
- Concern again when you realize that these product might not be so bad after all and that the value of your product in itself won’t be enough to set your product apart from the competition. This is where most people quit.
- Determination to make this work.
I could add a bunch more ‘concern’ stages, but I will much rather focus on where you should invest your energy to make your product better than the competition — and how you can increase the chances of winning.
1. Is your idea really that good?
The fact is that most designers fall in love with their own idea. This cognitive bias is known as the IKEA effect and describes the fact that we place disproportionately-high value on self-made products.
What you could do to put your idea to the test is to make a fake-door pretotype. Read more…
2. Will people love it?
The human attention span is dwindling. The human attention span in 2013 was 8 seconds, down from 12 seconds in 2000. Compared to the fact that the average attention span of a goldfish being 9 seconds you are up for quite a challenge.
This means, that if your consumer finds no immediate value in a performed task, they will stop doing it and ultimately stop using your product. A great tool for ensuring small payoffs along the user journey, leverage the hyperbolic discounting bias via a journey mapping. Read more…
3. Do you offer an experience worth experiencing?
In today’s technology-fueled world, having a great product is no longer enough. According to a report from 2017 it is the entire experience that is what makes a user decide whether to keep using your product or move on to the next.
To succeed your product needs to meet these new demands from your future consumer, also known as the active customer. Read more…
4. Is your organisation equipped?
In my experience, the sooner you know the strengths and weaknesses of your organisation, the sooner you can focus your energy on finding what is needed and delivering on what you can.
I hope I am kicking at an open door here: to succeed your product needs to deliver on all three of these expert areas to win 👇👇👇 Read more…
I hope this was inspiring and has urged you to push forward.
I am still rooting for you 👍👍👍
