First Principles of Building Products: Principle #2
Think Big, Start Small
In the previous article in this series, we talked about “Starting with the problem,” which was our first First Principle. It served as an antidote to one of the biggest product mistakes, which is being too focused on the solution. We won’t be spending any more time talking about that but if you haven’t read it, here’s the link.
Besides being solution-focused, there are 2 more traps that product thinkers typically fall into:
- Thinking big but starting too big
- Starting small but aiming too small
Let’s take a look:
Thinking big but starting too big
“Thinking big but starting too big” usually happens when there’s a vision for a product that delivers real value but the team tries to build the whole thing right away. Too enamored by what they’re trying to build, they fail to plan realistically and bite way more than they can chew.
This kind of thinking typically results in trying to build a product that is jam-packed with several features with all the bells and whistles. It forces development teams to build too big of a product too early without any feedback from the market, which is expensive, risky, and slow.
This is also usually partnered with the lack of a definite target customer or user. Since the product is trying to serve everyone, it becomes really difficult to pinpoint who it’s for; which means that selling it is a hell of a lot more difficult.
Starting small but aiming too small
“Starting small but aiming too small,” on the other hand, happens when the full vision for the product solves a low-value problem, something that either isn’t too painful for the user or doesn’t have a big enough market to make a viable business.
Some product ideas seem like full products when in reality, they are just features of something bigger. They’re the perfect size to deliver the smallest amount of value early and perfect as the first step, but they lack a grand vision that building a business around it wouldn’t justify the cost of building and operating it.
To put things bluntly, these ideas lack ambition.
Don’t get me wrong, these 2 ways of thinking aren’t completely worthless. However, they do suffer from unbalanced thinking — one on the side of being too ambitious and unrealistic, the other lacking foresight and a vision.
Just like the yin and yang, too much of either side is not good. To achieve product success, we need both. So we’ll take the best out of these two modes for our next First Principle for Building Products, which is Think big, but start small.
Think big, Start Small
“Thinking big” here simply means having a long-term vision for the product, something grand and starry-eyed. It can be a vision of solving the problem in different ways, solving several related problems, or creating new forms of value for more people. It’s up to you as long as it paints a picture of a better future for its stakeholders.
Meanwhile, “Starting small” means to find and work on the smallest solution possible that delivers the big product’s core value. Smaller steps are much easier to take and allow you to change course should there be obstacles.
Let’s take a look at how the combination of Thinking big and Starting Small will help your product.
Why
- Something to aim for
Having a big vision for a product is not only important, it’s essential as it aligns your efforts towards a desirable goal. Without a vision, a product may end up being torn apart by the different goals or agendas of its stakeholders because priorities can not be established.
Without a “North Star,” each decision is as good as the next, so taking a step forward is virtually impossible. You won’t know where you’re headed or if you’re getting closer to an ideal future without a criterion for success.
- To build a moat
A Moat, in business, is a really large and powerful competitive advantage that keeps competitors or new players from taking over the market. A great example of this is Amazon’s network of sellers and buyers.
A grand vision for the product helps build a really strong competitive advantage as knowing where the product will be in its later stages will help the team formulate a winning strategy. Even if competitors try to build the same features, they won’t be able to catch up when your strategy is aimed towards something bigger and you’ll always be one step ahead.
- To minimize risk
Even with a grand vision, a product has to start from step 1 (how do you eat an elephant?). That is to offer the core value of the product in the most cost-effective way to minimize risk.
Building something large with all the bells and whistles right away is not only slow and devoid of feedback but if the wrong thing is built, money could be flushed down the drain.
At the start, the goal is to prove that what you’re offering is valuable for the market. You can do that without building the whole product or even a part of it at all (i.e. concierging).
A bike and a car can both get you from point A to B. You want to prove that your market wants to get from point A to B and the bike will allow you to prove that. Building the “bike version” of your product is the better step as it’s a lot cheaper and less risky.
- To stay agile
Taking smaller steps literally makes you more nimble — you can try it out. If you build something small and cheap, it’s easier and faster to iterate based on what the market says.
Test something small, ship, and get feedback. By doing this repeatedly and often, you’ll be able to figure out what the market really wants sooner. This also saves you from having very large development cycles which is not only tedious but again, expensive.
- To learn more
A new product’s primary goal is to achieve product-market fit which isn’t really a straightforward process. It takes a lot of trial-and-error to lock in on what the market wants so this makes feedback and learning the most important things.
Having smaller and faster releases allows you to learn more in less time because the sooner you ship, the sooner you get feedback. If you have to go through 3 months of development before you find out if users want your new feature, you’ll only learn a couple of things. Compare this to shipping a new test every 2 weeks, you’ll learn a lot more within the same 3 months.
Smaller steps also allow for proper learning because specific things could be tweaked and the effects can be measured. If experiments were run with too many tweaked variables, the results will lead to false negatives or false positives.
How
Hopefully, at this point, you’re convinced why “Think big, Start small” is a first principle for building products. But the question still remains, “How?”
To apply “Thinking big, but starting small”, you can do two things:
Product Vision
First is to establish the Product Vision. Define who the product is for, what they need or desire, and what kind of value the product will deliver.
This product vision has to be aspirational and long-term, taking years to realize. It will be the product’s north star and define what the team is working on and why.
To wrap it up, the product vision must define success. How will you know when the product has fulfilled the vision?
This may sound simple here, but it takes a lot of aligning with a lot of stakeholders and team members as well as a bit of prediction.
Validation
If you’re in product, you’ve probably heard of the term “Minimum Viable Product.” Most new products start with the MVP, but a lot of experts would argue that it shouldn’t be the first step when you’re building a new product. The reason is that this already entails you putting in a significant investment despite not having an ounce of an idea if users want what you’re building.
This is where Validation comes in. Simply put, validation is the process of confirming with the market if your idea is desirable and viable. It can come into play at different stages of your product development journey, whether you’re creating a new product or features.
But to make things simple, you want to validate 4 things for your new product or feature:
- Validate the problem — To know if you’re working on a real problem that people want to solve or is causing them pain
- Validate the market — To know if there’s a mass of people who would want the problem solved
- Validate the solution — To know if your solution can solve the problem
- Validate willingness to pay — To know if people would actually pay to have the problem solved
There are different tools and methods that will help you validate those things above, it’s a matter of choosing what works with your budget and team.
If you want to learn more, you can check out our free Ebook on the different tools for product validation here: https://learn.teneleven.design
So that’s our 2nd First Principle, “Think Big,Start Small.”
Hopefully, by now you can start envisioning a bigger and grander vision for your product idea and think of the best way to validate that there is a market for it.
Do watch out for the 3rd First Principle for Building Products in the next article.
P.S.
This came really late. Sorry about that. I got caught in the holiday rush towards the end of 2021 and got covid at the start of the new year. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoyed this.
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