Digital Product Strategy for All: Part 1
“Who the f**k are you and what’s your problem?”
It comes to us whilst eating pizza,
Or whilst we’re on the loo,
That next killer App idea,
But we don’t know what to do.
So, you have an awesome idea but you’re not sure where to begin? Let’s walk through one easy way of getting started.
I’m going to keep things simple — I’ll assume you’re working alone and your goal is to go from an idea to a profitable entrepreneurial business.
Let’s get started.

Walk backwards from idea to problem
Inspiration normally hits us as solutions. However, it’s important to force ourselves to take a step back and frame the problem that our solution intends to address. By doing this, not only that we will better understand the problem, but we enable ourselves to identify and iterate on better solutions.
Fall in love with the problem, not the solution
— Uri Levine
This approach also helps preclude technology-driven solutions. By their very nature, technology-driven solutions are attempting to take a technology (e.g.: IoT, blockchain) and find a problem that it can solve. This can all-too-easily lead to a suboptimal solution as the priority becomes employing a new technology, versus solving a problem real people are facing.
To take the step back, answer this: what are people trying to achieve today that they could better achieve through your potential solution? Clayton Christensen eloquently describes this as the “job to be done”.
From what you know now:
- Is the problem you feel also felt by people other than yourself?
- Does the problem cause those people significant pain?
If the answer to either of the above is a definitive ‘no’, it may be worth paying another visit to the loo (or to whichever location offers you inspiration). The trick is to only proceed when there is a chance you’ve identified a problem for which the solution may offer value to others.
If your answers are even just a weak and unsure ‘yes’ at this stage, you are ready to move on; you will gain further confidence as we move forward.
So, you’ve identified a problem that may need solving. What’s next?
Identify our customer
Yes, you’ve already validated the problem in your head - but now it’s time to validate it with real people. Validating problems in this way is cheaper than building solutions only to find they either weren’t solving a real problem, or were solving the problem in the wrong way. More importantly, this form of validation will help us learn more about the problem and inform the solution we then build.
However, before validating your idea with real people, we need to know who those people are and where to find them. These are your potential customers. Answer this: What kind of person has the problem you are imagining?
Note down your answers and, as you do, realise they are all assumptions — best guesses that you will need to validate as you talk to those potential customers.
For bonus points, start to collate your assumptions into a ‘proto-persona’ — a simple grid that triggers and organises your thoughts about a customer (see below).

Proto-personas achieve several objectives. Firstly, they cause us to explicitly state the assumptions we hold about our customer. Secondly, it allows us to empathise with them — what goal are they trying to achieve, and what obstacles are getting in their way? And, most importantly, how will our solution help them towards their goal?
You’ve identified for whom you want to solve a problem. What now?
Validate the problem
Now we have defined what we believe our customers look like, we can start to identify people who fit these criteria and interact with them to validate two points: (1) does this problem exist and cause significant pain, and (2) does this problem exist for them? The first question is problem validation — confirming that the problem exists, whilst the second is customer segmentation — validating our understanding who we think our customers are (as per our proto-persona).
The simplest approach to validating these two points is often through interviews. This could be formal — such as a scheduled time-slot — or simply grabbing passers-by who match your proto-persona criteria (if easily identifiable — e.g.: male shoppers between 15 and 60 years of age).
Before conducting any interviews, it is useful to write down a problem statement — your assumption of what the problem looks like in only as much detail as you necessary. This information will be invaluable in then drafting an interview script — you will want to be intentional not only with the questions you ask, but in how you word them. Ash Maurya’s guidance may be of particular help in drafting something quick and effective.
A technique I also find useful is capturing detailed notes during the interview, and then distilling the salient points or quotes onto PostIts. I then scatter those PostIts across a wall and start to cluster where I see overlap or patterns across interviews. This often helps me identify more holistic elements of the problem space that I wouldn’t have otherwise seen.
There are no facts inside the building so get the hell outside.
— Steve Blank
You’ll likely find clarity starting to arise after as little as 5 interviews, and you can do this all within one day.
So, we’ve learnt about our customer and problem. What next?
Pause for thought
At this point, you should have gotten enough information to validate your understanding of the customer and the problem. You’ve probably found that the outcome wasn’t a simple “yes” or “no” validation, but instead a great deal of information that has refined your understanding of the customer and the problem.
Go back and ensure you update your proto-persona to capture your latest assumptions of who your customer is, and your problem statement to capture your latest understanding of the problem.
This process of first creating clarity on the problem you’re trying to solve is akin to tackling a jigsaw puzzle. By first assembling the corners and the border, you gain clarity on the problem you’re trying to solve upfront. Everything that then follows flows more quickly and with less rework.
Well, that’s my view on the world.
In the next post we’ll validate and iterate on your envisioned solution to the problem, increasing its chance of success.

