Building a product is always easy; you’re just doing it wrong.
An app that tells me when my water is done boiling would be neat, but what bigger problem does that solve? Does that even need to be an app? We’ve all got ideas, so what makes yours special?
Building a product is as simple as making a damn sandwich.
- Product
- Butter
- Jealous
Start with a problem.
Preferably a problem you understand, or experience. Don’t assume there’s a problem. You’re not some God sent hero sent to Earth to help civilians detect gluten with their iPhones (Android coming soon).
“I want to make an iPhone app!”
“Why?”
“Well… I can write in Objective-C.”
Don’t just make an app because you can. Focus on the problem you’re solving.
The team
Your butter is the team. Things flow smooth, yet simple between you and your team members.
Too much butter can just raise your cholesterol, and not enough butter will make your sandwich stick to the pan.
“I thought of that 10 years ago!”
This is the best part. You know you’re onto something when people see the final execution of your idea and throw a little shade.
If someone thinks your idea is stupid because of how simple it is, it might be a pretty damn good idea.
Thinking of an Idea vs. Executing an Idea
We all know that feeling when you come home from work, plop down on the couch, and suddenly feel starving. You’re too lazy to move, so you just keep thinking about food. Your roommate comes home and makes a sandwich. Because you’re hungry the line is a bit blurred to who that sandwich belongs to.
“I’m hungry, therefore that sandwich is mine.”
This is not a logical approach to solving the problem of hunger.
Thinking about a sandwich is not the equivalent of making the sandwich.
Having a great idea for a product is nowhere close to owning that product. Having the same idea would in no way lead to the same execution. Sure, seeing the end result of Instagram feels simple, and I’m sure plenty of people have “invented Instagram.” But Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger have in fact invented Instagram because they had executed the idea.
Keep it stupid simple
It’s a PB&J. We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel here. You can add other things like bananas, nutella, marshmallow fluff, or honey, but those are just features!
Don’t worry about features
Make sure you’ve mastered the art of sandwich making before you think you can handle what happens to a PB&J when you add honey…
For those of you who have put honey on an already slippery sandwich, you feel me.
Stop overthinking things. It’s not a Croque Monsieur, it’s a PB&J.
No one can fuck up a PB&J if you have all the ingredients. If you can’t build an awesome product, you’re just missing a key ingredient.
