Startup Series #4 — Your MVP (or product) is not the only thing customer sees.
Why We Love or Hate Products Beyond Their Features.
Why do we absolutely love or hate some products (or brands), even if they offer the exact same feature in solving our problem?
Customers don’t just touch and use your product (tangible or intangible). They experience a whole longer customer journey that will dictate if they will love or hate something.
I love this ‘Customer Journey & Touchpoints’ image in Tony Fadell’s book ‘Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making’.
Tony Fadell is the father of the iPod, co-creator of iPhone, and started Nest — later acquired by Google and become Google Nest
Similar concept has been suggested in ‘Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice’ by Clay Christensen, there are a lot more touchpoints that the company should be aware of and cater for the experience, which will eventually lead to customers adopting (and loving) a product.
That doesn’t spell doom for startups, and don’t delay your launch.
Launch your MVP (Minimum viable product), and think through how to make up the experiences with personalized (and sincere) approach: introduce, onboard, engage, ask and receive feedback/reviews from early adopters. Most early adopters will understand, and they will become your advocates as you build the experiences.
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You can find the beginning of the startup series here:
Sharpening Your Hunch for Success — Introduction to the Startup Series
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If you are really interested in the topic, read the book, or research the concept, or at least read the chapter. I used to see something and feel that I can relate, falling into the trap of thinking I’d known about 80% of the topic already, let’s not waste time looking into it.
I have come to realize learning a concept, and understanding the context of how the person come to the concept will deepen my understanding of a topic, and how I could expand and link it with other concepts I’d known.
I am still only 1/3 into the book, it’s definitely packed with information for employees or entrepreneurs alike, it doesn’t just talk about building products. A little summary from me about the book (only 1/3 of it) if you are interested below:
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Tony shared his personal experiences, thought processes and advice starting from his first company General Magic (A company founded in 1990 aiming to build devices similar to our smartphones now before personal computers become a common thing). How he failed, moved to Philips and become CTO at the age of 25, build the 2 handheld business devices Philips Velo and Nino PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), how to deal with corporate assholes (he literally write that and teach you how to categorize these people, and work with / around them).
Quitted after 4 years in Philips, joined a company for 2 weeks and resigned when he sees red flags (and he thinks the money and position arenot worth hating the job you are working for!). Started a new company, didn’t work, but landed him opportunity at Apple, worked 10 months to build iPod from ideation to launch. Then his manager in Apply takes credit and tells him he doesn’t deserve the promotion he’d been promised, how he overcome that to get the things he deserves.
It’s actually more autobiography, with thoughts, experiences and perspectives that are beneficial to everybody at a personal level.
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You can find the beginning of the startup series here:
Sharpening Your Hunch for Success — Introduction to the Startup Series
