Should you think Product first or Consumer first?
Vaibhav Taneja
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Inam from Outgrow@inam_from_outgrow
Product, because unless you have a good product you will not have any consumers to think.
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@inam_from_outgrow The simplest path, create something people already want. Creating a product directly for people ready to buy it is always a good first choice.
Consumer, because designing your product depends on how and what consumers think and want.
@yesser_falk Yeah, Or if you’re one of the rare geniuses and you have the passion you can create a product so brilliant, so revolutionary, people didn’t realize they needed it. The perfect example here is Apple. Time and time again they’ve created new categories of products so astounding they’re instant hits - even when people didn’t even know they needed the new thing they’re introducing.
Of course striking gold with a one-in-the-million product isn’t easy. And to do it more than once is almost unfathomable. But it doesn’t mean one can’t try.
Definitely consumer. If you think product first, it's extremely easy to make a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. Your product needs to solve clear problems for people first and can be built out after it meets that need.
@paul_vanzandt Indeed. Consumer first thinking is actually pretty straight-forward: it’s thinking of the consumer, first. It means putting yourself in their shoes, understanding their challenges and catering to them. It means creating products and services that are intended to make their lives better or easier. True consumer first thinking goes beyond driving reach, pursuing trends or developing innovative products and reaches into the heart of the consumer, understanding their wants and needs and offering a product or service that addresses them.
@vaibhav_taneja I completely agree, thanks for the breakdown - check us out if you want to collaborate on building consumer-first products: https://www.producthunt.com/upco...
Well you need an idea first, so the product will come first, but once the vision begins to come together you will need to tool it toward a "persona," the user whose life you're improving. Ideally there's more than one use case and you can solve more than one problem by implementing differently, for example.
So they arise together - the customer is the trellis on which the vine will grow but you will be focused on the seed and starter plant until the vine can meet and attach to the trellis.