How to Build a Product People Want to Buy

Key Takeaways on How to Build a Successful Product

• “Build something people want”: the YC motto has served startups well across the globe. How do you know if you haven’t just built a product that you and your friends love, but which seems irrelevant to everyone else?
• Fake door tests: put up advertisements of your product (even if it’s not built yet) and see if people click on them. Better yet, set up a website and see if people buy it.
• Run surveys/interviews:
  - Do NOT ask “Would you be interested in buying this?”
  - DO ask “When was the last time you experienced this problem?”
  People are inherently bad at predicting their future behavior. Therefore it’s much more useful to ask them about their past problems, and what they think might have solved them.
• Reflect on Marty Cagan’s 4 product-building risks:
  Desirability: do people want to buy your product?
  ‍Feasibility: do you have/could you get everything you need to build it?
  ‍Usability: is your product easy/pleasant to use?
  ‍Viability: can you make money by selling it? Do the unit economics work out? Is it hard enough to copy that you’ll maintain a sustainable advantage?
• Build a prototype through no-code/low-code platforms: building an MVP this way allows you to get your product in the customer’s hands as soon as possible without having to hire external engineers.
  
  If all goes well, you’re going to take the feedback received to iterate your product beyond recognition. If you used no-code/low-code for your prototype, then you won’t have accrued technical debt and you won’t have to throw away a bunch of precious, precious code!