Making products that solve a problem

Day 62 / 365

I have been thinking about what new things I should build using the new AI technologies. I never end up making much progress, because my thought process goes something like this —

• I think of a cool Idea for an App or a website.
• I figure out how I will actually make it.
• I then think of who will actually use it.
• Then I think of who will be ready to pay for it.

And I stop at this last step. No matter how cool my product is, it's useless if people will not be willing to pay for it.

For instance, I thought of creating Fake chat personas. An app that will let you create a person you can chat with, give them a name, qualities, etc. And then have a chat with them. It’s cool and with the new ChatGPT API, it's quite possible as well. But will anyone pay for it? I think not.

This is where I am reminded of an excerpt from a Steve Jobs interview. He talks about how this approach to product development is wrong. You shouldn’t start with a shiny and amazing piece of technology first and think of what to make and sell to your customers. Think of your customer first. What’s the problem that they are facing right now? Can you do something to solve it?

If your product solves a problem, then people will buy it. It doesn’t matter if it's trivial or highly advanced.