Products Must Solve Problems

Products are a game of problem solving.
Find a problem, then build a solution. Sometimes you just want to build a cool thing, but you don’t start with the problem. If you have a perfect solution to a problem nobody has, you lose.
The sooner you lose the better, because then you can get to work solving a real problem. Products are not about perfection, or about building something cool. Building a product is about finding an imperfect solution to a real problem, and improving from there. If you hone in on that, you can change and rebuild until it’s right, and eventually you’ll win.
I recently saw an ad for a water filtration system. They were describing the merits of the product, how it worked so much better than other filters. They could have told me until they were blue in the face about how great their system is, I don’t care because I don’t have a water filtration problem. I will never buy this product, no matter how great the marketing is, unless they convince me I have a water filtration problem I wasn’t aware of.
Do you know what your customer’s problems are? Do you know which one specifically you are solving? Is that clear in your marketing copy?
Find out what your customer’s problem is, articulate it clearly, and provide the solution. Then you win.