Better Product

What does it mean to develop a product with community in mind?

Over the first two seasons of Better Product, we’ve found that many of our conversations seem to involve community, whether the word is blatantly spoken or not. In many cases, it’s a matter of how much a company wants to invest in community that dictates the impact its community has on the success of a given product.

In this first episode of this new series, we’ll be looking into a few examples of product stories that were heavily influenced by their communities and how it looked differently for each of them. We’ll also hear how being intentional about community stands to benefit both your product and the experience of your users.

Listen in to hear part one of our new series on community.

• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Past Episodes Mentioned: 

• Scaling a Product While Building a Community with Sara Mauskopf
• Creating a Better Product Starts by Solving a Real Problem with Pieter Omvlee

Resources Mentioned: 

• Winnie
• Sketch
• InVision

Big announcement from Better Product: There will be no Season 3.

But that’s just because we love this podcast so much, we want to do it without the constraint of seasons! Sorry, was that misleading? We hope you’ll join us over the coming weeks as Anna and Christian take us on a journey into stories of how community and product intersect and what product teams can learn from their community of users.

We’ll also be exploring a variety of other themes in upcoming episodes, as well as sprinkling in full-episode interviews with some of our guests that our listeners have come to love. We hope you’ll join us on this new adventure!

• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Key Points:

• A pitch deck will spend more time on setting the context. You have investors that may need more background.
• Pitch decks often spend more time on the company and its financials. Investors want to see that you have the team to succeed, that you have a growth plan, and that you are seeing traction in the market.
• A sales deck focuses on “you.” Directly talking to the pains or potential gains of the person you’re talking to.
• Sales decks also focus on establishing agreement on the problem first, solution second.

Key Points:

• First, start with validating the problem. Just because you think it’s a problem, doesn’t mean others agree. Sometimes, people will guide you towards other ideas you hadn’t considered, or reveal that they actually have bigger problems they’d like solved.
• Ask people what they think! Carrie from Little Nugget (and a guest on the Better Product podcast), made a powerpoint and shared with other moms who she wanted to help. 
• Ensure that you are talking to the right person. I’ve talked to startups that are solving problems for retail consumers and they forget to talk to the store owners. For example, if you had an idea to create a parking app for grocery stores, you could validate the idea with the shoppers and hear things like “That’s a great idea, it’d make parking so easy!” But in that case, you’d need to also be solving a problem for the grocery because you can’t build something without their buy-in. 

Another season of Better Product is in the books, which makes this the perfect time to reflect on some of the conversations we’ve had over the course of Season 2.

Instead of re-hashing what you’ve already heard, we decided to dig through the tapes to find some great soundbites that got left on the cutting room floor. We’re calling them ‘Genius Cuts’ after our good friends at Share Your Genius, who produce this podcast.

You’ll hear additional product insights from great guests like Marty Cagan, Pieter Omvlee, April Dunford, and Sara Mauskopf about everything from product positioning statements to combining your product focus with insights from your community of users.

Listen in as Christian and Anna react to these insights and share their own takeaways from another season of Better Product.

• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Past Episodes Mentioned: 

• Scaling a Product While Building a Community with Sara Mauskopf
• The Real Definition of a Product Manager with Marty Cagan
• Creating a Better Product Starts by Solving a Real Problem with Pieter Omvlee

Key Points:

• Build a foundation, not walls
• Plan how your brand may grow
• Lean into your strengths

What happens when all your dreams come true but you lose sight of why you started?   Four years ago, things weren’t looking good for Gumroad, an e-commerce audience-building software that helps creators do more of what they love. In order for things to turn around, it required going back to what made the product a great idea from the beginning.    For Sahil Lavingia, founder and CEO of Gumroad, this meant seeing their customers as human beings and giving them a platform that made their lives easier. After sky-rocketing to success, Sahil and his team endured an up-and-down journey that led them to enlightening conclusions about what made Gumroad great and what the mission of their product truly is.   Listen in to hear the story of how a great product, built over the course of one weekend, grew to phenomenal heights, encountered unexpected challenges, and rediscovered its purpose.

• Connect with Sahil
• Learn more about Gumroad
• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Past Episodes Mentioned: 

• Scaling a Product While Building a Community with Sara Mauskopf

Resources Mentioned: 

• Reflecting on My Failure to Build a Billion Dollar Company

For many B2B companies, the product journey and brand still feel separate. But in e-commerce, they’re inherently tied together.   For Angie Stocklin, co-founder of online eyeglass retailer One Click Ventures, this presents an assortment of opportunities and challenges. For example, when operating three different eyewear brands under the One Click umbrella, how do you create a unified, but distinct, customer experience for each brand? It all starts with implementing a strategy to understand your customers.   As Angie and her team began to implement new methods for learning customer behavior and developing a customer journey roadmap that aligned with each respective brand’s audience, things began to come into focus.   How did they do it? Listen in to hear the story of how an intrigue in e-commerce led to a successful new venture that put a different spin on product strategy.

• Connect with Angie
• Learn more about One Click Ventures
• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Past Episodes Mentioned: 

• How a Product-Led Company Utilizes Storytelling Instead of Feature Pushing with Kyle Lacy

Resources mentioned:

• Do Better Work

Key Points:

• First, be absolutely clear on why you are considering freemium and exhaust all other paths.
• Be clear what features and level of feature sets you will give.
• Understand very clearly what the growth strategy is for a customer into a paid customer.

Is there a formula for developing the right product positioning statement? 

The positioning statement is arguably one of the most important aspects of any product company. April Dunford, the author of Obviously Awesome, shares with Anna and Christian the impact of getting the positioning statement right. When it’s done well all the other ‘stuff,’ from building out the marketing plan to developing the sales strategy, becomes easy. 

The conversation yields clear insights on how any company can tackle the perfect positioning statement. One of the key takeaways goes beyond ‘what to do’ - rather it teaches you how to think about creating these statements. Further, April sheds light on how to use your customer’s feedback - no matter your size - to shape this impactful statement.  

• Connect with April 
• Check out Obviously Awesome
• Connect with Christian
• Connect with Anna
• Learn more about Innovatemap

Past Episodes Mentioned: 

• Navigating a Complex Product Roadmap to Launch | Jeremy Leventhal
• How Sales and Product Work Together to Achieve Product-Market Fit | Rod Feuer

Products mentioned: 

• Sketch 
• Instagram