Avoid the Biggest Mistake in Product Development
Save time, money, and effort by focusing on discovery
Have you ever launched a product or service that didn’t achieve the results you expected? You’re not alone. The feeling of investing time, money, and effort into something customers don’t need is more common than it seems. The most frequent mistake in product development is starting directly with the solution. And I get it—creating solutions is much more exciting than exploring what we’re going to solve. But if you want to save time, money, and effort, I recommend separating the discovery and development stages before designing a solution. What do I mean?
The discovery stage is key in product development, as it includes activities such as research, prototyping, and experimentation to delve into the real needs, desires, and problems of users. Talking to customers, testing prototypes, and conducting experiments allow us to identify concrete opportunities in the market. Instead of assuming what users need, during the discovery stage, we can validate hypotheses and define the problem clearly. What actions should you include in the discovery stage?
User interviews: Speak directly with your potential users to understand their frustrations, desires, and behaviors.
Rapid prototyping: Create simple, functional versions of your ideas. This way, you can test your solution without major investments and get early feedback.
Controlled experiments: Conduct surveys, and A/B tests, or create landing pages to measure market interest in real time.
In summary, the discovery stage is not a waste of time; it saves time, money, and effort while helping the development stage create products and services that truly deliver value to users.