Creating a product sometimes can be the easiest part of the startup journey. The harder part is find a problem, then providing a relevant solution. Don’t forget finding product-market fit and finally distribution. This story is about how I got 500 users in 2 days on launch date.
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Idea Phase
In reality, you don’t want to create an idea in isolation. Find the problem, then provide a solution. The hardest part is finding a problem. Once you have found the problem, you can go after it to provide a solution. Before you go fishing for your problem I suggest you solve one thing first. The one thing that no one talks about is distribution.
How do you get distribution?
There are quite a few ways to get distribution. One way is to document your journey and find others who might be interested in your product. Another is finding a community and staying active in it. Another way is to create an open source project on GitHub and provide ancillary services like a subscription.
What’s next?
Once you have figured out your distribution strategy you might think the next step is to find a problem to solve for your distribution. Hold your horses there mister/misses. The next step is actually now to create a persona of your ideal customer. Why should you create a persona before looking for a problem? If you look for the problem, you might not be able to provide an optimal solution to your ideal customer. I suggest to find your ideal customer aka persona first, then look for your problem to solve.
My ideal Customer
Who is my ideal customer? People diagnosed with ADHD. Someone with ADHD gets distracted or can’t stay still for a task. This problem interferes with work and life.
Why did I chose this customer?
Being distracted and forgetful is a common problem. We are looking to get disciplined into accomplishing a task or changing our selves. The problem seemed obvious. I had days when I suffered from ‘not enough done’ syndrome. We all have on/off days and want a way to stay productive to get things done. There is one problem to this issue: it is not a consistent problem for us. We do have days when we are productive. What does this mean? I am not the ideal customer for the product that solves this problem. But I can be one day.
Is technology the answer they are looking for?
I need to find out if my ideal customer is willing to try technology as a solution for his/her problem. “Sales Safari” by Amy Hoy advocates this approach to finding customers with problems looking for solutions. The alternative active approach is the “Mom test”. No technique is perfect and you need a little bit of intuition. This is why when you are the customer, you have a better context to the problem.
The answer to my question is yes they are looking for an active solution. The next step is to find a solution that resonates with the customer. Finding solutions can go in many different directions. I started with existing solutions. There are to do lists, reminders, accountability apps and so forth. How can I stand out and also provide a novel approach to their problem that is better than what is already out there? Turns out many self help books on productivity have great solutions for this problem. I’m building on top of the shoulder of giants and I hope you do the same.
It took me close to a year to build the solution and now I’m getting feedback and iterating on the product. I launched the product in the forums where my ideal user hangs out and I got 500 sign ups in 2 days.
here’s my landing page: https://www.atomiclife.app
here’s the post I made for initial signups:
https://www.reddit.com/r/NonZeroDay/comments/qsze2w/i_have_been_working_on_an_app_for_12_hours_per/