Keywords:: PermanentNote
Reference: Startup Product Management
As said here PN: Problems stay, solutions (products) change, products exist to serve customer needs. The solution that does it in the most effective and cheapest way usually wins.
There is a approach to new product creation that is very cheap and effective. The goal is to validate your problem hypothesis with a product design with real target users in the quickest and cheapest way.
The process typically takes between 3 weeks and 2 months and consists the of following steps:
Find a problem (underserved customer need).
Create a prototype that will solve this problem.
Show it to the market.
Gather feedback.
Modify the prototype based on the feedback.
Repeat the process untill your have a solution to the problem (product) that people love.
Once you have the best possible solution, you bring on an engineering team. Thanks to the validated prototype, they will have a clear understanding of the product they need to build.
Relevant notes:
Instead, you should try to validate each idea as quickly as possible without getting feelings attached to it. You should strive to create an iterative and replicable process that will enable you to push your ideas into the market as quickly as you can.
PN: How to create a product (simplified): the most effective way to create new solutions is through quick iterations of prototype creation, testing, and recreation.
Therefore, if you want to create a product, you should always start with the problem space and only then get to the solution space. If you do the opposite, you will drastically limit the possibilities of solutions to the problem because you will be constrained to the functionalities, design, and technology you have defined in the solution space. Starting with the problem space invites novel possibilities because it removes the constraints. Starting in the solution space is like trying to decide what to wear without knowing whether it snows or the sun is shining.