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The problem with the statement "make something people want" is that people most often don't know what they want. Most people didn't want the first iPhone, or e

The problem with the statement "make something people want" is that people most often don't know what they want. Most people didn't want the first iPhone, or even the first car -- they were happy with their non-smart phone, and their buggies. If people did know what they want, there wouldn't be a huge marketing and PR industry to tell them what they want. The statement can lead to the kind of thinking that only products like Meerkat that have viral growth are worth investing in. Some companies may require a large marketing push to get off the ground. Even Paul Graham's first company was spending $16,000 a month on PR.

derefr 12y ago
I'm not sure you can say that most people didn't want the first iPhone. Sure, they weren't already picturing "an iPhone" and thinking "I want that"—but there had been Star-Trek-PADD-like-devices in the popular consciousness for ages. People were cognisant of a hole in their lives, that any number of hypothetical things within a previously-empty product category could fill. Apple's job in marketing the iPhone (and iPad) basically consisted of convincing people that "the future had arrived"—that they had created the first product to meet that known nothing-exists-that-can-meet-it need. I would say the same of the first internal-combustion-engine automobile. There were carriages, there were trains, and so people could see that in the intersection there was some efficiency to be gained in everyday life if the technology could be created to capture it—though it wasn't really clear what form it would take. I think this is where wearable/augmented-reality tech is today. People know there's something there, can see the potential of the product category from all the sci-fi movie UXes we've ever been subjected to—but nothing has really been an example of a real product that would sit in the as-yet-hypothetical space. We're still reaching toward the space, rather than landing in it.
- sparkzilla 12y ago
  I agree. A poster below said it might be better to express this as, "Solve a problem that people have". To which I would add, "...and cultivate the market for your solution". This would eliminate the implication that something should be automatically "wanted" by people for it to be successful.

derefr 12y ago

I'm not sure you can say that most people didn't want the first iPhone. Sure, they weren't already picturing "an iPhone" and thinking "I want that"—but there had been Star-Trek-PADD-like-devices in the popular consciousness for ages. People were cognisant of a hole in their lives, that any number of hypothetical things within a previously-empty product category could fill. Apple's job in marketing the iPhone (and iPad) basically consisted of convincing people that "the future had arrived"—that they had created the first product to meet that known nothing-exists-that-can-meet-it need. I would say the same of the first internal-combustion-engine automobile. There were carriages, there were trains, and so people could see that in the intersection there was some efficiency to be gained in everyday life if the technology could be created to capture it—though it wasn't really clear what form it would take. I think this is where wearable/augmented-reality tech is today. People know there's something there, can see the potential of the product category from all the sci-fi movie UXes we've ever been subjected to—but nothing has really been an example of a real product that would sit in the as-yet-hypothetical space. We're still reaching toward the space, rather than landing in it.

sparkzilla 12y ago
I agree. A poster below said it might be better to express this as, "Solve a problem that people have". To which I would add, "...and cultivate the market for your solution". This would eliminate the implication that something should be automatically "wanted" by people for it to be successful.