So what are you building? A vitamin tablet or a pain killer? i.e. a ‘nice to have’ product or ‘need to have’ one?
While it’s just normal for every startup to believe that they are building a pain killer, most of them (unfortunately) fall under vitamin category.
The other way to look at this statement is – what and how much do you pay for when it comes to vitamin vis-a-vis pain killer?
Even the poorest strata of the society pays for pain killers and keeps the vitamin tablets aside (for the days when they have enough ca$h to throw).
Essentially, we primarily pay for pain killers as compared to vitamins and that’s the truth with any other business as well – i.e. people/companies are willing to pay for services that solves a pain vis-a-vis services that are latent in nature.
Especially in India, and that too in technology business.
Look at the Internet business in India – at the end of the day, classified businesses are surviving (if not thriving) and most of those ‘nice to have’ businesses have either shut down or have managed to stay because of their deep pockets.
Vitamin or Pain Killer?
But we are talking about startups who may not get a ‘second life’ to change strategy – so how can a startup figure out whether they are building a vitamin tablet or a pain killer?
Here is what I’d suggest
- Do not ask your friends/family for idea approval – they all want to encourage you for whatever you are doing and will never throw candid perspective (chances are that they have no idea about what you are doing!).
- Go out and ask prospective customers about your service – if somebody says ‘I love the idea’, ask them to give a token money (if not cash, atleast something metaphorically). If they dodge, validate your hypothesis.
- Identify the catalysts that turn a ‘nice to have’ feature into ‘need to have’. Twitter could be a great example here – if it’s down, its’ a world news! If it’s up, people are figuring out how to use it!
- I am the end user syndrome – get out of this before you commit harakiri. Your baby will never look ugly to you and you will end up treating your pills as the magic potion, while it could be just another pill that solves no real purpose.
It’s pretty much a ‘nonsense’ service that the world is addicted to!
Aside, the most important sales lesson here is to convert your vitamin into a pain killer (lessons from Steve Jobs perhaps?) addict user and then charge a higher fee , but first thing you need to understand is whether you are building a vitamin tablet or a pain killer. Is there enough demand for your service or its all hypothesis?
And of course, a lot of these are governed by your product positioning (Read: The Art of Product Positioning – Do you know the right position?). If you want to sell vitamin as a vitamin – so be it. But internally, validate the hypothesis behind calling your solution as a pain killer or a vitamin tablet.
In short, know what you are building. Know thy business.
Recommended Read:
- Understanding User Needs – The Fundamental Motivation Theory
- The Story of Hammer and Nail (and Startups)
- Data Driven Decisions Vs. Intuition..Is it really a “vs”?
- Listen to Customers or Innovate? — Lessons from Facebook Redesign
[img]
Excellent article and superb analogy!
I do not think there is anything wrong in building a vitamin and seling it if you know it is vitamin and not a pain killer. IMO most of the business start as vitamin and then they become a painkiller. Cell phone is one such example when it started in Inida in 90s it was a Vitamin now people think it is painkiller. Taking same analogy ahead you can charge whatever you want for vitamin but for pain killer there will be always some pressure to commoditize it.
I would add cellphone as a food now….people cannot live without that.
I’m not sure about the last point “I’m not be end-user syndrome”. I’m a believer of Paul Graham school of thought.
“Great products almost always come from someone scratching their own itch.”
A great product addresses some pain-point for a large group of people and the best way to understand a pain-point is to have felt it yourself.
Any who one like this article may also like : http://www.microsoftstartupzone.com/Blogs/the_next_big_thing/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?List=6bab7b08-81ca-4602-bd97-4b7b2c893e88&ID=337
A very oft-repeated analogy, but a perfect one. Especially in troubled economic times like these, when no one wants to spend any additional penny.
An idea of the conviction of a startup entrepreneur can come from the fact if she is interested in putting in her own money or taking a loan against property rather than thinking of angels and vcs
its the question that if your product is in painkiller category means customer required your product when in need only one time or more than once but not for a long run,where as in vitamin category,its a customer requirement,like cellphones,firstly they are in pain killer category(customer use when he needs to call urgently) but now it comes under category of vitamin(its now become requirement).
And when customer requires your product, they are ready to pay a premium fee..they get addicted (think of cellphones).
The core is to identify what you are building and how you can move up.
Absolutely fed up of this must-have good-to-have debate. Lets play a simple game. I challenge anyone here: For every successful start-up that you can name that made a must-have product, I can name three successful startups that made good-to-have products.
Anyone?
Its not about that. Its how about how intelligently you do what you do.
w/o taking the names like google/twitter (lets leave silicon valley startups)- how many indian startups can you name?
of course, its abt intelligence..this article talks about validating your hypothesis
Pingback: As a Startup, you can say still 'No' to your customer if | YHP|Your Hidden Potential