Technology, people or… what users want?

• Tweet
• Buffer
• Pin It
• Email

• Tweet
• Buffer
• Pin It
• Email

[excerpt]Reading this post by Paul Buchheit, ex-Google employee and now at Friendfeed, I can only say that I can’t agree more. Don’t miss it out, it’s really worth a read.

If we could give a weigh to the elements that take part into giving value to a company, user base and the actual usage is definitely #1. [/excerpt]

You can have a great service, a fantastic algorithm, a stunning management, but what if users don’t pay attention to your service and can’t really find how to use it and get value from it? That said, he recommends to release your service as early as possible and tune it according to your users’ feedbacks.

In a nutshell, what he suggests is actually one of the basis of the so-called Web 2.0 paradigm: release often to get user feedbacks and improve your service according to what users really want.

On the other hand, my perception is that “closed beta” or “pre-alpha” versions hide a big risk: you release something that is perfect for your closed community of early-adopters but that couldn’t necessarily be suitable for a mass market usage. And as soon as you open it to general usage you clearly face this issue.

In addition to this, users are the best way to give others (Venture Capital firms?) the proof that you are doing right and moving to the right direction. In one of my latest posts, Guy Kawasaki, popular marketing man and entrepreneur commented:

If you get customers, you’ll get funding. But if you get funding, it doesn’t at all mean you’ll get customers. I wish this weren’t so true.

In conclusion, try to pay attention to what users really want. Your service could be cool, but the big risk is that it could be completely useless.

paul buchheit, luca filigheddu, marketing