Hiten and Marie share key learnings from their experience of building 5 products in a year in this presentation from SaaSFest 2017.

1. Marie Prokopets & Hiten Shah
What building 5 products in a
year forces you to do
producthabits.com🤓
1

2. 2
We share everything we do and
learn about Product.
(Except these super secret stories)
@marieprokopets @hnshah

3. Learn with us…
producthabits.com🤓
3

4. 4

5. 5

6. 📅 One Year
6

7. 📅 One Year
🔨 Five Products
7

8. 📅 One Year
🔨 Five Products
😎 One Team
8

9. 📅 One Year
🔨 Five Products
😎 One Team
💸 Self-Funded
9

10. 10
five products
made with Ralph
share on Product Habits

11. 11

12. 12
1 - We started with a product that
we will likely kill very soon.

13. Fundraising is a PITA 🥙
13

14. 14
50 interviews, 100s of decks

15. • Raising money sucks
• Pitch decks aren't compelling
• Thousands of companies raise money every year
• Investors want to fund great companies
• We always want to be helpful
Fundraising is a HUGE problem & market!
15

16. 16

17. 17

18. 18
1 deck per company
1 round per year/s
1 user per company

19. A big market and problem isn’t
enough… regular usage is a must.
19
Takeaway 🔑

20. Is the market big or are you
just convincing yourself it is?
20

21. 21
2 - We tried to copy & paste a product
without doing technical research.

22. 22

23. “Let’s copy and paste it.”
Hiten Shah
23

24. 24

25. “Let’s copy and paste it. And add audio!”
Hiten Shah
25

26. 26
Our Big Mistake

27. 27

28. 28

29. 29
No Technical Research
Our Big Mistake

30. Don’t build without doing thorough
technical research first.
30
Takeaway 🔑

31. Technical Research will bring to light
almost every obstacle you’ll
encounter as you build your Product.
31

32. 32
New product
New feature
Iterating
Changing direction
Crazy idea
If you care about time…
do technical research

33. 33

34. • Research findings
• Product overview
• What needs to be included
• What doesn’t need to be included
• Open questions
• Initial mockups
Our fuck-up proof Technical Research process
34

35. • Initial trade-offs - technical considerations, workarounds
• Speed - very rough estimates
• Decisions - stuff we have to decide now and later
• Risks - barriers, problems, nightmares
• Resources - do we have everything we need to build?
Our fuck-up proof Engineering Research process
35

36. Are we cutting corners and
causing preventable delays?
36

37. 37

38. 38
draftsend.com/examples

39. 39

40. 40
3 - We stumbled on a new product
while doing research for Draftsend.

41. 41

42. 42

43. 43

44. 44

45. 45

46. 46

47. 47

48. 6 weeks
2 surveys
1,500 responses
52 customer interviews
Priceless learnings!
48
The Approach Paid Off 🚀

49. Learn without bias and take action.
49
Takeaway 🔑

50. 50

51. 51
There was a bigger problem to solve…

52. The #1 problem people have with
documents is finding them.
52

53. 53

54. Are we solving the most
important problem?
54

55. 55
4 - We gave up on our favorite
features to build a product in days.

56. 56
Time to solve the #1 problem

57. The #1 problem people have with
documents is finding them.
57

58. After all that research, we had
3 features we wanted to build.
58

59. • Research findings
• Product overview
• What needs to be included
• What doesn’t need to be included
• Open questions
• Initial mockups
Our fuck-up proof Technical Research process
59

60. 60

61. “What’s the fastest path to learning?”
61

62. We had 3 features we wanted to build.
What feature do we need to nail first?
62

63. 63

64. You have to ship fast to learn faster.
64
Takeaway 🔑

65. Three days later, we were playing
with a functioning product.
65

66. Three days later, we were playing
with a functioning product.
66
Two more days and the product
was being used by customers.

67. 67
Now we’re building a totally
different feature thanks to
customer feedback.

68. Are we building to learn?
68

69. 69
5 - We were afraid to run user
tests without the help of an expert.

70. 70

71. 71
Product #5!

72. 72
Designer Researcher

73. 73
We decided to just do it.

74. User testing can get you unstuck.
74
Takeaway 🔑

75. 75
We nailed our new product idea
in just a few hours!

76. 76
We nailed our new product idea
in just a few hours!
And we’re building it!

77. Anyone can do user testing.
77
Takeaway 🔑

78. Our prototypes
Our websites
Competitors
Successful products
78
User Testing
The goal is to learn fast.

79. 79
How should we do onboarding for
our new tool in the document
space?

80. 80
First we user tested a competitor
How should we do onboarding for
our new tool in the document
space?

81. 81
First we user tested a competitor
Then we user tested the best
How should we do onboarding for
our new tool in the document
space?

82. 82

83. ✅ List all the features on the homepage
✅ Multiple install CTAs with the word free
✅ Repeat features over and over again
😐 Make sure the copy at the top of your website is compelling
😐 Invite people to join early
Mixmax user test results
83

84. 84

85. ✅ Show (don’t just tell) people the value they’ll get right on your homepage
😐 Make sure your homepage loads fast
😐 People see through impersonal personalization
😐 Keep the excitement level high during onboarding
😐 Avoid unexpected surprises about paid plans
Grammarly user test results
85

86. Are we doing enough user
testing?
86

87. 🔨 Five Products
87

88. The most efficient way to rapidly
learn is to have multiple
products.
88

89. Or, act like you do.
89

90. “The only way to do more is do more.”
Hiten Shah
90

91. 91

92. 92

93. “The only way to do more is do more.”
Hiten Shah
93

94. It’s actually about making room for
what matters.
94

95. 5 Products & counting…
9 People
1 Ralph
95

96. 96
We have no choice but to achieve
more with less.

97. 97
You have a choice to achieve
more with less.
We have no choice but to achieve
more with less.

98. What are you working on right
now that doesn’t matter?
98

99. 99
Work on things that matter.
Make those things better.
Be happier ☺

100. 100
Questions?
Ask us anything!
hiten@producthabits.com
marie@draftsend.com
bit.ly/5-products