My journey from idea to launch in 5 steps

Introduction

For the last business I built, I dove straight into the code and didn't come out until it was ready for launch. I knew for my current business this was too much of a risk. It's a larger technical lift, and so throwing something together quickly was not an option. I also needed to assess if this risk of sinking this much time into something was worth pursuing.

So these are the steps I have been taking so far while I build Hopscotch product tours.

1. Market Research
2. Talk to customers
3. Landing page
4. Working demo
5. MVP launch

Today, I finished step 4. Is this the right way? For me, I think so. For you? Maybe. Maybe not. Let's jump in.

1. Market Research

This assumes you have an idea already, and you're looking to find out if it is worth pursuing.

I didn't make a whole 20 page business plan or do some wild analysis. I simply started looking at the current landscape. How many competitors are there? How big are they? Who are they serving? Where is there a gap?

• I did a lot of signing up for competitor's products and testing them out.
• I took note of the pricing plans for existing solutions
• I used capterra and g2 to find reviews about existing solutions

Your business without customers is just a project, so I personally feel it's worth investing time up front to size the market and see if it is right for you.

2. Talk to customers

I wanted to see if I could reach some people that would be interested in the problem I am solving. I did some customer discovery in Slack groups, Twitter, and online communities.

I probably talked to 15 people before realizing this is something I want to work on. If I couldn't find anyone, or if everyone I spoke with was happy with their existing solution, I probably would have cut the cord at this point. I still felt confident in moving forward, so on to step 3 we went.

3. Landing page

To be honest, I had actually started building out the MVP first, but since I am building in public on Twitter, it made a lot more sense to be able to talk about the thing I am building and point people somewhere instead of just building "some vague secret project". That would get a bit boring for anyone following along.

So I put together a landing page with the initial value proposition, branding, and a sign up form. It's been great because as I work on other parts of the project in public, I can continue pointing people back to my landing page where they can discover the product and sign up for early access.

This step also helped me to really think about my messaging up front and has shaped how I plan to build the product.

I don't have a ton of official sign ups via the website form, but people have been reaching out by other means (Twitter DMs, Slack, Linked In) now that they see what I am working on. So it has been valuable for me to do this first and start talking to some more potential users while I build out the MVP.

4. Demo

This probably doesn't work for all businesses, but Hopscotch product tours is a visual product - it's a UI that sits on top of your app and guides your users in interactive steps - and so adding a working demo to the site made a lot of sense.

I opted to focus on this before building out the entire MVP because the lift was significantly smaller and now people who come to the landing page can get a taste of what the product experience will be like. If you want to check that out, go ahead and take a look here.

Demos are a fun way to showcase your solution and get feedback before you build it out entirely. In my case, it helped me to show progress to those I have been talking to about early access, instead of just remaining silent for another couple months.

5. MVP launch

This is my next major step I am working towards. The good thing is now I have some early potential customers to speak with while I build this out. That is going to help me to prioritize which features to include for launch, refine the marketing messaging, pricing, etc.

Wrapping up

I have learned a lot through this process so far. If you read between the lines, there is a lot of talking to potential users along the way, not just coding. Talking with people - even just a handful at each step - has helped to inform many of the decisions so far, and I am happy with the approach so I thought I would share.

I would love to know what you think about this process. How does it compare to your own? What steps do you think I am missing or what would you do differently?

Cheers!

Cam (@sloancam on Twitter)