My PM experience for B2B SaaS wasn't enough for my new audience: 3yrs olds
I work in tech doing B2B SaaS and not only am I fairly good at it, I also genuinely like it. But after years of managing roadmaps for corporate stakeholders, I decided it was time to build my own product from scratch.
I thought I understood "User Experience" until I failed the ultimate stress test: Bedtime with my 3-year-old niece, Lola.
I didn't even think about kids books for bedtime and ended up "saving the day" by pointing at toys of a promotional toy magazine and telling an awful story to her.
It was a disaster which gave me the idea for Lolaloos.
After that I went into 3-day founder mode to ship an MVP that would let her choose a few elements of the story (the main character, the place, and the bad guy) so the app could build the book for us.
In my day job, I’m used to reading adults. You look for "polite" feedback, or rude complains, or feature requests that hide bigger internal issues. But kids?
Never thought of it and honestly, WTF they are the most brutal "users" on the planet.
When I started showcasing the prototype to Lola I realized my PM experience was useless. Adults will nod even if they're bored; kids just walk away mid-sentence.
I realized I had to look at her eyes: everything is "new and shiny" to them, so if something isn't good enough, she'll look at it, but move on immediately.
However, if she really liked it, she would be really focused around that all the time, even when it doesn't make sense. Here an adult knows to identify the context and talk around that. A kid doesn't, and tbh this can be a bit funny.
The funniest thing is us, kids act in the same way as us adults when time passes, but funnier.
You'll tell your friends, your family, etc., however, remember the context?
She loved the fact that she could create her own character with a t-shirt as a rainbow, so first time she saw a gay flag she pointed at it and said her name (which is the same as her character's) very excited. I let you picture the scene because it was pure magic.
Building for this audience is a real experience. As you can imagine, I’m still iterating on everything, and I need some real-world stress tests from people who actually know how to build (and break) things.
If you have a kid (or you're the Cool Uncle/Aunt like me), I’d love for you to try building a story with them tonight at lolaloos.com.
But I have one request: Look at how honest is their feedback and see if yours is as honest.
(I’m especially curious if the "Printable PDF" feature actually helps with the screen-time guilt we all feel with kids.)
I’ve set up a code for the IH people: INDIE40PARENTS (gets you 40% off of a full book, but honestly, I'm mostly here for the feedback).
I'll be posting another update soon with the specific "Product Findings" I’ve had during our experience (because I went with a few other testers), because that’s a whole new story.
Love this — ‘kids are the most brutal users’ is such an accurate insight 😄
What really stood out is how different the feedback loop is. Adults filter, kids don’t. If they’re bored, they’re gone. If they’re engaged, you feel it instantly. That’s probably one of the purest forms of product validation you can get.
Also the point about watching behavior instead of listening to words is huge — feels like building for kids forces you into real UX, not just assumed UX.
The printable PDF angle is interesting too — that bridge between digital creation and offline experience might actually be the emotional hook for parents, not just the story itself.
Also sharing something I’m building in parallel — You have an idea. $19 puts it in a real competition. Winner gets a Tokyo trip (flights + hotel booked, minimum $500 guaranteed). Round just opened, so best odds right now: tokyolore.com
Actually that's one of the things I saw vs other apps, they are focused on the parents, while I faced is as an activity where the kids participate, and this forcess the process to be like easy.
Until I get more answers IMO, the PDF won't be used as much, it'll work more as a way to overcome a fear parents have with screen, even though I don't think they'll use it as much as they requested. But for sure I'll write about it!
I'll check yours out.
Thanks for reading!! Also open to feedback if you see something else!
Love this — especially the focus on real usage over just intent.
We’re actually building something similar around validating ideas early. It’s called Tokyolore — founders submit ideas, get an AI business breakdown, and compete for a growing prize pool (winner gets a Tokyo trip).
Still early, so odds are pretty solid right now. If it sounds interesting, would love you to check it out: tokyolore.com
Great origin story. The “printable PDF” angle is smart. It solves the screen-time guilt AND creates a physical artifact the kid wants to keep. That’s your retention loop right there: kid sees the printed book on the shelf, wants to make another one.
Yes but not really, because you can create the pdf but how the pdf is printed is out of my control.
For that, a future next step could be print on demand solution via api, but lots to do before getting there.
Thanks for reading!! Also open to feedback if you see something else!