A few weeks ago, while on my regular kids-driver duty (that is, driving my daughters to and from their afternoon activities), we found ourselves stuck in traffic. It happens. We used the time to chat when something caught my eye. 

A few cars ahead of us was an open moving truck loaded with stuff. The thing that caught my attention was a large Apple logo on what looked like a large, white box. My immediate thought was that someone is moving to a new apartment, and having a large apple device moving with her. But it didn’t make sense. I didn’t know of any Apple device that would require a box that large, and I also didn’t know anyone ever moving with an open truck instead of a regular moving van. 

I was curious, and as we got closer to the truck, I saw that the other things on the truck weren’t furniture. They were wooden sheets. So this was definitely not someone moving to a new apartment, but what was it? Why would someone move a large Apple device alongside wooden sheets? Wooden sheets belong in construction, but why would someone need an Apple device on their construction site? Still doesn’t make any sense.

Looking closer, I saw that what I thought was a box was actually two white, thick surfaces. I tried to see if the Apple logo appeared on both but I didn’t have visibility into the back one, and anyway I didn’t have any good explanation for what I saw.

It bugged me. I felt I had to understand what was going on. I asked my daughter but she didn’t have any idea either.

When traffic started to release, we got to see some more of the truck. As we passed by it, we saw that just before the white thingy with the Apple logo, and alongside the wooden sheets, there were glass sheets too. The glass sheets were too delicate to belong on a construction site, but they were still moving together with the other pieces. That’s when it dawned on me: the truck wasn’t going to any construction site. It was most likely going to a mall somewhere, where someone was going to build an Apple stand. Now, it finally made sense. All the pieces fell into the right place. 

When I shared this idea with my daughter, she agreed it is the most plausible idea (or at least the only plausible one we could find), but she also mentioned that we can’t be sure. And she was right, of course, but once I had a plausible explanation for what I saw I already felt much better. It wasn’t important enough (or possible) for me to go and figure out if I was right in this case, but it reminded me of the process we go through in building product strategy (where this final part of going to see if our theory is correct is very important). 

Many times, when I help companies build their product strategy, we start similarly to the truck story above: We know a few things about the domain, the problem we solve, the customers, our solution, etc., and we try to create a story that connects all the pieces together in a way that makes sense. Initially, there will be many holes in the story – much like in the truck story above. But as we continue working, and get to know more about the world we live in, we are able to iterate the story until it finally makes sense. Here is the way to do it.

Understand Which Dots You Need to Connect

I talk a lot about connecting the dots, but it’s important to know which dots are we connecting exactly. One of the most common pitfalls of product leaders and entrepreneurs is talking too much about the product. In your strategy, the product itself almost doesn’t matter. It is going to change anyway. The dots that are most important to connect are the ones related to the external world – the ones that you cannot impact but have to consider to succeed.

You need to be able to fully explain who should buy your product and more importantly why. What is their problem? What do they want? Hint: they don’t want your features. They want some kind of value, an outcome that gives them a benefit. The benefit is many times not functional but rather psychological, emotional, political (within an org), or social. 

Another pitfall is forgetting that people need to buy the product. Buying and paying for something requires them to be active, they need to take action, and it doesn’t happen by itself. In order for them to do so, the value needs to be significant enough. Remember that any buying process has friction – not because you did something wrong but because of the nature of the process: It requires them to decide that they want to buy, if it’s a major purchase they would want to consider alternatives to see that they are making the right choice, they need to find the budget (even in B2C they would usually at least think about it), and of course make the actual purchase. There could be other things on the line here, like their reputation in the org (unless you are IBM 😉 ), so buying a product really is a big deal.

If you want your potential customers to go through that big deal for you, you must make sure they have a good reason to do so – a significant problem that you are solving for them, and a good explanation of how you solve it the way they want and why they should pick you over the alternatives they have. Again, it’s not about features or your product. It’s not about your company either, it’s about them.

Build an Initial Version

Connecting all the dots together requires hard thinking. It’s very hard to do that in your head. I always recommend putting it in writing, even if things still don’t make sense. It is much easier to read what you wrote multiple times and figure out what’s missing, than grappling with it over and over in your thoughts alone.

Writing it down also forces you to think about every word, which is something that you cannot do when this is just an abstract thought. 

Iterate your written story a few times, until you feel that with everything you know this is the best explanation for your customer’s world and their need for your solution. Of course, you need to define what your solution is (it’s not your product, it’s the approach you take and the magic ingredients you bring to the solution, as I explained in my product circuit model). 

To build this, you should rely on what you already know and/or assume. Let yourself work freely so that you can use your knowledge without self-criticism. Once you wrote things, then it’s time to check whether you believe what you wrote or not. One way to do so is to mark each sentence in the story as either a fact or an assumption that still needs to be validated. But allowing yourself to include assumptions in the story is the missing glue that would often allow you to stick pieces together.

Talk It Out

I always say that if it doesn’t make sense on paper, it won’t make sense in reality. But even if it does make sense on paper, you still need to test it in reality. When you first take it to the world to see if your story still makes sense, start with a friendly environment. 

Share the story with your colleagues, advisors, friendly investors, friends, and family. Even if they are not from your domain and are unable to get all the details, this will still help you: First, you will get used to talking about it, and as you do so you will realize that you might have a missing link. It’s like building a presentation and thinking that you have included everything you need, but when you actually present it you see that something doesn’t work in the flow. Talking about it makes the story better. The other benefit is that you would need to explain it in simpler words and concepts, and that’s usually a good idea anyway since we tend to over-complicate our communication around product and strategy.

Once you feel you are ready, start talking about it in your real playground – with potential customers. Beyond direct feedback (which you cannot always trust), look at their immediate reactions. Where in the story do they sit tight and listen? Where do they nod in agreement? Do you get any responses like “yes, this happened to me just last week”? These are all indicators that you are able to accurately represent their world. If all you get is “yes, it’s nice”, you are probably not there yet.

Iterate

As with anything else in product development, your strategy needs iterations too. Some of it is because you weren’t able to articulate your message right, or haven’t yet found the right logical structure. Some of it though is because as you go you constantly learn new things about the world.

Like the glass sheets on the truck – some of the details you might see only when you get closer, but these are the details that matter and change everything. I cannot count the number of times I worked with a startup on their product strategy, and sent them to do this work, and suddenly it all clicked because of a random word they heard.

Keep your eyes, ears, and mind open, and stay patient. Eventually, if your idea is indeed a good one and if you work the right way, you will be able to find the glue that makes everything fall into place. Maybe your missing piece is just around the corner. Keep looking until you find it.