Right Product at the Right Time
Keep trying until you hit the right product launch at the right time for right target users
When we think of products that fit to the above description, WhatsApp comes first in mind. Struggling founders with strong beliefs and vision are key to its success. The famous quote from co-founder Brian Acton, ‘No Ads! No Games! No Gimmicks!’ shows their strong beliefs on creating a solution to a real-life problem with commitment to no-nonsense.
WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum reportedly came up with the idea in 2009 after his gym banned the use of cell phones. Koum became annoyed at missing calls during his workout and decided to create a solution, notes this Mashable report.
During the early stages, there were times when Koum thought of giving up. Their initial user acceptance test was carried out on Koum’s Russian friends. But Brian insisted to hang on for some more time (few more months). When iPhone came up with push notifications feature, WhatsApp was quick to leverage it and immediately rolled out its feature wherein users would get notified when a friend changes status, or sends a message. Source: Wikipedia
How did the two realize their dream? Is there an answer to planning your product well ahead for the right time, and right audience? Lets find out by digging a bit deeper to what happened in 2009 within WhatsApp:
Key Features:
- WhatsApp was essentially a product to allow users message each other for free, using internet on their phone
- It also allowed them call friends from within the app (normal phone call)
- Login would not ask users to enter any details like email, password, etc, rather simply focused on taking mobile number, which was essential for messaging
- It came up with the feature message delivery status- ‘read’ for users to understand where the message is in its journey, long before iMessage came up with it
- That’s it! It was really nothing much, simplicity was the key. It maintained no ads policy since the beginning
Here’s a suggestive roadmap of what would have been the plan during the early launches:
One important learning from the early phases of whatsApp:
Make the solution easy to understand and use, for the users! In the times of various types of fancy and non-fancy web instant messaging services bloom, whatsApp was able to tap the market by keeping the product simple to use- no login details required, no need to create a new address book- it populated contacts from your phone, no hassles of selecting unique usernames, one goal: free messaging to loved ones! And that summarizes how it was the right product at the right time for the right customer!
