Noisy features

There are companies which evolve through an unique product and they focus on that product a lot.

This focus is positive, but there is a moment where all that success provokes an inertia where you are not able to diversify and overexploit the product.

Some solutions try to increase their value and/or monetize more, breaking the law of the needs.
You can try to anticipate to user needs, but you need to respect the natural pace of evolution of needs. When this pace is not respected, then it provokes noise.

I have built this visual representation with a Wardley Map:

Note that I have used inertia in a vertical way, which it wrong by concept, but I hope it could be understood that solutions that fit well, they have a limit. The inertia limit represents the ceiling of that solution.

Noisy feature sequence

There are many ways and factors that can make this different, but I wanted to comment a pattern I use to see, and which I hope it serves for reflection.

1. You are successful offering a solution to a need and are willing to create more value to your user.
   • To be successful means to have enough cash in the balance.
   • Enough money that the CFO is telling you: we have to invest more, no matter where we do it.
2. You speculate about new needs the client could have, or try to monetize more your solution.
3. Build new features to promote value increase.
4. User perceives this as noise (I do not need this!!).
5. Certain users will look for a similar solution at better price. Potentially a competitor that moves quickly to next stage of evolution.

Where do I find this common?

I find it usually in companies that only have one product, where they have been focused on that only product. This focus is required to execute the plans properly, but the product fit has a limit and overload the product with features or force the value provided over the real needs is counterproductive.

Some examples?

• Zoom: when they were trying to turn a communications product into an integrator of applications.
• Meetup: when they have tried to monetize by RSVPs to the organizers of events.

What is the alternative?

To jump from being a “one product company” to a “two products company” is a tough process, specially to the ones that have a very niche product.

Decide on following the current product evolution or jump into a complete different space is tough. To diversify and know how to do it is tougher.

The other alternative is to be patient

Listen to your users, understand what are the real needs they have, and attend them. Patience is the forgotten ability that we all should cultivate. This is specially not well considered in software industry where all goes at high pace of evolution, and there is FOMO in every corner of the territory.

The best example of patient I know

comes in the book “good strategy, bad strategy”

“In the summer of 1998, I got an opportunity to talk with Jobs again. I said, “Steve, this turnaround at
Apple has been impressive. But everything we know about the PC business says that Apple cannot
really push beyond a small niche position. The network effects are just too strong to upset the Wintel
standard. So what are you trying to do in the longer term? What is the strategy?”
He did not attack my argument. He didn’t agree with it, either. He just smiled and said, “I am going
to wait for the next big thing.”