Ease of Use is Everything
You must invest in high quality design to succeed.
Why? Isn’t it a luxury? Couldn’t we hire a designer once things take off?
I don’t think so. And here’s why. It’s one thing if you’re selling custom applications to specific companies, because they’re probably stuck using Excel. If you’ve landed the contract, then you’ve already sold them on the benefits, and they’re happy to learn a new tool.
But if you’re trying to sell a product to many customers, then your product better be brilliantly simple. The danger here is not that the customers won’t want to spend money. The danger is that they will feel threatened, because they don’t understand your new technology.
If your software is brilliantly simple, then they can understand it. They won’t fear it. They’ll be more open to change.
There were other MP3 players before the iPod. Only the early adopters used them. Once Apple released the iPod, the market exploded. Apple didn’t just steal the early adopter market. By creating an easy to use, easy to understand product, they created a new market from the people who didn’t even realize they wanted an MP3 player.
It’s your job to do the same.