How to build a product 101

The Birth of an Idea

Every great product starts with an idea. We have sat across countless coffee tables and video calls, listening to passionate founders share their vision.

The spark in their eyes is universal, they've identified a problem and thought of a potential solution. However, the inevitable question always ends up being: "How do we actually build this?"

That's exactly what we want to explore here. Let’s use a recipe app called "GetCooking" as our guide. The idea seems simple enough: an app where users can save, share, and import recipes. But we'll discover, there's much more beneath the surface.

Whether you're a founder with just an idea or already knee-deep in development, this roadmap will hopefully help you understand the complete journey of bringing a digital product to life.

Why This Matters

Why walk through this entire process? Because in our years of product development, we've seen too many ideas suffer gravely not due to lack of vision, but due to unexpected technical hurdles or missed critical steps.

Understanding the full scope of product development helps you make better and more informed decisions, allocate resources wisely, and most importantly build something users will actually want to use.

Understanding Your Users

Before writing a single line of code or designing any screens, we always start with user research. In our experience, this step often makes the difference between a product people will value and one they forget.

For GetCooking, we'd need to understand:

• Who are our target users? (Home cooks, professional chefs, busy parents?)

• What are their current pain points with existing recipe apps?

• How do they currently save and share recipes?

• Which devices do they primarily use while cooking?

In an ideal world, the following steps would be executed:

• User interviews (at least 10-15 target users)

• Competitive analysis

• If possible, perhaps product validation through user surveys

Mapping the User Experience

Once we understand our users, it's time to map out their journey. For GetCooking, we need to consider several key flows:

1. User Authentication:

   • Email signup/login

   • Google/Apple authentication

   • Password recovery

2. Core Features:

   • Recipe creation

   • Recipe import

   • Recipe sharing

   • Search and discovery

First step will always be user flow diagrams. They're invaluable for identifying potential issues early and ensuring a smooth user experience.

Designing Your Product

Now comes the fun part - bringing your vision to life visually. The design process typically follows this progression:

1. Wireframes:

   • Information architecture

   • High-fidelity wireframes

   • User flow validation

2. UI Design:

   • Brand identity development

   • Color scheme selection

   • Typography choices

   • Component library creation

   • Layout designs

   • Graphics, animations and interactions

The importance of starting with a design system can’t and shouldn’t be ignored. It saves countless hours later in the development process and ensures the use of consistent design throughout the product.

Common Pitfalls to Avoid

The common things that easily derail a project and often catch founders off-guard are:

• Scope Creep: Starting with too many features can delay launch and drain resources. A 3-month project shouldn’t turn into a 9-month delay. Making a polished MVP and getting to the market is almost always more important than being perfect.

• Technical Debt: Poor architectural decisions in the beginning can easily triple your development costs later. It's always more expensive to fix than to build right the first time.

• Design Afterthought: Treating design as merely aesthetics rather than core functionality. Users don’t want to use an app that confuses them.

• Market Assumptions: Building in isolation without continuous user feedback isn’t advisable. You have to study the market and the competitive landscape and then determine your own positioning.

• Resource Underestimation: Not accounting for ongoing maintenance and updates. Hosting a backend on a cloud service costs money. More users cost more bandwidth which will increase your monthly cloud services bill.

Keeping these challenges in mind will help you make better decisions throughout the product building process.

Technical Architecture

Here's where things get technical. For an app like GetCooking, you'll need:

1. Frontend:

   • Mobile app (iOS/Android)

   • Native development for each platform, or

   • React Native or Flutter for cross-platform development

   • State management solution

2. Backend:

   • API development

   • Database design

   • Image storage solution

3. Cloud Services:

   • AWS/Azure/Google Cloud etc. for hosting

   • Authentication services

   • CDN for image delivery

   • Analytics tools

Building Your Website Landing Page

It’s not merely enough to build an app, you need a website landing page for it as well. A place where you can showcase your app on the web, direct users to download the app and hopefully drive more traffic towards your app. SEO is a powerful tool when implemented and used correctly.

We typically structure product landing pages with at least the following details:

• Hero section with clear value proposition

• Feature highlights

• Social proof

• Download/signup CTAs

• FAQ section

• Contact information

Development Phase

Development isn't just about coding. That comes a bit later, first it's crucial to:

• Set up the development environment:

  • Version control (Git)

  • CI/CD pipelines

  • Testing frameworks

  • Code review processes

Only after that (or at-least some of those steps) comes the coding part:

1. Implement core features:

   • User authentication

   • Recipe CRUD operations

   • Search functionality

   • Social sharing features

2. Focus on performance:

   • Image optimization

   • Caching strategies

   • API response times

   • App load times

3. Testing throughly

   • A closed beta can be very useful in this regard

Beyond Launch: The Reality of Product Evolution

The journey doesn't end once the app is ready, that is where it actually starts rolling. All successful products will:

• Actively listen to early user feedback

• Adapt quickly to real-world usage patterns

• Scale thoughtfully based on demand

• Maintain a clear vision while being flexible in execution

Your Next Steps

Doesn’t matter where you are in your product building journey, whether you have a name on a coffee shop napkin or ready to build a landing page website, your journey will be quite unique.

We support founders wherever they are in their product building journey

• Just an idea? Let's get on a call and explore its potential

• Need validation? We'll help with user research

• Ready for design? Our UI/UX will bring your vision to life

• Looking for Comprehensive Branding: We got your back

• Looking for development? From landing pages to full-stack applications, we've got you covered

• Already launched? Perhaps it’s time to refine your website to attract more users. May be some new graphics to delight your users

Start Your Journey

Building a digital product isn't just about following steps, it's about creating something meaningful that solves real problems. Whether you need end-to-end development or expertise at a specific stage, we're here to help transform your vision into reality.

Got an idea you want to discuss? We're always excited to hear about new concepts.Hit us up at [email protected] or book a free consultation call.

Building something great starts with a conversation. Let's have one.