24 products
What was the first thing you did after you got up this morning? Maybe you placed your feet on the floor and reached for your phone. Or you slipped into your slippers and somehow made your way to the bathroom, where you handled the usual morning routine. Perhaps you went straight for a shower.
Maybe you’re the type of person who needs coffee before anything else, with the smell of fresh brewed coffee helping you wake up. If tea or fruit juice is more your thing, that can wake you up too. Then comes breakfast—whether it’s eggs, oatmeal, toast, or fruit.
At some point, your day gets underway. If you have children, you might get them washed, dressed, and fed before school. Or maybe you grab your laptop, stash it in your duffle bag or rucksack, and car keys. If you’re commuting, perhaps you take a 10-minute walk to the station.
If you follow a largely Western lifestyle, in the first hour and a half of your day, you’ve already used at least 24 different products.
A phone, the messages app on your phone, slippers, shower soap, shampoo, body lotion, shaving or face cream, or a deodorant, coffee beans and a grinder, or coffee capsules, or tea bags. Milk – whether dairy, almond, soy, or oat – sugar, honey, or sweetener. Eggs, toast, jam, or cheese, or maybe your favourite brand of oatmeal. Then your children’s clothes, trainers, your own clothes, your laptop, duffle bag or rucksack, tissues, a phone charger with cable, the car and its fuel or electric charge, or, if you’re commuting, a train pass.
That’s 24 products in less than two hours. If you think about the entire day, you’ve probably come into contact with a hundred or more.
The exact products you use depend on your brand preferences. You might mix things up now and then or go for a backup option if your preferred brand isn’t available.
But how do you choose a product or brand in the first place? And how do you know if you’ll like it? The only way to know is by trying it out. Maybe you recognise the brand, or you’ve had something similar from them before, so you give it a go. And if it does what you expected – or even better – you’ll probably buy it again.
That’s how it works with most consumer products. Whether it’s something significant or small, you decide whether to stick with it based on how well it meets your needs. And most products do what you expect them to do.
But with the majority of products out there doing what you expect, how do you know which ones you’ll go back to? A lot of it happens instinctively. Sometimes you think it through, but more often, it’s your gut feeling and past experiences that guide you. When you pick up a jar of tomato sauce, you might consider the brand, the packaging, or the ingredients. Once you’ve found, tried and liked it, you tend to stick with it – unless something makes you reconsider. Maybe you’ll try a cheaper brand to see if it compares to the one you like.
Most products made to fulfil a purpose do exactly what they’re designed to do. But it’s the quality – and how well they meet or surpass our expectations – that has the biggest influence on our choices. Good advertising might grab your attention, but it can’t make up for a product that doesn’t deliver.
When you shop, you rely on your intuition, your knowledge, and what you want in that moment. You look for products that meet your needs, and sometimes, you find something unexpected that catches your interest. If it sparks your curiosity, you might give it a try—even if you don’t need it right now.
It’s the job of manufacturers, developers, and researchers to create products that not only meet basic needs but go beyond them—offering a reliable, even delightful, experience. Their goal is to win your trust and bring you back to buy their product again. And if they succeed, you might even tell your friends about it.
That’s what this book is for. Whether you’re developing a product idea, figuring out why something didn’t work, or searching for the right products for your company, understanding how to build trust in products and services is key to business success.
Who should read this book?
Are you a product designer? Then you may have heard of Design Thinking, and you may have experience in either industrial design or Web and mobile app productions. Or maybe you’re a software engineer or a product manager? If so, you can probably skip the chapter on agile development and team-building.
This book wasn’t written mainly for industry experts. If you’re deeply entrenched in product management, software development, or UX design, you’ll find many of the concepts here familiar. The book is for those who don’t have a background in product development but have an idea or vision they want to bring to life.
If you’ve worked in marketing or sales, you probably know how to launch a product and get it into the market—but when it comes to creating a product from scratch, you might not know where to start or how to align its features with what customers actually need. That’s where this book comes in. It will guide you through what to look for in customer research and help you design something that genuinely connects with your audience.
The stories and anecdotes in this book will help you better understand complex concepts, making them easier to grasp, even if you’re not an expert in design, production, or development. Real-world examples—like the journeys of Segway, Thermomix or Slack—will make it easier to relate to your own experiences.
These stories will also show you that product development isn’t just for large companies with endless resources. Even successful products often start with challenges, pivots, and lessons learned. By seeing this process in action, you’ll find the idea of creating a product less daunting and more achievable, no matter where you are in your journey.
Have you already built something but you’re unsure who your audience is or why they’d want to buy it? The book will help you identify your market and understand why certain products succeed while others don’t.
Never before in history has creating products been so accessible, with so many resources available to anyone with an idea. Most of the tools you’ll need are out there for free, along with a wealth of knowledge. There’s easy access to information, whether it’s through this book, an online course, or free programmes offered by universities.
While a bachelor’s or master’s degree and years of experience might make you an expert, you don’t need a degree to come up with a product idea that can succeed in its market.
This book won’t go into depth with every concept, nor will it cover technical details of building an engineers team or developing software. But it will provide an overview of what these concepts and tools are, how they work, and why they matter. If you want to dive deeper – whether to learn how to structure a team or understand the software development process – you’ll probably want to do your own research. But after reading this book, you’ll have a strong foundation and a clear understanding of what to look for when you’re hiring experts or building out your own product team.
Whether you’ve never built a product before or you’re looking to refine your approach, this book provides guidance through key principles and concepts that will set you on the right path. While it covers the foundational steps, it’s up to you to apply them and dive deeper where needed. The book won’t hand you every answer, but it will give you the starting points to ask the right questions, take the right actions, and push your product idea forward with confidence.
Ultimately, the aim is to equip you with the confidence to take your product idea forward—no matter where you’re starting from. The journey begins here, but the work is yours to complete.
