How to Build Products Users Love
Speaker: Kevin Hale (Founder of Wufoo, YC Partner)
Core Philosophy
The goal is to create products that generate a passionate user base—users who unconditionally want the product and company to succeed. While many focus on the math of growth, Hale suggests focusing on the human scale.
The Growth Equation: Growth is simply the interaction between Conversion Rate and Churn.
- Conversion: Getting people to say "Yes."
- Churn: Keeping people from saying "No" later.
The Wufoo Approach: To reach $1 billion, focus on the values that got you your first dollar. Wufoo was an outlier: they raised very little capital ($118k) but generated a massive return for investors (29,561%) by focusing on product love rather than just utility.
Part 1: Acquisition (The "Dating" Metaphor)
Acquiring new users is like dating. Humans are relationship-manufacturing creatures; we anthropomorphize products and assign them personalities.
1. First Impressions Matter
Just like on a first date, the threshold for failure is low. If a product fails early (e.g., a "nose-picking" moment), the user leaves.
- The Opportunity: Most companies focus on marketing for first impressions. Product-focused companies use every touchpoint: the first email, the login screen, the error message, and the first support ticket.
2. Japanese Quality Concepts
To build love, you must understand two types of quality:
- Atarimae Hinshitsu (Taken for Granted Quality): Pure functionality. If a pen doesn't write, nothing else matters.
- Miryokuteki Hinshitsu (Enchanting Quality): The aesthetic, the weight, the joy of using it.
3. Examples of "Seduction" in Product
- Wufoo: A login screen with a dinosaur that says "RARRR!" when hovered over. It doesn't add function, but it makes users smile.
- Vimeo: Playful interactions on the site (e.g., searching for "fart" makes noises).
- Forms: Writing copy that feels human or poetic rather than robotic (e.g., Cork’d sign-up form).
- Stripe: Documentation that auto-populates code snippets with the user's actual API keys when logged in.
Part 2: Retention (The "Marriage" Metaphor)
Keeping existing users is like a successful marriage.
1. Predicting Success (The John Gottman Research)
Relationship researcher John Gottman can predict divorce with high accuracy by watching a couple fight.
- The Lesson: How you handle conflict (Customer Support) predicts your long-term retention.
- Common Fight Topics: Money, Kids, Sex, Time, In-laws.
- Startup Equivalents: Pricing, Client management, Performance/Speed, Competitors/Partnerships.
2. The Four Horsemen of Churn
Gottman identified four behaviors that predict relationship failure. These apply directly to customer support:
- Criticism: Users attacking the company's character ("You never listen").
- Contempt: Purposefully insulting the user.
- Defensiveness: Making excuses rather than taking accountability.
- Stonewalling: Ignoring the user. This is the worst behavior. Ignoring support tickets is a primary cause of early-stage churn.
3. Solution: Support Driven Development (SDD)
The feedback loop in startups is often broken because developers are insulated from the consequences of their code.
- The Fix: Everyone does customer support.
- Benefits: Engineers fix bugs immediately to stop the "phone from ringing." It builds empathy and results in higher quality software.
- The Airbnb Example: Early founders did everything, including taking photos of apartments and handling support calls, which helped them understand the market.
[Image of software development feedback loop]
Part 3: Tactics & Experiments
Wufoo ran specific experiments to increase "User Intimacy."
- The Emotion Dropdown: Added a field in support forms asking users how they felt (e.g., Confused, Angry, Worried).
- Result: Users became nicer/more rational. Developers gained empathy.
- The "Since You've Been Gone" Alert: A system that showed users exactly what new features were shipped since their last login.
- Result: Users felt they were getting constant value for their subscription.
- Handwritten Thank You Notes: Every Friday, the team wrote handwritten cards to users.
- Result: Built a tightly knit team culture and surprised users who weren't expecting physical gratitude from a software company.
Part 4: Market Dominance Strategy
According to Treacy and Wiersema, there are three paths to market dominance. You must pick one to excel at:
- Best Price (Operational Excellence): e.g., Walmart, Amazon.
- Best Product (Product Leadership): e.g., Apple.
- Best Overall Solution (Customer Intimacy): e.g., Luxury brands, Hospitality.
- Kevin's Advice: Customer Intimacy is the only path accessible to startups with no money. It requires only humility and manners.
Q&A Highlights
- On Multiple User Types: Focus strictly on the most passionate niche first. If you try to appeal to everyone, you appeal to no one.
- On Marketing vs. Product: Marketing is a "tax" you pay for not making your product remarkable. If the product is great, your users become your sales force.
- On Product Roadmap: Look at customer support. Users will tell you exactly what is wrong. Fix the underlying issue, not just the symptom.
- On Remote Work:
- Requires a 15-minute rule: If a chat/call takes longer than 15 minutes, table it until the weekly meeting.
- Focus on "protected time" (3 days a week) where engineers can code without interruption.
- On Hiring: Don't just interview. Contract candidates for a small 1-month project. Test their ability to handle support (e.g., ask them to write a "break-up letter" to a customer) to check for empathy.
