Apurva Gupta, senior designer at Amazon, shares the steps that Amazon takes in designing its software products and how you can create a great product that people want to use.Designing a product from scratch can be like driving at night: The road ahead is dark, and only a few feet in front of you are illuminated by your headlights
Determine who your user is
The first and biggest question you need to ask is “who are you building for?”
- While building a new product, Amazon made a list of potential user groups: software developers, business analysts, data scientists, designers, researchers, marketers, etc.
- The product team reached out to potential users in those roles and spoke with them about their pain points and needs.
Test whether your assumptions are valid
Put it in front of the people most likely to use it
- Treat your prototypes as conversation pieces to validate your design and identify potential use cases
- Find out if there is something for the future that you can put on the road map
Understand how the product will grow
Have an idea of what it will look like down the road
- Decide what data points to use to measure the success of your product
- These metrics will help you decide what features to roll out later on and will ensure you have a product that keeps users engaged for years to come
