56. Don’t Treat Your Users Like Lab Rats

No one likes to feel like they’re being used. When we build software and don’t validate it until we push everything to production, there’s a good chance our users will feel like they are part of an experiment. In this episode, we discuss the many opportunities to validate along the way and how you might go about making sure the thing you release to your full user base is what they really want or need. The fact is, there are many ways to validate your product throughout the product life cycle. If you’re waiting to validate your assumptions until the final release, there’s a good chance you are treating your users like a bunch of lab rats. And there’s an equally good chance they won’t like it. Topics:• 02:05 – If software is an experiment, who are our lab rats?• 04:52 – Make sure it’s a controlled experiment.• 06:08 – Make sure you build in a way that allows iteration• 07:30 – There are many ways we can validate our apps.• 11:25 – We need to validate early and often.• 12:55 – Don’t make your users feel like lab rats.• 15:08 – If you can recover quickly, users won’t feel like lab rats.• 15:28 – Allow your users to opt into new features.• 18:00 – Try to limit collateral damage when making big changes.• 18:37 – Investing in dynamic content might seem like a huge investment, but it will pay dividends.• 19:34 – How do we measure success? —– Thanks for listening! We hope you enjoyed today’s episode. If you liked what you heard, be sure to like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts! If you enjoyed today’s episode, please leave a comment and a five-star review. It helps us out a ton. If you haven’t already, sign up for our email list. We won’t spam you. Pinky swear. • Check out our website • Follow us on twitter • Find us on Facebook • Subscribe on Google Podcasts • Subscribe on Apple Podcasts • Subscribe on Spotify • Subscribe on Stitcher Photo by Ranjith Jaya on Unsplash