By: John S. Morlu II, CPA
Spoiler: It’s Not Because the Market “Wasn’t Ready.” It’s Because You Weren’t.
Let’s get something out of the way: most products fail not because people are stupid, or “the market just didn’t get it,” but because the product was built for a unicorn riding a Segway through Silicon Valley—not for the actual human being it’s supposed to serve.
You built a mobile app for goat herders in Chad… that only works with 5G.
You launched a savings app… for people who don’t have enough left at the end of the day to save for a bus fare.
You created a fitness tracker… for people whose idea of exercise is avoiding potholes.
Let’s talk about why real-life products fail spectacularly—and how to make something that people will actually use, love, and tell their cousin about.
1. The Myth of the “Average User” (They Don’t Exist)
There is no average user. There’s Ahmed, a mechanic in rural Egypt who can rebuild a diesel engine blindfolded but doesn’t understand what “refresh your browser” means. There’s Susan, a single mother in Arkansas who balances three jobs and has exactly 42 seconds a day to look at an app. There’s Raj, who owns a tea stall in Kolkata and uses WhatsApp better than your entire product team combined.
Fun Fact: 85% of new product features are never used.
Instead of building for imaginary people, start with actual people. Real ones. With messy lives, cracked phones, and limited time.
2. Your User Experience Needs Therapy
If your app has ten steps before anything useful happens, it’s not onboarding—it’s hazing. Mariana, a small business owner in Mexico, is just trying to figure out where the “Pay Now” button is before her toddler eats the receipt.
Pro Tip: Build your interface like it’s going to be used in a bumpy bus by someone who skipped breakfast and has low battery.
3. Features Are Not Strategy. Simplicity Is.
You don’t need to out-feature your competitors. You need to out-understand your users.
Johan, a farmer in Sweden, doesn’t want blockchain traceability for his potatoes. He wants to know whether the co-op received his delivery and when he’ll get paid.
Zainab, a schoolteacher in rural Pakistan, isn’t looking for gamified learning analytics. She wants a mobile-friendly quiz generator that works in low bandwidth.
Rule of Thumb: If your product can’t pass the grandma test, the goat test, or the “I’m-tired-and-haven’t-had-coffee” test, it’s too complicated.
4. Your Real Competition Is “I’ll Just Do It the Old Way”
You launch a fancy order tracking system. Meanwhile, Mama Ceesay in The Gambia is sending WhatsApp voice notes to all her customers: “Your onions dey come tomorrow. Tell Lamin be ready.”
If your product can’t beat that? Back to the whiteboard.
In rural Alabama, Frank, who runs a feed store, still tracks sales with a pen and a wall calendar. You want to digitize his process? First, make sure your system loads faster than him scribbling with a Sharpie.
5. Humor Is the Shortcut to Trust
Put a joke in your 404 page. Use local idioms. Make your empty state screens fun. People forgive flaws if they trust the tone.
Fun Tidbit: A fintech app increased conversion by 19% just by changing the error message from “Invalid PIN” to “Hmm… that PIN doesn’t look right. Wanna try again?”
6. Build With, Not At, Your Users
Go to where people are. Watch them work, play, stress, hustle, relax. Ask dumb questions. Listen more than you talk.
Whether your user is a seamstress in Beirut, a woodworker in Romania, or a shopkeeper in Mississippi, build like their time is precious, their patience is thin, and their life matters—because it does.
Jeff Bezos once said: “We want to build something that helps people. If it doesn’t help real people, we’re not interested.”
That’s your filter. Does it solve a real problem? Does it help a real person? Or is it just more software made to impress investors at brunch?
Because the best product in the world isn’t the one with the most features. It’s the one that gets used, loved, and passed along like a well-kept secret.
Build that. And the rest will follow.
Author: John S. Morlu II, CPA | CEO & Chief Strategist of JS Morlu
John leads a Virginia-based CPA firm using business-smart technology to help people solve real problems. His portfolio includes innovations like:
• www.FinovatePro.com
• www.fixaars.com
• www.ReckSoft.com