Working on a startup is tough as there an endless number of mistakes you can make that will kill the project. Happily, there are also some best practices that increase the odds for an overall success. Let's talk about them and analyze tools you might need to follow the advice.

1. Study your users

For sure, you will have lots of ideas on how to make your product better. However, it is not easy to distinguish between a bad idea and the good one. Also, the idea might be useful but is not worthy of implementing right now.

To make everything right, you need to conduct a so-called customer development. This is a set of interviews with your users and customers. You should develop a set of interview questions answers to which will allow you to understand the real pains of your customers, what they do not know about the product.

This will allow you to take data-backed decisions, that might not seem evident at the beginning, but will be beneficial for the product and its users.

Tools to use: SurveyMonkey, Usertesting

2. Build the prototype and test it

The next step is to develop a quick and not so expensive prototype of the new features you've come up after talking to users.

Even though people told you they need something does not necessarily mean they will actually use it. It is better to detect such situations before you've invested tons of resources and time in building something. So, you can create a simple prototype with a limited feature set, run some test advertising campaigns, and conduct some more customer development to collect the feedback.

Tools to use: Invision, Proto.io

3. Analyze the performance

Once you've tested the features and rolled them out to all of the users, it is the right time to analyze the real performance in detail. To do this, you will both measure important parameters over time and on the go.

Modern analytics tools offer endless analysis opportunities and you can merge, visualize and analyze all the needed data in one place. Once you've created such a data hub, you will be able to monitor all the related product data and its users with ease.

Tools to use: Mixpanel, Datapine

What is your approach for building and developing a great product?

3 Steps Towards Building a Successful Software Product