[0xferruccio]

Tuft and Needle started selling with a fake landing page to validate their idea.

Once they got their first sale for a mattress they started working on the company. (source: their indiehackers interview)

Hotjar started a super successful referral campaign before having a working product.

Pietr Levels validated features with a fake credit card form to see if people would pay for some membership.

And there are countless other examples. Building a landing page that explains the product or a proof of concept isn’t building the product, if something can help you give the idea of what you have in mind build it.

[mrtksn]

Cool, thank you!

I think I took the "selling" word a bit too literally.

[0xferruccio]

Happy this conversation helped you :)

I find this topic to be really sensitive to me as I find that the first impact with the customer is always a big reality check for every idea I have.

I often find myself building what “I think” people/companies want, but I think it’s healthy to try and build what they’re already willing to pay for!

[mrtksn]

Oh, it happens to me too. As techies maybe we think in the context of "Wouldn't be cool if..." and just really want to believe that it's not just cool but actually people will use it and pay for it and ignore the signs of the opposite as long as we can because it's really cool and sure people will come around and see how cool it is if I can make it shinier.