Your product can be a swiss army knife or a steak knife. You can do a little bit of everything and delight no-one. Or you can do less and do it better.
The swiss army app ticks every feature checklist. It does a bit of everything – appeasing everyone but delighting no-one. The majority of features work fine for covering a wide variety of potential use cases.
But the lack of focus results in a common occurrence: “You can technically achieve that desired outcome, but it would be easier if …”
A professional cook can prepare food with a swiss army knife. But it would be a hell of a lot easier with a bigger, sharper knife.
Enter: The Steak Knife App
Meanwhile, the steak knife approach lets you laser focus on designing experiences that delight people and drive value.
It targets specific user personas – supporting the most important outcomes they want to achieve and building the very best experience possible for them.
Even ignoring Apple App Clips and Android Instant Apps, we’ve seen the deconstruction of bloated all-in-one super apps into focused, lightweight, and streamlined experiences.
For product owners, it’s just a matter of focusing on who you’re building for, what they want to do, why they want to do it, and what’s getting in the way.
Because, be honest, how are the ruler and tweezers helping?