The Product Ideas Newsletter #9
the key to innovation, cohort-based courses, and saddles as wellness products
1 Prompt
The CEO of Slack famously explained “We don’t sell saddles here”. Instead, metaphorically speaking, they’re selling the lifestyle of horseback riding to the masses.
Similarly, Jeff Morris Jr. observed: “Superhuman is a productivity tool on the surface. But for people who use the product everyday, Superhuman is closer to a wellness product.”
Another great example is how Conor White-Sullivan’s Roam which is a wellness product disguised as a note-taking tool.
Hence ask yourself: What regular product could you turn into a “wellness product”?
1 Opportunity
Regular lectures are far from effective and putting them online does more harm than good.
But slowly a far more effective, online-first course approach starts to gain traction: "premium group-coaching experiences”.
Tiago Forte and David Perell have massive success with their premium cohort-based courses and just a few days ago, the first big startup in the field was announced by Gagan Biyani, the co-founder of Udemy. This validates that the economics make sense, that there is demand, and that “smart money” (e.g. Naval Ravikant, Sahil Lavingia, & Austen Allred) think it’s an idea worth pursuing.
Nevertheless, it’s still early and there is lots of room for niche-focused offers.
1 Thought
"Few ideas work on the first try. Iteration is key to innovation." - Sebastian Thrun