A platform's immediate user is the developer. However, to demonstrate true value, you must also understand and solve for the developer's end customer. This "two-hop" thinking is essential for connecting platform work to tangible business outcomes, not just internal technical improvements.

As software commoditizes, the buying experience itself becomes a key differentiator. Map the entire customer journey, from awareness to renewal, and design unique, valuable interactions at each stage. This shifts the focus from transactional selling to creating a memorable, human-centric experience that drives purchasing decisions.

Don't force your sales team to learn and sell a completely new product. Instead, integrate the new capability into an existing, successful product, making it "first" or "default" for that channel. This reduces sales friction and complexity, leveraging established momentum for adoption.

To grow an established product, introduce new formats (e.g., Instagram Stories, Google AI Mode) as separate but integrated experiences. This allows you to tap into new user behaviors without disrupting the expectations and mental models users have for the core product, avoiding confusion and accelerating adoption.

After reaching scale, a product's dormant user base is a massive growth opportunity. Activating these users requires designing specific return experiences, like Duolingo’s proficiency tests, which can be a bigger lever than new user acquisition.

Figma learned that removing issues preventing users from adopting the product was as important as adding new features. They systematically tackled these blockers—often table stakes features—and saw a direct, measurable improvement in retention and activation after fixing each one.

The 48 minutes per month that users waste on login issues isn't just an annoyance; it's a direct productivity loss for the "extended enterprise." For a company with thousands of suppliers, this reclaimed time represents a significant ROI for investing in seamless, passwordless access.