&l;span&g;What sets successful consumer tech startups apart from the fads is how their products impact customers&a;rsquo; two most precious commodities: time and money. We&a;rsquo;ve all heard the saying &l;em&g;better, faster, cheaper;&l;/em&g; this is how to apply it with precision.&l;/span&g;
&l;span&g;Eckhart Tolle fans will concur that all we really have is the &a;ldquo;now,&a;rdquo; so how does your product make each moment &l;em&g;better&l;/em&g;? Consider music listening. &l;strong&g;Spotify&l;/strong&g; entered a market dominated by iTunes with a subscription service offering access to millions of songs for a single, monthly fee. Without the decision fatigue of pondering whether each new song was worth $1 to access, customers enjoyed &l;em&g;better&l;/em&g; listening time&l;em&g;, &l;/em&g;filled with more, higher quality music. By the end of 2018, 96 million customers had concluded the subscription fee was worth it. Many moments are also spent deciding on and using physical goods. Buyers looking to feel &l;em&g;better&l;/em&g; about themselves will be drawn towards platforms like &l;strong&g;Poshmark &l;/strong&g;or&l;strong&g; StockX &l;/strong&g;that highlight branded merchandise.&l;/span&g;
&l;em&g;&l;span&g;Faster&l;/span&g;&l;/em&g;&l;span&g; is more straightforward. Consumers love to find products that deliver the same result in less time. &l;strong&g;Instacart&l;/strong&g; offers one example, saving busy shoppers an hour by avoiding a trip to their favorite grocery store. This simple convenience exploited a billion-dollar opportunity. &l;em&g;Faster&l;/em&g; can come in both big and small packages, and some of the most easily overlooked opportunities are streamlining frequently performed actions. Keyless car entry, voice assistants and touchpad scrolling are all innovations that have enhanced millions of lives by shaving just seconds off the activities we do many times every day.&l;/span&g;
&l;span&g;To refine your features and marketing message, consider the minutes in your target customers&a;rsquo; week before and after they adopt your product. Below is a visual aid from the time tracking app, &l;u&g;&l;a href=&q;http://www.northcube.com/lifecycle/&q; target=&q;_blank&q;&g;Life Cycle&l;/a&g;&l;/u&g;. Imagine a second-by-second version of a chart such as this, tagged with context and intent, and pinpoint exactly where and how your product makes an impact.&l;/span&g;
&l;img class=&q;size-full wp-image-18&q; src=&q;http://blogs-images.forbes.com/shawncarolan/files/2019/02/chart1-1.jpg?width=960&q; alt=&q;&q; data-height=&q;594&q; data-width=&q;672&q;&g; Life Cycle provides a helpful visual timeline for estimating how the average consumer spends each hour in a day.
&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;Moving onto &l;/span&g;&l;b&g;money&l;/b&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;: who doesn&a;rsquo;t enjoy a screaming deal? Getting the same or functionally-equivalent products for &l;/span&g;&l;i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;cheaper&l;/span&g;&l;/i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g; can seismically shift consumer purchasing decisions. Consider resources like the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, which&l;/span&g;&l;a href=&q;https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.t01.htm&q; target=&q;_blank&q;&g; &l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;tracks the US consumer dollar&l;/span&g;&l;/a&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g; and offers a top-down view of market sizes. &l;/span&g;&l;b&g;Walmart&l;/b&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g; grew to the Fortune #1 company by offering everyday low prices and today companies like &l;/span&g;&l;b&g;Wish &l;/b&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;are finding success by selling direct-from-factory at prices far less than retail can offer.&l;/span&g;
&l;b&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;Of course, a product might deliver only a partial combination of &l;/span&g;&l;i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;better, faster, cheaper, &l;/span&g;&l;/i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;but the most compelling products offer all three.&a;nbsp;&l;/span&g;Uber&a;sup1;&l;/b&g; &l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;represents one of the fastest growing tech companies in history through a service that might save you 15 minutes of standing on a corner (&l;/span&g;&l;i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;faster&l;/span&g;&l;/i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;) while offering a broad array of ride options (&l;/span&g;&l;i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;better&l;/span&g;&l;/i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;) and lower pricing (&l;/span&g;&l;i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;cheaper&l;/span&g;&l;/i&g;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;). The trifecta also explains the rise of&a;nbsp;&l;/span&g;&l;b&g;Roku&a;sup2;&l;/b&g;,&a;nbsp;&l;span&g;which effectively beat out Apple and countless others to become the leading TV streaming platform worldwide. When Menlo invested in 2008, consumers were still running to their local Blockbuster to pick out DVDs on Friday nights. Through the magic of streaming, Roku&a;rsquo;s pioneering &a;ldquo;Netflix Player by Roku&a;rdquo; offered millions of great shows (&l;em&g;better&l;/em&g;), on-demand (&l;em&g;faster&l;/em&g;), at a much lower monthly fee than cable TV (&l;em&g;cheaper&l;/em&g;). Now with its smart TVs, these offerings are effectively free as part of Roku&a;rsquo;s platform bundle.&l;/span&g;
&l;span&g;Ultimately, the hardest part can often be picking a small, single challenge to get started on. Many opportunities remain for consumer tech to make a positive impact, including addressing key issues in transportation, housing, lifelong learning, mental health and much more. None can be solved easily, but by having a crystal-clear picture of your product, it&a;rsquo;s still possible to capture customer attention in a busy and distracted world. Consumers will always look out for their own best interests, rather than yours. When both can be met simultaneously, great new companies are born.&l;/span&g;
&l;hr&g;
&a;sup1;&a;nbsp;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;Menlo Ventures led the Series B round of Uber in 2011 and remains a shareholder.&l;/span&g;
&a;sup2;&a;nbsp;&l;span style=&q;font-weight: 400&q;&g;Menlo Ventures was the first VC investor in Roku in 2008.&l;/span&g;
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