Learning what to build when there isn't a playbook

eporta was a B2B marketplace helping interior designers source products from furniture and fittings manufacturers.

When I joined eporta, many of the manufacturers we worked with still relied on trade shows, printed catalogues and, in some cases, fax machines to win business. They built beautiful, highly bespoke products, but selling those products online was still largely unexplored.

There wasn’t much of a playbook. We were exploring the problem alongside our customers, trying to understand what would genuinely help rather than simply digitising what already existed.

One of the things I’m proudest of was creating our Innovation Lab. Rather than treating customers as people we occasionally interviewed, we invited a small group to help shape the product with us. They got early access to designs and prototypes, and in return we met every couple of weeks to learn together.

We started by pitching several different product ideas before we’d built anything, inviting customers to join the area they found most interesting. It gave us confidence we were investing our time in problems customers actually wanted us to solve.

The biggest benefit wasn’t just better customer feedback. It was seeing Product, Design and Engineering hear those conversations first-hand. The team made better decisions because we all understood the problem together.

The biggest thing I took away from eporta was just how much faster a team can move when everyone shares the same understanding of the problem they’re trying to solve. Since then, I’ve tried to create that same shared understanding wherever I’ve worked.

Wondering why I spend so much time with customers?

I’ve found that the best product decisions rarely come from one person having all the answers. They come from teams building a shared understanding of the problem together. It’s a big part of how I approach product.