Hi Shay - YES! So many things I’d do different that I wrote a whole book about them: https://sparktoro.com/book. And yes, I definitely believe that having a great product is not nearly enough to get adoption, even early. I’ve seen plenty of products fail in early and mid stages that were phenomenal, and plenty of terrible products go on to do well. There was a bookmarking+search tool called Trunkly in the 2010s that I absolutely loved. Amazing product. When I convinced folks to try it, they loved it, too. But sadly, it didn’t survive. Then I look at something like Soylent - terrible product. Generally worse than a slimfast shake. Gives a high percent of people who drink it diarrhea. Tastes bad (intentionally). But… It’s marketed toward a segment of folks who love the positioning, buy into the benefits, and wouldn’t consider the long-standing market alternatives like Slimfast or others because they’re targeted to women. Most every crypto-currency fits into this “bad product, but right timing, positioning, and marketing” paradigm. So do most conspiracy-theory cults. Qanon has had extraordinary success as a product, sold tens of millions of dollars or merchandise, overtaken people’s entire lives, but it’s obviously a terrible product.
So, yeah, great product ≠ success. And terrible products ≠ failure. It’s more complicated.
All that said, I’d definitely rather have a great product.