Strava and Glasp: Building Successful Communities and De-risking Product Development

Strava and Glasp: Building Successful Communities and De-risking Product Development

Introduction:
Strava, the popular fitness app, has been experiencing remarkable growth, adding a million new users every 40 days. This success can be attributed to its strong sense of community, where users feel like they are joining rather than simply downloading the app. The company's commitment to its original mission and the discipline to keep things simple have been essential in attracting and retaining users. This article explores the parallels between Strava's community-building approach and the potential for Glasp, an active learning platform, to become the home for learners.

Building a Strong Community:
Strava's CEO emphasizes the importance of community, stating that people say they join Strava rather than simply downloading it. This underscores the idea that building a product or service that people love is challenging but essential. Similarly, Glasp aims to create a community of active learners, where individuals feel connected to their learning journey and are motivated to engage consistently.

The Power of Proof of Work:
Strava's slogan, "If it's not on Strava, it didn't happen," highlights the concept of proof of work in public. Users can hold world records on Strava, adding an exciting element to the app. Similarly, Glasp could incorporate a similar concept by allowing users to showcase their learning achievements and progress, fostering a sense of accomplishment and motivation.

The Importance of a North Star:
Strava's success has been attributed to never losing sight of the company's original mission. This focus has helped the app remain simple and make deliberate choices about what to include. Likewise, for Glasp to thrive, it needs to have a clear vision and stay true to its mission of providing an active learning platform that empowers individuals to reach their full potential.

Balancing Community Growth and Profitability:
Strava acknowledges that profitability is not their immediate priority. Instead, they prioritize growing the community and becoming the most engaged community of athletes in the world. This approach creates various opportunities to build a sustainable business in the future. Glasp could adopt a similar strategy by prioritizing community engagement and active learning experiences, which would lay the foundation for long-term success.

Founder's Passion and Product Usage:
The CEO of Strava shares his personal experience of using the app, highlighting his passion for fitness and improvement. This serves as a valuable lesson for founders to build a product they use daily and genuinely care about. By incorporating their own experiences and passions into the product, founders can create a more authentic and valuable user experience. This principle can be applied to Glasp, encouraging founders to be active learners themselves and deeply invested in the platform's success.

De-risking Product Development:
Reducing product risk and removing the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) mindset is crucial for successful product development. Understanding the type of customer being built for is essential, as initial releases will never have everything teams want. Iteration is key, as long as value is consistently provided to users. It is important to remember that users may not have the product thinking skills to articulate their needs effectively, requiring product teams to infer solutions themselves.

Investment and Iteration:
The level of investment before a product reaches the customer should be tied to the team's confidence in understanding the problem and the viability of the solution. Building features on top of an existing product can provide a more lightweight approach, allowing for faster iterations. MVPs and Minimum Viable Features (MVF) are crucial in proving that ideas solve a problem, but further investment is often necessary to reach the product's full potential.

Releasing Regularly to De-risk Vision:
Releasing new features regularly allows for incremental de-risking of the product's technical aspects. By observing how the product scales or breaks incrementally, teams can address issues promptly rather than facing them all at once. This iterative approach enhances the product's overall stability and user experience.

Actionable Advice:

1. Prioritize community building: Focus on creating a strong sense of community within your product or service, where users feel connected, motivated, and engaged.
2. Embrace your passion: Build a product that you genuinely care about and use daily. Your personal investment will resonate with users and create a more authentic experience.
3. Iterate and release regularly: Adopt an iterative approach to product development, releasing features incrementally to de-risk the product's technical aspects and enhance the overall user experience.

Conclusion:
Strava's success in building a thriving community and staying true to their mission provides valuable insights for entrepreneurs and founders. By prioritizing community engagement, incorporating personal passion, and adopting an iterative approach to product development, founders can increase their chances of building long-lasting global companies. With Glasp, the potential for creating a home for active learning and de-risking product development lies in applying these principles and creating a compelling platform for learners.