Guides to building products.
Three reading paths through the Journal, each with the posts in the order I’d read them: building an MVP, SaaS pricing and monetization, and SaaS product design patterns.
Format
Posts in reading order, with why each one comes where it does.
Source
Real products, each with a case study on this site.
Building an MVP: a guide from 7 real products
Timelines, scope, discovery, a PRD, launch checks and switch-over, from seven real products.
- How long does it take to build an MVP? Real timelines from 7 products
- How to scope an MVP: what to build first and what to cut
- Product discovery for startups: a process for when the brief is one sentence
- How to write a PRD developers can build from (free template)
- Live in 5 weeks against an 8‑week plan: integrate before you build
- A launch‑readiness checklist for SaaS products
- How to move customers to a new SaaS platform without downtime
- Product manager vs product designer: what each does, and when one person can do both
SaaS pricing and monetization: what I learned pricing real products
Pricing models, revenue-based pricing, one checkout and the platform behind a subscription library.
- SaaS pricing models explained: per user, per location, usage and revenue‑based
- Why we priced Find Your Calm by the revenue operators manage
- How Mark Andrews Creative sells subscriptions, courses and products in one checkout
- How to build an e‑learning platform like Udemy: subscriptions, courses and a shop in one
SaaS product design patterns from shipped products
Booking flows, role dashboards, approval workflows, AI patterns and build order, from shipped products.
- Booking flow UX: 8 patterns that help people finish booking
- How we cut a booking flow from 9 steps to 4, and lifted completion by 31%
- B2B SaaS dashboard design: how to design the screen people open every day
- Designing approval workflows for B2B SaaS that don't lose requests
- Designing AI features people trust: 7 UX patterns from shipping LeanDeck
- Where the AI acts in LeanDeck, and where it doesn't
- Replace three tools with one: why we shipped time tracking first
- How to build time tracking software: features, build order and trade‑offs
Building a product?
I help founders and teams decide what to build, design it, and ship it. Tell me about your project.