It’s about simplicity, stupid!
by Eric Pender on March 3, 2008
Alright, he goes my first techno-rant.
I’m tired about hearing how a new site entering into a market needs to bring more features to the marketplace. Features are great, but simplicity is paramount. Case in point: just about everything Apple does. They don’t necessarily add features, they just take existing features and make them really easy to use.
This isn’t to say that they don’t add features, they do. But many times these features are really things that have already existed. Apple just simplifies them and makes them easy to use.
Facebook and MySpace worked the same way. It’s hard to say that Facebook’s surge to prominence was brought about by a delivery of new features. Rather, they found success through a streamlined, clean and polished user interface that was aesthetically appealing and functional. Only after they succeeded on UI did they open up the platform to outside developers.
Am I saying that you shouldn’t go to market with a bunch of new features? No, I’m only saying that another option is to have a few unique features and make them work really really well.
Why does this work? Well, let’s take a look at why having a ton of complex features doesn’t work. It doesn’t work because complexity doesn’t make sense to the masses. ACID music production software is great for professionals. But Garage Band is successful because it brings music production to the masses. Same thing happened with the iPod. The iPod was successful because it very simply integrated what the other players in the market never could. Apple integrated the device to the computer, the computer to the music marketplace, and thus the device to the marketplace. The interface wasn’t difficult, you just plugged it in and it worked. That’s what companies should be trying for.
Make it simple, make it accessible to the masses. Then, after you’ve established simplicity, you can introduce complexity.
