The duck lure

Are you carving a beautiful duck lure, or are you actually catching fish?

One of the ways you catch bass is by putting a lure that looks like a baby duckling in the water, in the hopes that a big fish will try to eat it. (Yes, nature is intense.)

If you ask the average person to buy (or make) one of these lures, they will pick something that looks hyper-realistic—exactly like a duckling! ... and they won't catch any fish.

The problem is: it doesn't need to look like a duck to you—it needs to look like a duck to the fish. And the most successful duck lures actually look… pretty weird. Cartoonishly exaggerated in some places, weirdly shaped in others. Very much not what you would expect.

So what does this have to do with startups?

If you're spending all of your time building the product, and no time talking to your customers, you're building a lure that's very appealing to you—but it probably won't catch any fish.

It doesn't matter what the denizens of the California conference room think. The only thing that matters is whether you're solving a big pain point for customers who can afford to pay you.

If you aren't testing your lure with the fish, stop whatever you're doing and put it in the water.