It's easy to get caught up in test "wins" (because they're exciting). But associating the value of optimization exclusively with winning experiments misses one of the more important benefits.
Product & engineers are expensive. And their roadmaps typically get established several months in advance. Wasted effort here adds up fast and slows down the entire organization.
But how can they know what's valuable enough to build? If you knew exactly what to do you would just do it (and so would your competitors)If you knew exactly what to do you would just do it (and so would your competitors)
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Optimization & experimentation can help alleviate that wasted effort by guiding product & engineering teams towards the most valuable features through evidence. But that only works if:
- It moves much faster than the product features are rolled out - remember that 80% of your ideas won't work80% of your ideas won't work
) - You Decouple experimentation from product developmentDecouple experimentation from product development
Your product development process is optimized for shipping a reliable, polished experience to users.
But experimentation requires you to Explore before you refine and Take big swings early o... - what's the point of using the same resources if your goal is to free them up? - You're not incurring significant technical debt with experimentation that has to be cleaned up later