🧭 THIS WEEK AT BuildProven
Howdy, firstly welcome all new readers, appreciate it! I would celebrate, but let’s not go crazy! Perhaps when we hit 1k, 10k, …
Today, we’re continuing on - how your expertise can translate to products!
🧰 Worth Your Click
Here are a few things I found recently:
Claude Architect Course - guess any course these days can be reverse engineered - for free!
Financial firms are running trading agents with autonomous transaction access. Healthcare orgs have clinical agents processing patient data across systems.
Sanders interviewed Anthropic's Claude on camera and pushed it on healthcare, billionaires, and corporate power. Claude folded every time
🗺️ FEATURED INSIGHT
I Shipped 7 Products. Here's Why Nobody Bought Them.
7 products. 784 commits. 485 Claude sessions.
Revenue: zero.
Not because the products were bad. I tested them. They worked. They solved real problems I'd spent 25 years watching people struggle with.
The issue: I'd built tools that solved MY problems, described in MY language, for an audience of ME.
Nobody else understood what they did or why they should care.
Here's what I've learned fixing this — and the exact templates I now use before I show anything to anyone.
The Positioning Gap
Most builders think the hard work ends when the product ships. It doesn't. It shifts.
Building is about solving a problem. Positioning is about explaining the solution in words your customer already uses.
I built QA Architect because I was sick of hunting integration bugs manually after 25 years in automotive. Obvious problem. Clean solution. Great tool.
My landing page said: "Automated quality architecture analysis for embedded systems integration."
You know what a program manager actually wants to hear?
"Stop spending 15 hours a week hunting bugs. This finds them in 30 minutes."
Same tool. Different words. One sells. The other doesn't.
The 3-Phase Framework (Most People Skip Phase 2)
Phase 1: Build — 40 hours, give or take
You know the problem. You build the solution. The fun part. Done.
Phase 2: Position — 2-3 weeks, and it's uncomfortable
Translate your solution into your customer's language. Not features. Not specs. Value.
Three questions to answer:
How much TIME does it save? (Be specific — "3 hours/week" not "saves time")
How much does that time COST them? ("3 hours at $150/hr = $450/week wasted")
What's the FRUSTRATION tax? (The thing that makes them dread Monday morning)
Phase 3: Sell — ongoing, but Phase 2 makes it almost automatic
Once someone understands the value in their own words, the sale is a formality.
Most people rush Phase 1, skip Phase 2, and wonder why Phase 3 never happens.
The Positioning Template (Copy This)
Before you show your product to anyone — fill this in:
PROBLEM:
"[Customer type] spends [X hours/week] on [specific task]
and it costs them [business impact]."
SOLUTION:
"[Your product] does [core action] so that
[the outcome they actually want]."
PROOF (pick one):
- "Tested with [X customers]. [Y%] reported [specific benefit]."
- "Saves [time/cost] compared to [current method]."
- "Built by someone with [credibility element]."
Here's mine for QA Architect:
PROBLEM:
"QA engineers spend 15 hours/week hunting integration bugs
manually and it delays releases by 2 weeks per cycle."
SOLUTION:
"QA Architect finds integration bugs automatically so that
QA engineers ship confident code without the hunting."
PROOF:
"Tested with 12 QA teams. 10 reported shipping 1 week faster."
That took 10 minutes to write. It changed every conversation I had about the product.
The Outreach Script (Also Copy This)
Once your positioning is done, find 20 people who have the problem. Not friends. Not family. People who are actively dealing with the pain your product solves.
Here's the exact message template I use:
Hey [Name],
Quick question — do you still spend time on [specific problem]?
I built a tool that [one-sentence solution]. I'm looking for
honest feedback from people who actually deal with this.
Would you have 15 minutes this week to look at it?
No pitch. Just want to know if it's useful or if I'm
solving the wrong problem.
That last line is critical. "No pitch" lowers the barrier. "Am I solving the wrong problem" shows you're genuinely asking, not just seeking validation.
I sent this to 15 program managers. 11 replied. 5 said they'd pay for it.
If fewer than 3 out of 20 say yes: you don't have a product problem. You have a positioning problem. Go back to the template.
If 0 out of 20 say yes: you might have an audience problem. The people you're asking might not care enough to pay. Find different people — or a different problem.
Your Turn
Open Claude (or whatever AI tool you use) and paste this:
I have a product called [name] that solves [problem] for [audience].
Help me fill in this positioning template:
PROBLEM: "[Customer type] spends [X hours/week] on [task]
and it costs them [impact]."
SOLUTION: "[Product] does [action] so that [outcome]."
PROOF: Pick the strongest proof point I have.
Then write me a 4-sentence outreach message I can send to
someone who has this problem. Keep it casual, no jargon,
and include "Am I solving the wrong problem?" as the closer.
You'll have your positioning and your first outreach message in 5 minutes. Send it to one person today.
Weekly build logs from a 25-year program manager who codes with AI.
— Brett
👉 Hit “Reply” and share your experience — I read every one!