Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
Last year, a potential client approached me with what seemed like a dream project: build a comprehensive two-sided marketplace platform. The budget was substantial, the technical challenge was interesting, and it would have been one of my biggest projects to date.
I said no.
Not because I couldn't deliver—the technology exists to build amazing platforms quickly. But because their core statement revealed everything wrong with how founders approach rapid product iteration in 2025: "We want to see if our idea is worth pursuing."
They had no existing audience, no validated customer base, no proof of demand. Just an idea and enthusiasm for building. This is the trap I see everywhere: founders think rapid iteration means building features faster, when it actually means learning faster.
Instead of a 3-month platform build, I proposed something that made them uncomfortable: validate their entire business model in 24 hours using nothing but manual processes.
Here's what you'll discover in this playbook:
Why "rapid iteration" isn't about faster development—it's about faster validation
My 24-hour MVP framework that proves demand without writing code
The counterintuitive approach that saves months and reveals real user needs
When to graduate from manual validation to automated systems
How to structure iterations that actually compound learning
This approach has become my secret weapon for helping startups avoid the expensive "build first, validate later" trap.
Common Wisdom
What every startup accelerator teaches about iteration
Every startup accelerator, blog post, and product management course preaches the same gospel about rapid product iteration:
"Ship early and often" - Release basic features quickly and improve based on user feedback
"Build-measure-learn cycles" - Create a minimum viable product, analyze usage data, iterate
"Fail fast" - Launch quickly to discover what doesn't work and pivot accordingly
"Release early, release often" - Continuous deployment and constant feature updates
"User feedback drives everything" - Let customer input guide product development decisions
This advice sounds logical and is repeated everywhere from Silicon Valley to startup communities worldwide. The problem? It assumes you should build something first.
In the age of no-code tools, AI development, and rapid prototyping platforms, founders can now build complex products in weeks instead of months. This sounds like progress, but it's created a dangerous new problem: founders are building the wrong things faster than ever.
The result is "rapid iteration" that's actually just rapid feature development—teams shipping updates weekly while completely missing their market. They're optimizing for development velocity when they should be optimizing for learning velocity.
Most importantly, this conventional approach completely ignores the most valuable insight about rapid iteration: your fastest iteration isn't code—it's conversation.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
When that potential client came to me wanting to build their two-sided marketplace, they had done their homework. They'd researched the competition, identified gaps in the market, and had a clear vision for their platform. On paper, everything looked solid.
But I asked them a simple question: "Have you manually facilitated a single transaction between your target supply and demand sides?"
Silence.
They wanted to spend months building user registration, matching algorithms, payment processing, and review systems—without ever proving that their target market actually wanted to transact with each other. Classic "build it and they will come" thinking, dressed up in modern rapid iteration language.
Instead of taking their money and building what they asked for, I made them an uncomfortable proposal. What if we could test their entire business model in 24 hours using nothing but manual processes?
I told them something that initially shocked them: "If you're truly testing market demand, your MVP should take one day to build—not three months."
This moment crystallized something I'd been observing across multiple SaaS projects: founders were confusing rapid iteration with rapid development. They thought faster coding meant faster learning, but the opposite was true.
The client ultimately decided not to work with me—they wanted someone who would build their vision, not challenge their assumptions. Six months later, I heard through the grapevine that they'd spent significant money building their platform, launched to crickets, and eventually shut down.
This experience forced me to completely rethink what "rapid product iteration" actually means in practice.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
Phase 1: Market Reality Check (Hours 1-4)
Instead of building anything, start by manually orchestrating the exact value you plan to automate. For the marketplace client, this meant:
Create a simple landing page explaining the value proposition
Start manual outreach to potential supply side participants
Identify 10-20 potential demand side customers
Set up tracking for interest and conversion metrics
Phase 2: Manual Matchmaking (Hours 5-12)
This is where the magic happens—manually doing what your platform would eventually automate:
Conduct individual calls with both sides to understand real needs
Manually match supply and demand via email/phone
Facilitate the first transaction outside any platform
Document every friction point and user feedback
Phase 3: Iteration Without Code (Hours 13-20)
Based on what you learn from manual facilitation, iterate on your approach:
Refine your value proposition based on real user language
Test different messaging with new prospects
Adjust your matching criteria based on successful transactions
Identify which features are actually essential vs nice-to-have
Phase 4: Build or Kill Decision (Hours 21-24)
By hour 24, you'll have definitive answers to the most important questions:
Do both sides actually want what you're offering?
What's the real pain point you're solving?
What would people pay for this solution?
What features do they actually need vs what you thought they needed?
This framework works because it forces you to confront market reality before you invest in building. Your first iteration isn't your product—it's your understanding of the problem you're solving.
I've applied this approach to everything from SaaS products to e-commerce platforms, and it consistently reveals gaps between founder assumptions and market reality.
Manual First
Always start without automation—it teaches you what actually matters vs what you think matters
Learning Speed
Each manual interaction teaches you more than weeks of feature development and user analytics
Real Feedback
Talking to customers directly reveals problems that analytics and surveys completely miss
Build Confidence
Only automate processes you've successfully executed manually multiple times
Using this approach across multiple client projects has produced consistently eye-opening results:
Speed of Learning: 24 hours of manual validation teaches more about product-market fit than months of feature development
Cost Efficiency: Spending $500 on customer interviews vs $50,000 on platform development dramatically improves ROI
Feature Clarity: Manual processes immediately reveal which features are essential vs nice-to-have
Market Validation: You know within hours whether real demand exists, not months later
The marketplace client who rejected this approach? They never got their first paying customer after six months and significant investment. Meanwhile, clients who embraced manual validation first consistently built products that customers actually wanted.
This isn't just theory—it's a fundamental shift in how you think about product development. Your goal isn't to build something quickly; it's to learn what to build quickly.
The best part? Once you've validated demand manually, building the automated version becomes straightforward because you understand exactly what users need and why they need it.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Iteration speed beats development speed: Learning faster matters more than coding faster
Manual processes reveal true user needs: Automation hides the friction that teaches you about real problems
Conversation trumps analytics: Direct user feedback provides context that data can't
Market demand validation comes first: Build confidence in the problem before investing in the solution
Feature complexity should be earned: Only build what you've proven users actually need
Cheap experiments enable expensive builds: Manual validation justifies development investment
Real iteration compounds understanding: Each cycle should deepen market knowledge, not just add features
The biggest lesson: rapid iteration isn't about how fast you ship features—it's about how fast you ship learning. Every hour spent in manual validation saves weeks in misdirected development.
This approach works because it forces you to confront market reality before you get emotionally and financially invested in building the wrong thing. Your fastest iteration will always be conversation, not code.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
Test demand manually before building automated features
Use direct customer interviews to validate each iteration
Focus on learning velocity over development velocity
Build confidence in problem-solution fit before scaling
For your Ecommerce store
Manually fulfill orders before building automated systems
Test product-market fit through direct customer engagement
Validate pricing and positioning before investing in features
Use manual processes to identify essential vs nice-to-have functionality