Is your product a vitamin or drug?

An interesting framework from Grace Ng in which startups(products) are categorized along two axes: the level of pain you’re solving and the frequency of use: When should your startup focus on UX?.

I think this is an interesting way to talk about products and their real value. A lot of mobile apps I’ve tried are vitamins helping me do something trivial easily. But since the problem isn’t a big one, I quickly find myself not using them anymore. That’s not to say that they won’t be successful, but it puts an increasing focus on finding a deeper problem over time. Runkeeper, for example, started out as a way to track runs but has since grown deeper into overall fitness. Evernote seemed like just a note taking tool at first but now tries to help you organize your life. This makes sense…software shouldn’t solve simpler problems over time it should solve deeper problems.