Tesla built 360,000 versions of their car to sell online. Most of them never sold. Not because people didn’t want one. But the checkout had 64 clicks in it. And by the time someone got through half of it, choosing tire specs and interior colors and autopilot configurations, they were already exhausted before they even hit the payment screen. Jon McNeill, who ran Tesla’s sales at the time, only spotted this because he sat down and actually used the website himself. Not a report. Not a sales...

I was pretty close to buying AirPods. Not because I specifically needed AirPods, but because everyone has them, I mean, that’s just what came to your mind when you need earbuds, right? Made sense at the time. I watched YouTube reviews. A lot of them. And they were fine, I guess, but most of it was just unboxing videos and spec comparisons, and none of it answered what I actually needed to know: how long do AirPods last? Because where I am, spending that much on something that lasts two or...

Everyone says validate fast. Take pre-orders. Get paid before you build it. And I get why that sounds right. It feels like the safe move, like you’re being smart. But here’s the thing about taking money before you’re actually ready: you’re not just proving demand. You’re also creating a deadline. And if your product has any kind of complicated backend, like bulk inventory, overseas manufacturing, long shipping timelines, you just handed your first customers the ability to make your life...