IDEAS / POST
The Trap Great Products Fall Into – And How To Escape It
I was looking at a fast-growing lighting company recently. Beautiful products, polished site, confident testimonials. Honestly? I felt a little insecure.
Everything they were doing looked right.
High growth. Great design. Expanding markets. A team clearly proud of their work. And yet, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing.
This company was, in many ways, a perfect fit for me: They were in growth mode They had a genuinely strong product Their category was crowded with imitators.
But when I looked at their site and listened to their team talk, I found myself wondering, what could I possibly add to this?
So I did what I always do when something looks too perfect. I got curious.
I pulled in a sharp creative partner. We started poking around – not just at the product, but the thinking behind the product. The marketing. The story. The emotional logic beneath the visual polish.
And that’s when the pattern emerged.
There was beauty, but no bond. Incredible product, but no feeling.
They were functioning at a high level, but they weren’t connecting at a deep one. Under the veneer of beauty, they were product-led, not brand-led.
And here’s the danger: The better the product, the easier it is to miss the gap.
The Moment Most Founders Hit The Wall
Most founders don’t realize they’ve hit a wall because, like my first impression, they see everything as just right.
The business is growing. The product is winning awards. Everything is working. Until suddenly, it isn’t.
Cheaper versions start appearing. The competition catches up – or looks just close enough to confuse customers. And brand preference becomes a coin toss.
At that moment, most founders double down on what got them here. More features. More launches. More product innovation. They try to engineer their way through the vulnerability.
But what they’re actually doing is running faster on a treadmill that’s slowly slipping backwards.
They’re mistaking motion for meaning.
Linear Thinking vs Lateral Brand Building
This is the trap that highly capable, product-led founders fall into. They’ve been rewarded their whole lives for solving problems with linear thinking.
Problem. Solution. Execution. Result.
They’re fast, effective, and precise. But brand doesn’t live on that line.
Brand lives laterally – in identity, emotion, and meaning. And that’s where linear thinkers struggle. Not because they’re weak, but because they’re wired for a different kind of problem-solving.
This is the Einstein paradox in action. You can’t solve a problem with the same mind that created it.
Brand building requires a shift – not just in tactics, but in mindset.
The Lie Product-led Companies Tell Themselves
The internal narrative is seductive. If we keep making the product better, everything else will follow.
But that’s a myth.
Because at some point, better becomes invisible. The customer can’t tell the difference. Or worse, they don’t care to.
What matters is how the product makes them feel. What it signals to others. What story it lets them tell about themselves.
And here’s the real tell.
The Mimicry Problem
I know a brand isn’t connecting when its marketing mimics emotion instead of triggering it.
Think of the majority of car ads. Attractive people. Open road. Laughter. Sunset “See? Emotion!”
But that’s not brand thinking. That’s product placement in a staged mood.
True brand-led companies don’t show people connecting with the product. They give you something to connect with.
Here’s the difference.
Absolut didn’t show vodka being poured at stylish parties filled with scenemakers. They used quirky art and irony to say, if you get this, you’re an insider like us.
1960’s VW didn’t show students or beatniks on road trips. They used self-deprecating wit to say, we’re the car for the smart outsider.
Diesel didn’t sell denim. They sold irresponsibility.
Benetton didn’t show people wearing clothes. They sold human connection that defied bias and bigotry.
These companies weren’t dramatizing product use. They were owning emotional territory.
And they built tribes around that.
The Uncomfortable Truth
People aren’t buying your product. Stop fixing it.
They’re buying a feeling. And you simply can’t engineer a way to get them there.
If your emotional strategy is showing people “connecting with the product,” you’re already losing.
The job is to create a world, a tension, a point of view – and to let the product live inside it.
That’s the leap. The leap that separates high-functioning products from unforgettable brands.
And it’s the leap most product-led companies never make.