Be Wary of Solving a Small, Rare Problem

After leaving a PhD about measuring programming ability, Des began writing about design and usability. He met co-founder Eoghan McCabe at a Dublin coffee morning in 2006, and they later built a customer messaging tool after struggling to communicate with users of their product Exceptional.

Des says Intercom’s early content aimed to help startup founders with topics like user growth, funnels, and naming, rather than repeatedly pitching the product. He wrote 93 of the first 100 posts and drew on lessons from Intercom and Exceptional, while being clear about the limits of his experience.

Des argues that companies need to understand the problem customers are trying to solve and the different ways they describe it. Intercom created content to guide people from broad concerns, such as customer relationships, toward messaging and its product. He also says brand building supports later measurable campaigns, and that marketing needs to speak to different buying journeys.

Des describes product, marketing, code, and design as different expressions of a shared idea. Intercom’s mission to make internet business personal guided which products it pursued, while product launches prompted coordinated work across content, sales, design, and marketing. As the company grew, he found new hire onboarding essential for keeping people aligned on its purpose and practices.

Des recommends starting with a company vision and a belief about the problem space before deciding what to build. A product can address a big problem that happens rarely, or a small problem that happens often, but he warns that small, rare problems are hard to monetize and sustain. He also cautions that founder-led onboarding and consulting can make early revenue look more scalable than it is.