Be Wary of Solving a Small, Rare Problem - Des Traynor of Intercom

TL;DR

Des Traynor recounts Intercom’s origin from a side project error-monitoring tool (Exceptional), the accidental discovery of in-app messaging as the real product, and the subsequent pivot. Core conclusion: product success depends on matching a big, frequent problem (not small+rare), aligning brand/product/marketing around a central idea, and investing in content that serves the audience first and s

Key insights

• Template-based marking in CS education encourages rote learning, not actual programming ability; this finding made universities reject his PhD research.
• The in-app messaging feature was discovered by accident: a downtime apology message in the product drove more blog engagement than email, leading to the idea of two-way in-product conversation.
• Early Intercom sales were one-by-one: founder personally emailed prospects, CTO did Skype install walkthroughs, no automated onboarding existed.