The Case For Radical Simplicity

Jan 21

In my new newsletter, the Build It Right newsletter, I talk about this bread my dad used to make. I remember this bread at crucial points throughout my childhood, like points on a map of my time with him. This bread, it was the most delicious bread, tender and chewy inside, perfectly crunchy on the outside.

He made it with four everyday ingredients: flour, yeast, salt, and water.

I’m not exaggerating when I say I’ve spent the past twenty years trying to re-create my dad’s bread. I’ve come close, but I just can’t seem to stick it.

The secret is that there is no secret. He simply had this sense, this instinct, of how to pull it off just perfectly. It always came out equalling more than the sum of those four simple ingredients.

As you think about your app, I want to make the case for radical simplicity. What problem, above all else, must your app solve? How, and for whom?

Narrow is the scope

We regularly work closely with clients to hone their answer to this question and zero in on their MVP. It’s trickier than you might imagine. After all, you can make an app to do practically anything. Once you start considering the problems adjacent to the main problem your product addresses, it’s easy to add on and on and on to your concept.

But somewhere along the way, the main thing stops being the main thing.

So often in advertising, you’ll hear something described as “The Swiss Army Knife of _______.”

I get the sentiment, but let’s think about this for a second.

When was the last time you used a Swiss Army Knife? Even if you own one, you probably still use an individual can opener, an individual pair of scissors, an individual Philips head screwdriver in your daily living, right? There’s a reason for that: It’s easier. The experience is better. It works better.
Your users already have a Swiss Army Knife: Their phone. I imagine a Swiss Army Knife where one of the tools in it is another, tiny Swiss Army Knife — not super usable, right? Humans do not multi-task, and at a point, Swiss Army Knife apps just add extra layers between the user’s problem and the solution to it.

To borrow a saying, “It’s better to whole-ass one thing at a time than half-ass a dozen things at once.”

Solve one problem. Solve it in the most insanely usable, delightful way.

Radical simplicity wins

Yep, the simplest apps end up on top and go viral.

Your bank’s mobile app is probably a great example of a Swiss Army Knife app. Inside that app is likely an app called Zelle, which does the same thing Venmo does. On paper, Zelle does it better. It’s practically instant. There are no fees. It’s more private.

Yet people aren’t “Zelle-ing” each other money. They’re Venmo-ing it. That’s because Venmo took one function and made it convenient and fun.

Acuity is my go-to example. Acuity did everything Calendly does and more. But Calendly is, like Venmo, simple, singular, and easier to use. It’s executed better. That’s why Calendly dominates.

My favorite AI app right now is Pi. Compared to ChatGPT, its interface is radically simple, and the experience much better. ChatGPT wants you to do a million things with it: plan vacations, write emails, code a website, whatever. But Pi just wants you to talk to it. I’ve been amazed at the intelligence of some of Pi’s responses and conversations.

The thing about apps design is that nothing is neutral. Everything a user sees, feels, or interacts with in your app either improves the experience or detracts from it.

In fact, I’d argue that if your app does eight things, you should create eight apps — a conveniently profitable point of view for an app developer, I know. But I think we underestimate the power of letting users opt out of functions they don’t need.

A new future is coming

More apps mean more frenetic hopping from one app to another — but maybe not for long.

On this AI rollercoaster we’re all on, new products like Humane’s AI pin and the Rabbit R1 are capable of navigating apps for you. You simply tell it what task you want accomplished.

Some say these products take steps toward a post-screen world. But I’m not convinced. Some apps you have to see to use them. Like Uber. You need to see your driver getting closer on the map. Even with an app like Calendar, which you could have an AI tool read or assess for you, it still helps to see your stack of meetings represented visually.

What’s more likely is that these products will sort of “frame” apps with UI that you need to see. The apps with the simplest interfaces will function best with the world that’s coming.