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Demand Can Come Before the Product

One of the most common assumptions builders make is that product development must come first—and that marketing, demand generation, and sales only begin once the product is ready.

That assumption is wrong more often than people want to admit.

The market-facing side of a business can exist before the product exists. In many cases, it should.

This is not about faking a product.
It’s about testing reality earlier.

The Cart Can Come Before the Horse​

People say not to put the cart before the horse.

But in business, there are situations where the cart should come first.

Not a fake cart. Not a dishonest one.
But enough of it to answer a critical question:

If this existed, could I get anyone to care?

That question matters more than most internal planning.

It’s easy to create projections:

  • “We’ll capture X% of the market”
  • “Our TAM is Y”
  • “We’ll convert at Z%”

Anyone can write that.

A better question is:

What happens when I actually try to generate demand?

  • Do people click?
  • Do they sign up?
  • Do they respond?
  • Do they care?

That’s real signal.

This Is Really About ROIC​

One of the most useful lenses here is return on invested capital (ROIC).

In The Four Cornerstones of Corporate Finance, one of the core ideas is that capital allocation drives value—not just growth.

Growth without returns is often destructive.

That applies directly to how you build products.

Every project forces you to allocate capital:

  • engineering time
  • infrastructure
  • marketing
  • attention

The default instinct is:

“Put everything into building first.”

But that is not always the highest-return move.

If you invest entirely in product development, you risk ending up with:

  • a polished system
  • no audience
  • no distribution
  • no validated demand

From an ROIC perspective, that’s a weak allocation.

A better question is:

Where does each marginal dollar (or hour) reduce uncertainty the most?

Sometimes that’s building.

But often—especially early—it’s demand generation.

Because demand generation produces something forecasts cannot:

signal.

Forecasts Are Cheap. Signal Is Not​

Anyone can build a revenue model.

You can claim:

  • CAC will be reasonable
  • conversion will be strong
  • demand will exist

That’s easy.

What’s hard—and far more valuable—is:

  • real signups
  • real engagement
  • real inbound interest
  • real willingness to act

That’s signal.

And signal is what gives projections substance.

Without it, projections are just narratives.

A Simple Example: TalkTop.us​

I’ve already applied this approach.

With TalkTopUs, I set up the market-facing layer before the product was complete:

  • a landing page
  • email capture wired up (Brevo)
  • messaging live
  • infrastructure ready to collect inbound

At the same time:

  • the backend was still being built
  • the frontend didn’t exist yet

And what happened?

I shelved the project.

That’s fine.

Because:

  • I didn’t overinvest blindly into building
  • I had a system for capturing demand
  • I created optionality instead of committing too early

That’s a better outcome than building in isolation and hoping demand appears later.

Two Different Reasons to Do This​

There are two distinct use cases for generating demand before the product exists.

1. You’re building it no matter what​

Some ideas you pursue because you believe they are worth bringing into the world.

In this case, early demand generation is not about deciding whether to build.

It’s about:

  • shortening time to revenue
  • building an audience early
  • refining messaging
  • avoiding a “cold start” at launch

2. You’re evaluating whether it has legs​

This is the more analytical case.

Here, you’re treating the idea like an investment.

The question becomes:

If I invest capital into this, what evidence do I get back?

That means:

  • testing landing pages
  • running small campaigns
  • doing outreach
  • measuring response

Not forecasts.
Evidence.

Why Engineers Push Back​

A lot of engineers resist this idea.

It sounds like:

  • selling something that doesn’t exist
  • creating pressure before implementation
  • committing to features too early

And yes, that can happen—if done poorly.

But there’s a difference between:

  • testing demand
  • building an audience
  • collecting interest

and

  • pretending a finished product exists

Early demand generation is not the problem.
Dishonesty is.

Runway Is Being Spent Either Way​

Every project consumes capital.

If you delay demand generation, you are effectively saying:

“I’m willing to burn runway without learning about the market.”

That’s risky.

If you introduce even lightweight demand generation early:

  • landing page
  • waitlist
  • messaging
  • outreach

you create feedback loops immediately.

Even weak signal is better than none.

The Caveat​

Not every worthwhile idea will validate quickly.

Some ideas are:

  • ahead of their time
  • misunderstood early
  • valuable regardless of immediate feedback

So no—early demand signals are not the sole judge of what deserves to exist.

But even in those cases, early audience-building and messaging still improve outcomes.

They don’t define the vision.
They refine execution.

Final Thought​

The product does not have to be finished before the business begins.

Sometimes the highest-ROIC move is to start the market-facing side early:

  • build attention
  • test positioning
  • gather signal
  • reduce uncertainty

This isn’t about putting the cart before the horse.

It’s about recognizing that there are two horses:

  • building the product
  • proving demand exists

Waiting on one before touching the other is how projects stay invisible—and pre-revenue—far longer than they should.