Google 的 AI 转型内幕:AI Mode、AI Overviews 与 AI 驱动搜索的愿景 | Robby Stein
Google 的 AI 转型内幕:AI Mode、AI Overviews 与 AI 驱动搜索的愿景 | Robby Stein
访谈记录
Gemini 登顶与 Google 内部的变化
Lenny Rachitsky: Google 内部似乎发生了某些变化。就在上周,Google Gemini 登顶 App Store 排行榜第一。我觉得没有人预见到这一幕。
Robby Stein: Google 的使命是让一切信息都能被普遍获取,这是一个非常持久、非常激励人心的目标。而现在,在 AI 的浪潮下,我们比以往任何时候都更有能力真正实现它。我现在的感受是一种难以置信的专注和紧迫感。事情已经到了一个临界点——这些模型如今真正能够为消费者提供价值了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 过去几年间,随着 ChatGPT 的崛起、Perplexity 的出现,很多人直接断言”Google 完了”,认为没人愿意再一条条翻搜索结果、点链接了。
Robby Stein: 在我看来,Google 搜索的核心并没有真正改变。我们发现用户来搜索的东西种类极其广泛——他们要找一个具体的电话号码,要查某个东西的价格,要获取路线指引。这种广度,很多人并没有充分意识到。AI 是扩张性的。现在有了 AI 的加持,实际上有越来越多的问题可以被提出,有越来越多的好奇心可以被满足。
产品哲学:践行不懈改进
Lenny Rachitsky: 你打造过很多非常成功的产品。你曾用过这样一个说法:践行不懈改进(embodying relentless improvement)。
Robby Stein: 你需要成为两样东西的具象化身。第一是”不懈”——持续不断地朝正向产出的方向付出全力。第二是”把事情做得更好”——你必须始终在改进,永远不满足。
Lenny Rachitsky: 你当年在 Instagram 打造并上线了 Stories,这件事当时争议很大,因为它基本上就是把 Snapchat 做得非常好的东西拿来,然后说”好吧,我们把它搬到 Instagram 上来”。
Robby Stein: 并非每一项伟大的创新都必须由你发明。Facebook 大概创造了现代信息流的形态,但现在几乎每个产品都有自己的信息流。说到底,如果你不这样做,你只是在剥夺你的用户群拥有更好产品的机会。
嘉宾介绍
Lenny Rachitsky: 今天的嘉宾是 Robby Stein。Robby 是 Google 搜索的产品副总裁,负责的几乎是整个 Google 搜索体验,包括新的 AI Overviews、AI Mode、像 Google Lens 这样的多模态 AI 体验,以及排序算法等等。他身处 Google 历史上最大转型之一的最前沿,并且已经深刻影响了 Google 的发展轨迹。他同样深刻影响了 Instagram 的发展轨迹——他在那里担任产品负责人,主导了 Instagram Stories、Reels 和 Close Friends 的上线,借此将 Instagram 的日活跃用户增长到了五亿。他还是 Artifact 的创始团队成员,与 Mike Krieger 和 Kevin Systrom 一起工作过,自己也创办过两家公司。很少有人能在两个全球级消费产品上产生如此量级的影响力。在这次访谈中,Robby 分享了他关于打造优秀消费产品的所有最重要的经验教训,以及关于 Google 在 AI 领域走向的一系列洞察。
Lenny Rachitsky: Robby,非常感谢你的到来,欢迎来到播客。
Robby Stein: 非常感谢邀请。
Gemini 登顶的背后
Lenny Rachitsky: 这周录播客的时机太巧了。就在上周,Google Gemini 登顶 App Store 排行榜第一。我这里截图了,它现在仍然是第一,排在 ChatGPT 前面。我觉得没有人预见到这一幕。大家一直在说:“Google,你们到底在干什么?你们造了这么多厉害的技术,为什么在消费端拿不出能用的东西?为什么 ChatGPT 做得风生水起?为什么所有这些出色的公司都比 Google 做得好?”
所以首先,恭喜你——我知道这不全是你一个人的功劳,但我想你应该也有份,先道一声恭喜。
Robby Stein: 背后还有非常多的人,是的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 感觉 Google 内部确实发生了某些变化,尤其是在 AI 消费端,一切开始真正奏效了。就增长而言,Nano Banana 是这波近期增长的主要来源吗,还是有其他原因?
Robby Stein: 大家确实对 Nano Banana 非常兴奋,这一点毫无疑问。但我认为,人们也开始认识到 Google 整个产品线中能做的酷事情实在太多了,而且它们已经变得相当强大。即便是搜索里的一些功能,我总是感到惊讶——我们觉得它们非常显而易见,就摆在核心搜索体验里,但在 X(推特)上,我会看到有人说”哦,我刚发现这个 AI 功能”,明明看起来很显而易见。我觉得很多人只是在逐渐发现这些工具有多强大。
从技术领先到消费端突破
Lenny Rachitsky: 再往深一层说。正如你所说,Google 拥有所有这些令人难以置信的技术——你们写出了最初的 Transformers 论文,推动了如此多的创新,但人们一直在问:“Google 人在哪?为什么他们不造出那个能赢的东西?”
到底发生了什么变化?是进行了重大组织架构调整吗?是启用了新的领导者吗?还是过去几年里形成了一套新的理念,最终促成了 Gemini 成为全球顶级应用这一刻?
Google 的专注与紧迫感
Robby Stein: 是这样的,我在 Google 已经是第二段任期了。我最早 2007 年加入 Google,中间做过其他事情,现在又回来了,所以我无法对过去这么多年里的整个历程逐一评说。但我可以告诉你我现在的感受——一种极其强烈的专注和紧迫感,要尽快交付出色的产品。我认为这部分确实归功于领导力。我们与 DeepMind 和 Google DeepMind 的合作伙伴密切协作,在整个组织内部也在紧密配合。这里有一群了不起的人,也有一群一直在思考这些问题的优秀研究员和技术思想家。当这种能量汇聚起来,产品团队和技术、研究团队真正紧密协作时,我们就能够快速推进,完成大量工作。
我不认为发生了某一件具体的事情。很多时候人们喜欢把大量动量归结为一次性的变化或某个单一的人。但我觉得很大程度上其实是复利效应——每个月毫不松懈地改进产品或模型,每天都在变得更好,然后到达一个临界点,用户开始喜欢它,使用频率增加,享受其中。这更像是我的感受:我们做出了正确的投入和聚焦,然后到了某个时刻,人们开始看到这些努力的成果。
搜索的”死亡”并未发生
Lenny Rachitsky: 随着 ChatGPT 在过去几年崛起,Perplexity 以及其他各种聊天机器人纷纷出现,很多人直接断言:“Google 死了。没人愿意再翻搜索结果、点链接。为什么不直接拿到答案?”
但感觉这完全没有发生。感觉你们做得挺好的。关于 Google 搜索的现状,你能分享些什么吗?之后我们再聊 AI Mode。在所有这些产品都存在的情况下,流量怎么样,搜索表现如何?自 ChatGPT 发布以来,你在数据中看到了什么?
Robby Stein: 有意思的是,人们来搜索的东西范围极其广泛,真的是五花八门。他们要查一个具体的电话号码,要查某个东西的价格,要查路线,要找缴税的支付页面——你能想到的一切。我觉得很多人低估了这个规模的庞大程度。而我们看到的是,这并没有改变。AI 在很多方面并没有真正改变那些基础性的需求,我们发现 AI 是扩张性的——实际上产生了越来越多的问题和好奇心,现在可以通过 AI 来满足。所以增长正是来源于此。
在我看来,Google 搜索的核心并没有真正改变。我们没有看到那种变化,但你看到的是一个扩张的时刻。举几个例子:你现在可以拍一张照片,问你看到的任何东西。Google Lens 是增长最快的产品之一,视觉搜索同比增长 70%,而它本身的规模已经非常庞大了——以这种方式进行的搜索达到数十亿次。
你可以拍一张自己鞋子的照片,说”哪里能买到这款?”
或者拍一张作业的照片,说”我在第二题卡住了。”
或者拍一张书架的照片,说”基于这些书,我还应该读什么?“AI 现在都能帮你处理这些事情。这也是为什么我认为还有巨大的增长空间,也是我们如此兴奋的原因。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的,所以你没有看到搜索的消亡。
Robby Stein: 没有。
AI Mode 的三大组成
Lenny Rachitsky: 同样的话题,你们最近推出了 AI Mode,我觉得讨论它的人还不够多。访问地址是 google.com/ai,对吗?
Robby Stein: 对。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的。我在为这次对话做准备时一直在试用它,真的很棒。我问它”关于产品和增长最好的 Newsletter 是什么”,它非常聪明地回答了——Lenny’s Newsletter。这就是我的评估标准。
Robby Stein: 太棒了。完美评分,满分。
Lenny Rachitsky: 确实完美。而且,你打开它的首页,上面有一些推荐提问,你会觉得”等等,你怎么知道我关心这些?“比如首页上就写着”帮我转行做产品管理”。
我就想,“你怎么知道的?“它告诉你这是基于你的 Google 活动记录。聊聊人们对 AI Mode 应该了解什么,也许有哪些他们还没真正意识到的强大之处。
Robby Stein: 我可以告诉你,我们看待 AI 搜索和下一代搜索体验,有三大核心组成部分。第一显然是 AI Overviews,就是页面顶部快速出现的 AI 摘要,很多人已经见过了,它的增长非常非常快。当你用自然语言提问,直接输入 Google,就能得到这个 AI 回答,对用户来说确实很有帮助。
第二个方向是多模态,也就是视觉搜索和 Lens。这是另一个重要部分。你打开 Google 应用里的相机功能,就会看到它的增长势头。
而 AI Mode 真正把这一切整合在了一起。它基于最先进的模型,打造了一个端到端的前沿搜索体验,真正让你可以向 Google 搜索提问任何问题。你可以来回对话,进行多轮交互,而且它专门为搜索而设计。这意味着什么呢?
我认为它做的一件很酷的事情是,它能够理解 Google 内部极其丰富的信息。比如 Google 购物图谱中有 500 亿件商品,商家每小时更新 20 亿次实时价格。地图中有 2.5 亿个地点。还有所有的金融信息,更不用说整个网页的上下文以及如何与之关联——让你既能获得上下文,又能深入探索。你把所有这些都放进这个大脑里,本质上就是与 Google 对话、获取这些知识的方式。这就是你现在可以做到的事情。
你可以问任何想问的,它会利用所有这些信息,尽可能为你提供高质量、有依据的回答。你可以直接在 google.com/ai 使用它。但它也已经整合到我们的核心体验中了。我们宣布了,你现在可以对 AI Overviews 提出追问,直接进入 AI Mode。Lens 也是一样——拍张照片就能跳转到 AI Mode,你可以在那里进行多轮对话、追问。所以它正越来越多地融入产品的核心体验中。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我猜很大程度上是在观察人们怎么使用它,但整体愿景是怎样的?这些功能之间如何连接?思路是继续把 AI Mode 放在旁边,AI Overviews 在顶部,再加上多模态体验?还是有一个逐渐把它们进一步整合在一起的愿景?
AI 功能的融合
Robby Stein: 我认为这些功能有机会更加紧密地结合在一起。我觉得 AI Mode 代表的就是这个方向——至少对核心 AI 体验来说是如此。但我认为它们与核心搜索产品是非常互补的关系。最终,你应该不需要考虑自己是在哪里提问,你只需要打开 Google 就行。现在,不管你输入什么,我们实际上已经开始在 AI Overviews 中使用 AI Mode 背后的很多能力了。所以你可以直接问非常难的问题,可以把一个五句话的问题直接丢进 Google 搜索。你可以试试看,它会在顶部触发 AI,给你一个预览,然后你可以进一步深入 AI Mode 进行来回对话。这就是这些东西之间的连接方式。
拍照也是一样的。你拍张照片,“这是什么植物?“或者”我怎么买这双鞋?“它会给你一个小的 AI 预览。然后如果你继续深入,同样是由 AI Mode 驱动的,你可以进行来回对话。所以你不需要去想这些,它最终应该是一个一致且简单的产品体验。但显然这对我们来说是一个新事物,所以我们想以一种让人们能够使用并给我们反馈的方式来启动它,比如像 google.com/ai 这样的直接入口。
Google 的时刻
Lenny Rachitsky: 我最近在播客上请了 Brian Balfour,他分享了一句引用,让我一直印象深刻,听你讲这些的时候我一直在想这句话。那是 Alex Rampell 说的,意思是创业公司是一场与时间赛跑的游戏——在现有巨头来得及创新之前抢到分发渠道。
感觉你们终于到了那个时刻——“天哪,现在 Google 来了。“我不确定我这里是否有一个明确的问题,但就是感觉,之前那么长的时间大家都在建立分发渠道,而现在,Google 终于来了。
Robby Stein: 我们发现,人们本来就在 Google 上问这些问题,他们本来就希望从 Google 那里得到这些答案。所以如果我们能拥有一个足够强大的 AI,能够回答用户正在努力求解的一个非常复杂的计算,或者拍一张化学多选题作业的照片——人们确实在做这些事情。现在有了基于我们前沿模型的这个非常精密的 AI,我们可以为用户处理越来越多的需求,所以希望这是一个更自然的入口。然后我们只需要让人们更容易上手,因为这些是新产品,而人们已经习惯了以特定方式使用 Google。
他们输入关键词,我们有时候称之为”关键词惯性”,但你其实可以在 Google 里使用自然语言。这是最大的转变。我们看到人们在问真正冗长、复杂、有难度的问题。你可能不会想到,“哦,我可以去 Google 输入’约会之夜去哪里好?我去过这四家餐厅了,我想找户外用餐的,我朋友对某个东西过敏。‘“你完全可以把这些都放进 Google 里。我认为这就是我们希望能继续让人们轻松做到的事情。
回到 Ask Jeeves
Lenny Rachitsky: 挺有意思的,这让我们绕回去了——当年有个 Ask Jeeves,它的理念就是你像问人一样直接提问,然后它会给你一个很好的答案。
然后我们进入了 Google 的时代——“不不不,你就输入你想要的东西,搞清楚 Google 喜欢什么样的查询方式。”
现在又回到了——“好吧,直接问你的问题,它会给你一个很好的答案。”
Robby Stein: 是啊,Ask Jeeves 在这点上出奇地有先见之明,对吧?他们有实质性的东西,他们有一个远超那个时代的东西,而我们现在正围绕这个方向汇聚。
AEO、GEO 与搜索优化的演变
Lenny Rachitsky: 天哪。你对 AEO、GEO 的兴起怎么看?这是 SEO 的一个演变。我猜你的回答会是”做好内容就行,别担心这些”,但现在确实有一整套技能是关于如何让你的内容出现在这些 AI 回答中的。你觉得人们应该怎么思考这件事?
AI 回答的底层机制
Robby Stein: 好的。我可以给你讲一点底层是怎么运作的,因为我确实觉得这能帮助人们理解该怎么做。当我们的 AI 构建一个回答时,它实际上会做一个叫做”查询扇出”(query fan-out)的操作——模型把 Google 搜索当作工具,去做额外的查询。比如你可能问的是某款特定的鞋子,它会扩展出所有这些其他查询——可能是几十个查询——然后在后台基本上开始搜索。它还会向我们的数据后端发起请求,如果需要实时信息的话,它就会去获取。所以归根结底,实际上是有东西在搜索的——不是一个人,但确实有搜索在发生,而每一次搜索都配对着内容。所以如果在某次搜索中,你的网页被设计得非常有帮助,你可以去看看 Google 的人工评分指南,去读一读——那是一份很长的文档,几十年来经过精心打磨,阐述什么样的信息才是好的。
这是 Google 比任何人都研究得更多的东西。核心问题是:你是否满足了用户的意图——他们想得到什么?你有没有来源?你的信息有没有引用?是原创内容,还是把已经被重复了 500 遍的东西又重复了一遍?有这些最佳实践,我认为它们很大程度上仍然适用,因为归根到底是一个 AI 在做研究、在寻找信息。而很多核心信号——这条信息对这个问题的回答好不好——它们仍然有效,非常有效,非常有用。这样生成的回答中,你就更有可能出现在那些体验里。
我觉得我唯一会给出的建议是,想一想人们在用 AI 做什么。我之前提到这是一个扩展性的时刻。看起来人们现在在问更多的问题,尤其是关于建议类的、“怎么做”类的,或者更复杂的需求,而不是比较简单的东西。所以如果我是内容创作者,我会思考:人们用 AI 来找什么样的内容?然后我的内容如何才能最好地满足这些特定的需求?我觉得这是一个非常具体的思考方式。
Lenny Rachitsky: 关于它会发起搜索这一点很有意思。当你使用它时,它会搜索上千个页面之类的。这和其他流行的聊天机器人的核心机制是不是不一样?因为其他的不会在你提问时去搜索一堆网站。
Robby Stein: 是的。这是我们为 AI 所做的独特设计。它显然有能力使用参数化记忆,以及思考、推理——一个模型该有的能力都有。但让它在信息任务方面独一无二的一点是,我们专门为信息需求设计它——这正是 Google 的核心所在——那它是如何找到信息的?如何判断信息是否正确?如何检验自己的工作?这些都是我们构建到模型中的能力。所以它对 Google 有独特的访问权限。显然,它是 Google 搜索的一部分,所以它能利用 Google 搜索的各种信号——从识别垃圾内容、判断什么可能是垃圾内容而我们大概不应该在回答中使用,一直到发现”这是最权威、最有帮助的信息,我们要链接到它,并解释说’根据这个网站的信息,看看这些内容’,然后你可能会亲自去看看。“这就是我们设计这个产品时的思路。
构建 AI 产品的体悟
Lenny Rachitsky: 你到目前为止做过很多 AI 产品,不只是 Google,还有 Artifact 和 Instagram,你在 AI 方面做了很多事情。关于构建 AI 产品,你学到了什么可能是大家还没有真正理解的东西?或者说,在构建成功的 AI 产品过程中,有什么让你意外的发现?
Robby Stein: 我觉得最近的一个体悟——真的是最近一两周之内的事——就是这个界面在变得多么像人类,你能多么自然地与 AI 沟通和引导它。就在几个月前,你还得费很大力气才能让 AI 做你想让它做的事,对吧?你得念那些”咒语”,得用非常特定的方式写提示词。人们会搞各种 hack,比如”嘿,假设你是一个教练,你要做这些事情”,你得使劲推它才行。或者从更技术的角度来说,你得做后训练,你得拿这个基础模型,给它看数据,训练它,实际更新它的权重,才能让它做更复杂的事情。
比如你告诉它:“嘿,这是一份 API 文档。如果你遇到问题,就调这个 API。这是数据。“就好像你在跟一个工程师说话一样,但它完全不知道该拿这些信息怎么办,或者似懂非懂,也并不真的去做。
但越来越多的,你直接用自然语言就行了。几乎就像写一份指令——你可以说:“我是一家新创业公司。这是我的内部数据。这是 API 的接口,这是 schema 和 URL,什么时候该用它。另外,如果遇到这类问题,一定要确保做对。“然后模型就能做很多事情了。
模型现在已经被编码成能够说:“好,对于这类问题,我要投入更多的推理或思考预算。“或者说,“我要使用工具或代码,用代码执行来连接到我被告知的这个 API。“这是一个相对较新的东西。所以我觉得这将大大推动访问这些模型的民主化进程,让人们能构建出令人惊叹的东西,因为你甚至不需要做太多。要获得最复杂的结果,你越来越不需要做那些繁重的微调工作了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 这让我想到,我最近请了一位嘉宾 Nesrine Changuel 上播客。她曾是 Google 的 PM,负责过 Google Meet,她是一位专注于让产品更令人愉悦的 PM。她谈到 Google Meet 之所以做得这么好、现在感觉正在击败 Zoom 的原因——他们把 Google Meet 的体验对标的是真实的人际会议体验,而不是做到”最好的视频会议”,而是让它尽可能接近人与人面对面交流的体验。你刚才说的很有意思,这几乎就是 AI 的目标——让你感觉自己只是在跟一个人说话。
Robby Stein: 完全正确。
践行不懈改进
Lenny Rachitsky: 这也许显而易见,但值得深思。好,让我拉远一点,聊聊你在整个职业生涯中学到的更广泛的教训。你构建过很多非常成功的产品,我在开头已经介绍过了。
Robby Stein: 也有很多不太成功的,我的履历是完整的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好极了,我们也会聊聊那些。在准备这次对话时我问过你,你想在这次对话中传达的一个核心观点是什么?你觉得什么东西对产品构建者来说特别有帮助,能帮助他们做出更成功的产品?你用了一个说法:“践行不懈改进”。能谈谈这个吗?这是什么意思?为什么这么重要?
Robby Stein: 当然。我觉得你需要成为两样东西的具身化。一个是坚持不懈,就是百分之百的努力,但这个努力始终指向正向生产力的方向。第二个是让事情变得更好。你必须持续让事情变得更好,永远不满足。
这其实源于一个故事,一个有点搞笑的故事。当时我在 Instagram,正在做一次大型全员会议,是我最初的几次之一,他们搞了一个破冰环节——用一个词形容你自己。于是在后台,我赶紧给我妻子发了条短信:“嘿,用一个词形容我,第一反应是什么。“她直接回了一个词:“不满足。”
我在后台笑了起来,因为我首先有点受伤——不是”有爱心的”、“体贴的”之类的词吗?然后我看到她的小气泡。她说:“好吧,还有更多。“然后她给我写了一段非常用心的话:“不是说你只是不开心。而是你希望世界变得更好。你是出于一种深层的渴望而被驱动——你对世界给你的东西感到一种不满足。你想让它变得更好,这种渴望推动着你、激励着你去行动。”
我之后反复想了这段话。直到我们做了一批产品——有些做得不好,有些取得了非常大的成功,有数十亿人在使用——我才感觉到其中一个重要的差异。当然,很多取决于产品本身的条件和一点点运气。但在那些做得好的产品中,始终有这样一种精神——只要我们再多走两步让它更好,我们最终一定能做成。然后就像我之前在对话中提到的,最终你会迎来一个拐点,它就翻过了那条线,变成了对人们真正有用的东西——因为你投入了那么多的复利式努力,因为你永远是自己作品最苛刻的批评者、房间里最不满意的那个。
我觉得这非常有意义。还有另一个很棒的故事,是 Tony Fadell 在十年前的一次 TED 演讲上讲的。你可以搜到,标题大概叫 Think Younger。他讲到,随着我们长大成人——我有两个小孩,所以我经常想这个问题——我们对一切都会习以为常。我们接受并容忍世界给我们的种种不如意,我们只会说”哦,这有点糟糕,算了吧”,耸耸肩就过去了。
但如果你不这样做,而是问:“为什么?这太糟糕了,我为什么要忍受这个?我怎样才能让它变得更好?“他讲了一个关于去超市买菜的精彩故事,他几乎用了十分钟来讲这个故事——他讲到买一个水果,比如李子或桃子,上面贴着那个标签,那个小贴纸——谁把那个贴纸贴上去的?然后你回到家,从袋子里拿出水果,准备吃了,满心期待,你用拇指去抠那个贴纸,它直接戳进了果肉里。他极其细致地描述那个贴纸怎么戳进水果的果肉。贴纸撕下来了,水果开始流汁,然后你弹掉贴纸,贴纸没弹进垃圾桶,你弯腰捡起来,再把贴纸扔进去。
我当时就想,“哇,这就是这种心态的完美体现——为什么这个东西会在这里?怎样才能做得更好?“我觉得最优秀的产品人、这个领域最优秀的思考者,他们就是这样思考的,至少在我看来是这样。
AI Mode 的诞生
Lenny Rachitsky: 我想象在你参与过的众多产品中,有很多这样的例子。有没有哪个案例让你印象特别深,能很好地说明这种心态在实践中发挥了大作用、带来了巨大成果?
Robby Stein: 说实话,一个重要的例子就是开发 AI Mode。当时我们在 AI Overviews 中看到,用户在尝试提出更难的问题,但很多问题我们回答不了,或者 AI Overviews 根本没有出现。于是我们一群人坐在一起讨论:“为什么不能对所有问题都这样做?”
我们不是那种态度——“哦,我们不需要解决这个问题”,或者”那不是下一个最容易攻克的方向”。相反,我们实际上看到用户在查询流中,在查询词后面手动加上”AI”两个字,因为他们想让 AI 来处理。我们看到这个现象时就想,“这太不合理了,我们必须做点什么。”
这正是重要的驱动力之一——识别出用户的真实问题,替用户感到不满。我们每天都在辜负用户,没有帮助他们更好地表达需求、获得理解。于是我们决定去构建一整套解决方案。顺便说一句,构建所有这些技术难度非常大,但我们需要做的事情如此显而易见,别无选择。
产品理想与指标驱动
Lenny Rachitsky: 有两类人。假设一类是只想把东西做好、创造出色体验的人,做好了自然会有好结果。另一类是驱动指标、推动目标、达成 KPI 的人。我知道你不是在说”只要埋头做就好了,不断改进就行”。你是怎么看待这二者的交集的——既要把东西做好,同时又有战略、有愿景?
Robby Stein: 我不认为这是一个二选一的问题。我认为两者必须交汇。我的思考方式是,你从一个问题出发,或者反过来从一个愿景出发——但它们是相通的。大多数伟大的公司、伟大的产品都源于一个问题,而从问题中会孕育出”这里有更好的方式”。与其忍受某个糟糕的东西、某种糟糕的生活方式、或者我们都在默默承受的现状,不如有创业站出来说:“如果我们换一种做法呢?“所以它源于不满,源于”事情应该可以更好”的信念。但接下来你要动手构建,最终你需要通过工具来判断自己是否走在正确的轨道上。
这时你就要引入各种工具。你做出产品的第一个版本,用户喜欢吗?然后每个产品都会经历自己的旅程。判断用户是否喜欢的方式就是去仔细审视。通常你要和用户交流,但也要加入分析工具。你可能会看类似 J曲线 这样的东西——留存率,即第七天、第三十天、第九十天仍在使用产品的用户比例,曲线是趋于平稳,还是用户持续流失?如果随时间推移产品无法持续激发用户的兴趣,那么在足够长的时间线上,使用量会归零。过不了这一关,产品就到此为止了。好,有一部分用户在用了,很好。我们需要让更多人使用,而且产品要好到用户愿意自发传播,这样它才能增长。这是又一个门槛。
然后还有另一个问题:这件事到底能做多大?是个小生意,还是中等规模的生意?我觉得大多数公司都有做大的雄心,但你不可能一开始就做大的。每个产品都必须走过那段旅程。没有哪个产品是一开始就大的。即使是那些增长极快的产品,哪怕是按周计算的增长,它们也是从某个小东西开始的。甚至在公司内部,它们也是从小开始的——可能从一百人甚至更少的人开始。所以你必须关注指标,才能知道自己是否做对了方向。
另一方面,当你在运营一个已经很大的产品时,指标就是你的导航。假设我们的核心指标这周下降了 5%,那就是——怎么回事?你需要深入做根因分析:“到底是什么问题?是某个地区的问题?某个设备的问题?某个人群的问题?还是某个使用场景的问题?问题出在哪里?”
找到问题所在后,你就理解了问题,接下来又回到”把事情做得更好”的循环——“好,我要修复这个问题。这个’病症’的’治疗方案’是什么?“修复之后你又回到增长轨道。你需要这套机制,始终审视自己正在运作的系统是什么、我的仪表盘在哪里。我就像一个飞行员,需要知道这架飞机是否在正常飞行。但仪表盘不会告诉你具体该做什么,你必须自己去思考如何让它变得更好。工具只能给你指一点点方向。
Stories 的诞生与反思
Lenny Rachitsky: 你刚才实际上给了一堂关于如何排序优先级、如何选择做什么的大师课。我想稍微岔开一下话题。说到做得非常成功、变得非常大的产品——Stories。你在 Instagram 构建并发布了 Stories。那次产品发布在当时相当有名,也很有争议,因为它基本上是把 Snapchat 做得非常好的东西拿了过来,然后说:“我们把它带到 Instagram 上吧。“这对 Snapchat 打击很大。现在回头看,那已经是好久以前的事了,我非常好奇想听听那段经历——当时的决策是怎么做的、你们讨论了什么、如何决定推进的,以及你现在回望那段时间有什么想法。
Robby Stein: 我认为那次发布有几个非常重要的经验教训。后来我们还推出了 Reels、对私信的多次重大更新、信息流排序的改版。我在 2016 年到 2021 年左右在 Instagram 期间,有大量新产品被构建出来。我认为从所有这些产品,尤其是 Stories 中,一个很有意思的经验是:你必须真正理解用户为什么使用你的产品,并且要知道什么时候一个问题实际上是关乎存亡的——因为可能有更好的格式、不同的做事方式已经被验证有效,你需要弄清楚那对你意味着什么。因为并非每一件伟大的事物都会由你发明。但我认为很多东西可以成为一种格式,你可以将其变为自己的,你需要从世界、从外部正在发生的事情中学习,才能让你的产品始终为用户提供最好的体验。
回到 Stories,我们审视 Instagram 的本质——Instagram 的核心是什么?就是分享你的生活、与他人建立联系。如果有一种方式能降低分享的压力——比如没有点赞数,或者采用阅后即焚的格式,并且在移动端体验优化得很好,因为是全屏的体验——那就是一个非常好的格式。这一点要归功于 Snapchat 的发明。但我们并不认为”不是我们发明的”就是一个阻碍因素,觉得我们必须让 Instagram 的照片流变成阅后即焚的。实际上,这个想法的早期版本确实尝试过把 Instagram 的核心信息流做成阅后即焚的。但当你试图把一个在用户心中已经非常固化、视觉形态也非常明确的核心产品,强行扭曲成去做一件新事情时,通常结果都不好。所以我们知道需要做一件全新的东西。而这件事又如此清晰地契合了产品的核心本质,能够自然地融入其中。
让它成为自己的
Robby Stein: 但问题是,我们如何让它成为自己的?如何在它的基础上构建?如果你仔细想想,我们做了很多事情让它具有 Instagram 的特色。比如,它有不同的创作工具,有霓虹绘画之类的功能,还有那些用户非常喜欢的精致滤镜。我们也会回到”用户不满意”这个话题来思考——很多时候,人们想用主相机拍一张照片,然后上传到 Instagram,因为他们想保存它,想要一张高质量、高分辨率的照片,因为那是一个记忆。而 Snapchat 当时是不允许你上传照片的,你必须用 Snap 的相机。所以我们做了很多这样的决定——为什么不让人上传照片呢?回到”不满意”这一点,这确实让人很沮丧。
还有一个例子,你在浏览 story 的时候没法暂停。你不能暂停,它就会一直播下去然后结束,因为它是一种阅后即焚的形式,想要营造一种安全感。为什么不能暂停呢?过得太快了。所以我们加了暂停功能,虽然是件很小的事,但现在你只需要把手指按下去就能暂停 story。我们上线了一整套这样的改动,让 Stories 有 Instagram 的感觉。它不是像你只是加了某个别的东西进来。后来的结果是效果惊人地好,好到团队里有人提到,他们当时没意识到,但几乎觉得页面顶部一直缺了 story 那些圆形的入口,某种程度上它补全了整个产品。所以我认为那是一个非常重要的经验教训。
关于”抄袭”的争议
Lenny Rachitsky: Instagram 在那件事上确实遭到了很多创始人的抨击。就是那种”你们就是偷了这个创意,这太糟糕了”的感觉。
你们内部是怎么应对的?就是”我们必须得做这件事,我们必须对股东负责、把这个东西做大”,有时候就是这样的?
Robby Stein: 我觉得更重要的是,我们关注的是我们的用户,是那些热爱 Instagram 的人——如果不做的话,就是剥夺了他们轻松分享一张照片然后让它消失的机会。归根结底,这才是我们想要添加的。说到底,那是一种人们会采纳的格式。就像你思考信息流一样——我想我们在发布的时候也讨论过这个。Facebook 大概创造了现代信息流,但现在每个产品都有自己的信息流。LinkedIn 有信息流,DoorDash 也有信息流。
这些东西很快就变成了核心的原语和格式。到头来,如果你不为你的用户场景打造最好的产品,你就是在剥夺你的用户群获得更好产品的机会。而且 Instagram 的使用方式是不同的。人们使用 Instagram 的方式跟使用其他产品不同。事实证明,WhatsApp 和 Messenger 以及许多其他社交产品在发展过程中都有类似的体验,而且它们实际上的使用方式都各不相同,这很有趣。
接手成熟产品的增长之道
Lenny Rachitsky: 我还想聊另一件事。你进入的两款产品都已经做得很好了——Instagram 和 Google。在 Instagram 那边,实现了变革性的增长和提升。Google 这边正在进行中,我们正处于你所推动的改进和增长的进程中。能够进入一个现有产品并让它实现显著增长,这样的机会并不多。很多人都想做到这一点。他们有一个存在了很久的产品,想知道:我们怎么让它增长、变得更成功?关于进入一个现有产品、找到大的机会在哪里、然后实现曲棍球 stick 式的增长,你有没有学到什么具体的经验?因为这正是所有人都想做到的事。
Robby Stein: 这里有几个经验。而且我认为,首先要说的经验是——始终保持谦逊,因为能够为用户打造如此有影响力的产品,是一件极其了不起的事。我把做产品看作打高尔夫——你永远离打飞只差一杆。一旦你觉得自己很厉害了,你就完了,你其实什么都不懂。世界变化很快。你必须始终做用户群的仆人,向他们学习。我做的第一件事、也是我一直在想的,就是去了解人们为什么使用这个产品,增长点在哪里。通常,即使在一个庞大的产品或成熟的复杂系统中,也会有某个部分在增长,某个部分已经成熟,某个部分可能在下滑或者增长没那么快。
在 Instagram,这些年确实有一个很大的转变——从公开的、大范围广播式的帖子分享和信息流,转向 Stories 这样更轻量的格式,以及通过私信进行的私密分享。你必须去观察这些变化,因为每个月、每年,世界都在变化,人们的需求也在变化。你要做的第一件事就是弄清楚人们从这个产品中想得到什么?它的真正本质是什么?我经常思考”待办任务”(Jobs to Be Done)框架,这是我很推崇的一个框架,Clayton Christensen 关于这个主题的书《与运气竞争》是我最喜欢的书之一——你必须真正成为研究因果关系的学生。一个人为什么使用这个产品?他在用它做什么?他试图用它完成什么任务?
这通常会引导你去做更大的、下一阶段的想法,并且打破”你必须用现有工具来解决问题”这种信念。在 Instagram 的例子中,就是你觉得必须让方形照片为人们做更多事情——那会是产品迭代的方式。而在 Google 的例子中,就是核心搜索体验需要做某个非常具体的改变,某个微妙的调整。你必须去想——那个大的东西是什么?有人正在向 Google 问一个很难的问题?对他们来说最好的方式是什么?这让你更多地从第一性原理出发思考,这是最根本的起点。
然后一旦从第一性原理出发,你就会想:“哦,这个更新的东西。“它可能是一次转变,可能是一种新形式。在很多方面,AI 版的 Google、Stories 和 Reels 都是类似的——它们都是世界上出现的新格式,人们期待并想要更多。
把它们加进来,是互补而非替代。在这两个案例中,Stories 并没有替代 Instagram,它扩展了 Instagram,就像我们现在在 AI 上看到的一样。有趣的是,接下来你就要想——我怎么把它融入我的产品中?你有这样一个庞大成熟的产品。我所见过的最好方式是让它成为互补的,让它成为核心体验的一部分,但又明确界定为一个有自己的属性特征的独立存在,因为人们是按空间方式思考的。如果你有一个信息流和带有图片的圆形入口,他们会期望那些入口做特定的事情。如果你把其中一个入口做成了带小时钟的,第二天就消失,或者不能点赞,或者跟信息流其他部分运作方式不同,对人们来说就会非常困惑。体验很差。
谨慎地添加产品
Robby Stein: 所以你必须谨慎地添加产品,但要让它感觉既协调又不同。Stories 有着相似的美学风格,显然它使用你的相册,和系统一样可以通过私信分享,在系统内运作——但它有不同的原语。Google AI 也是一样,它是一个全页面体验,现在可以弹出来,可以进行后续对话。人们对这些使用场景有一套期望,你需要去契合。然后你不断学习如何最好地让这些新产品在你自己的体系中运作。
你绝不能简单地把一个在其他地方有效的东西直接搬过来,你必须让它为你的用户、你的期望、以及人们想用你的产品做什么而服务。这其实是我在人们身上看到最容易失败的一点——他们假设在一个系统中有效的东西在你的世界里也会有效,但别人的系统面对的是完全不同类型的用户,用户对那个产品的消费期望也完全不同,那是一套完全不同的期望体系。你必须尊重这一点,然后说”我们能从中学到什么”,再把它带到这里。我想如果要总结我两次经历中看到的方法论,这些产品大概就是这么发展出来的。
优化现有产品 vs 下大注
Lenny Rachitsky: 我很喜欢这个话题。它让我想到人们一直在寻找的那个平衡——优化已有的东西,还是在一个全新的事物上下大注。你有很多这样的案例,在完全新的东西上下大注,而且结果极其成功。你在组建团队和分配优先级方面有没有什么经验法则——我们有很棒的 Google 体验,多少百分比的资源用于改进它,多少用于尝试全新的东西?
Robby Stein: 这个问题上,我确实觉得更分析性、系统化的思维会很有帮助,因为你是在试图在世界上创造价值,你会想以某种方式量化它。所以如果你看到一条增长曲线,你试图理解——人们在越来越多地使用和喜欢这个产品。产品在年轻的时候会增长,然后最终趋于成熟。你可以把产品套件和产品的不同功能以同样的方式拆开来看——某些功能增长很快,其他功能则不然。你会到达每个系统中边际收益递减的那个点,感觉就算你往这个项目放 50 个人,也不会显著推动任何东西。部分原因是需要团队自下而上地认真思考——那笔投资的预期价值是多少,要知道什么时候它开始趋近于零或边际收益递减。
而当这种情况发生时,这些时刻通常与某些根本性的变化相重合。要么是人们的期望发生了变化,要么是外部环境、市场饱和——总有一些事情正在发生,需要你做出调整。然后你去寻找下一个增长驱动力,或一组驱动力。这时候你需要更多地从第一性原理出发,去尝试这些新的东西。然后当你找到一个新东西,它创造了一个新的小增长引擎,你把人放上去,你去优化它,因为每一次改动都是 10% 的提升、20% 的提升、4% 的提升。
它明显还有很大的价值和提升空间让人们体验更好,你可以从数据中看到这一点。所以这变成了——我之前提到的这种度量体系——它成为你判断决策是否正确的指南。否则,如果你不知道自己要去哪里,没有更量化的目标,你很难知道自己做的事情对任何人有没有意义。我觉得我让产品变得更好了,但有人在用吗?有人在乎吗?还是我们只是在自我庆贺?最终你想要对人们产生影响,这才是最重要的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 所以本质上是追踪每个产品的 S曲线,理解你是否处于平台期,是不是该把重注投到别处。
Robby Stein: 是的。
(赞助商广告,已跳过)
AI Mode 的诞生历程
Lenny Rachitsky: 也许聊聊 AI Mode 的发展历程会很有帮助——它是怎么出现的,你采取了哪些步骤,到现在它已经成为 Google 搜索体验中如此重要的一部分。这一切是什么时候开始的?你是怎么决定这件事值得下注的?然后逐步推广的过程是怎样的?
Robby Stein: 我觉得可能要追溯到更早的 AI Overviews,那是我们第一次将生成式 AI 引入搜索。在那个阶段,我们注意到人们在问各种问题,很多人实际上试图在搜索中输入自然语言问题。所以我们想——如何提供有用的上下文和可以深入探索的链接,打造一个对 Google 来说得通的 AI 体验?那是我们为用户提供的第一个版本,让模型能够做到这些。然后在构建过程中,我们观察到人们想要更多、想要直接访问、想要能够追问。你需要一种新的模态。要在核心搜索体验的框架内构建所有这些,会非常困难。这促使我们组建了一个小团队——几个技术负责人、几个设计师,规模很小——去验证一个想法:如果有一个几乎空白的页面,删掉一切,做一个只有光标闪烁的全新文档会怎样。
如果有一个新页面,你可以在上面问任何你想问的问题。你可以直接接入那个原本在搜索体验顶部驱动一切的 AI。但我们在让它变得更强大方面做了大量投入,就是我之前描述的那些——它可以替你搜索,它的模型具备推理能力,它有多轮上下文,所以如果你跟它对话,它可以追踪那个上下文——它有一些独特的能力。如果我们快速试一下会怎样。我们最初大概就是五到十个人的规模。
Lenny Rachitsky: 这个团队是什么时候组建的?
Robby Stein: 大概是过去一年,基本是去年夏天到秋天之间。
Lenny Rachitsky: 哇,所以大约一年前。
Robby Stein: 大概一年前吧,也许那时候才算真正开始。我们一直在埋头打磨,然后看到了一个早期的小版本——不算很好,但偶尔会闪现出精彩瞬间。说实话,这又有点像打高尔夫,你偶尔打出一记完美的球,就会感叹”天哪”。那种感觉就是一切都刚刚好。我当时问了它一个问题——具体忘了,当时我在陪女儿做点什么,正在规划一次活动,结果它找到了大量非常有用的公园信息,附带链接可以直接去网站确认各种事项,还有 Google Maps 的信息,显示对我女儿来说可以步行到达。就是这类早期案例,让我对它能找到的东西和提供的帮助感到震撼。
这给了我们信心,决定继续推进。当然,这类决策涉及很多人,组织各级领导也给予了大量支持。但最初就是一个小团队——你得先做出点东西,然后自己去感受它,这非常像创业。当你亲眼看到实物,就会想:“什么样的版本算是好的、可行的?“这给了你希望。之后我们基本上把它完整搭建出来,做出了最初在 Labs 发布的版本。
Lenny Rachitsky: 所以第一个重要的里程碑就是——这东西能用。是一种定性的体验:“哇,这里面真的有魔力。”
Robby Stein: 对,能用了。不过在 Labs 之前,我们其实先把它给了一个可信测试者小组。大概有五百名外部用户加入,我们和他们保持联系。其中有些甚至是亲友。我们试着用更接近创业公司的方式来运作,因为觉得必须让真实用户来测试,告诉你实话——告诉你哪里不行,因为它很可能确实不行。
然后他们会给你发消息。我有个朋友特别喜欢它,但也特别讨厌它——理由都很充分——整天给我发截图,“这个坏了,这个出错了,这个完全说不通。”
这样持续了一段时间。后来到了一个感觉不错的阶段,可信测试者们的反馈也很好,我们就把它推进到 Labs 阶段,任何人都可以开启使用。然后我们利用真实的查询数据来改进它——我们终于能在更大规模上看到人们用它来做什么,从而可以针对性地调优。再后来我们向所有人开放了——至少先在美国上线——然后一直在这条路上推进,扩展到所有国家和语言,让更多人能够使用。
一年从构想到上线
Lenny Rachitsky: 令人难以置信的是,Google 大约在一年之内,从想法走到了对搜索体验做出重大改变——而且是 AI 驱动的。我觉得这不是人们印象中的 Google 的做事方式。感觉你们的运作方式确实不一样了,发生了变化。是什么让这一切进展得这么快?什么变了?是自上而下的领导力——“必须把事情搞定”——还是有其他原因?
Robby Stein: 我觉得组织如何变化这件事本身很有意思。当你感觉到一个明确的关键时刻——人们从 Google 获取信息,而我们无法回答某些问题、无法在某些方面帮助人们,而现在有一项技术可以做到——这就会产生紧迫感。当然,很多人在构建很多东西,市场疯狂,各种各样的产品不断发布。
这是一个令人兴奋且健康的时刻,让我们可以快速构建。能够抓住这个机会也让人振奋,因为我认为人们相信——我也坚信——未来一年左右的产品形态将决定人们未来许多年如何使用下一代产品。至少我只能代表自己说,我对用户有一种责任感——要给他们最好的、由 AI 驱动的 Google,把 Google 所了解的关于世界和信息的一切,通过 AI 交给人们。这正是驱动大量热情的原因。
AI Mode 的定位
Lenny Rachitsky: 说得好,人们正在建立新的习惯。现在那么多人依赖 ChatGPT,而且变化之快令人惊讶。我能理解 Google 会担心——天哪,每个人都在把搜索习惯从 Google 转向 ChatGPT。而现在 Gemini 已经排到了第一。我之前看了那个排行榜——前 15 个应用里,Google 占了大约五个,三分之一。太夸张了,太强了。当人们拿 AI Mode 和 ChatGPT 或 Claude,甚至 Perplexity 比较时,你怎么看待 AI Mode 相对这些工具的定位?它是想做一个直接的竞争者,还是说”不,其实它很不一样,它的用途是这样的”?
Robby Stein: AI Mode 是一种让你可以向搜索提出任何问题的方式。它专门为信息获取而设计和打造。所以它应该能在人们来 Google 寻找的那些事情上,提供极其有用的回答。想想看——你在规划旅行、想买东西、正在研究课题中攻克某个问题——这些都需要信息,而这正是它的核心。它在创意方面投入较少,虽然也有一些不错的能力——像任何核心 AI 产品一样,你可以让它帮你改写东西,它也能做。但我们不那么关注创意、生产力——比如上传一个电子表格让它输出图表——这不是我们的重点。
我们真正关注的是人们用 Google 来做什么,并为此打造一个 AI。这样你可以来 Google,随便问什么,就能毫不费力地获取相关信息、上下文,以及可以验证和深入查看的链接,最终导向人们想要的权威来源——我们从用户那里听到了这些需求。这些也就成了这款产品区别于更通用的聊天机器人的特质。也许你会和聊天机器人聊天,甚至有点像寒暄——“嘿,你今天过得怎么样”——我们也有少量这种情况,能看到一点,但人们通常是来获取信息的,是想学到东西,我们的产品就是围绕这个来打造的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 明白了,AI Mode 不是你的心理治疗师。
产品哲学的三堂课
Lenny Rachitsky: 也许再稍微拉远一点,回顾一下你参与过的所有出色产品和所有工作过的地方——如果让你挑两三个核心产品原则或理念,帮助你打造出如此优秀且成功的产品,你会选什么?你想到什么?
Robby Stein: 我通常会想三件事。如果要我写一本关于如何打造伟大产品的书,大概会有三个章节——可能不止三个,但核心是三个。
Lenny Rachitsky: 太好了,我喜欢这本书这么短,简直是理想中的书。
Robby Stein: 这三个领域我已经想了很久,它们始终是一致的三个要点。第一,深入理解人。我们之前谈到待办任务(Jobs to Be Done)的观点时聊过一点,还有 Clayton Christensen 的那本《与运气竞争》——我很喜欢。它帮助你真正去研究——用他的话说——为什么一个人最终会”雇佣”一款产品。不要把用户看作是在”使用”你的产品,要把用户看作是”雇佣”你去帮他们完成某件事。
Robby Stein: 有一句名言,我记得是 Theodore Levitt 说的:“人们不需要一把四分之一英寸的钻头,他们需要的是一个四分之一英寸的孔。” 所以,一个人到底想做什么?你必须深入理解这一点,然后才能打造出伟大的产品。而且话说回来,当你回过头去看,为什么有人不用你的产品?他的方法论聚焦于如何提取因果关系。他其实花了很多篇幅讲这种访谈技巧,他称之为”审讯式”访谈——你和用户对话:“嘿,你为什么用我的产品?你当时在哪里?在床上?还是在上班?你在做什么?” “哦,我早上在跟妻子聊天。” “好,那怎么聊起这个的?” “嗯,我当时在看报纸吧。” “好,为什么看报纸呢?” 然后你就会有那种恍然大悟的时刻——他们第一次决定使用你产品的那一瞬间,他称之为”大雇佣”(big hire)。你在这个过程中获取到的信息最终变得最为关键,因为那正是驱使某人使用你产品的真正原因。如果你能研究它、理解它,你就比单纯做一些听起来很酷的东西要走得远得多。所以第一章就是:深入理解人。
第二章:分析严谨性
第二章围绕的是分析严谨性,理解你的问题。你必须理解自己的问题。这一点跟我们之前聊的根因分析有些关联——指标在下降,为什么?如果有人不用你的产品,为什么?要真正能够层层剖析,找到真正的根因。比如,用户一路走到了最后一步,然后放弃了。你去了解,发现原来是这样的——我们其实在 Instagram 的 Close Friends 功能上就学到了这个教训。那个功能刚发布的时候在很多地方彻底失败了。我们去看数据,发现人们只往列表里加了一个密友,因为在很多市场里它被误译成了”最好的朋友”。于是人们就只放了一个进去,而那个人看到并回复你的概率几乎为零。这个产品从根本上就是坏的。所以你必须理解你的问题。
第三章:为清晰而设计
第三个要点是,要为清晰而设计,而不是为巧妙而设计。很多人会说:“我们要在设计上做出差异化。“我们之前聊 Stories 的时候也谈到过一点——我们要做一个新版本的东西。但如果某个东西已经成为标准,人们已经理解它了,你去顺应它,获得的杠杆效应远比重新发明要大得多。你必须非常审慎地考虑什么时候该重新发明、什么时候不该。这一点上,Don Norman 的书里有一个很棒的例子。当然,《设计心理学》(Design of Everyday Things)这本书本身很重要,但他里面有一章关于门的讨论非常精彩——为什么这么多年过去了,你走到一扇门前,有时候根据它的设计,人们还是不知道该拉还是该推?因为如果你设计了一扇玻璃门,两边各一个完全对称、一模一样的漂亮把手,它根本没有向你传递任何信息。我见过很多这样的情况——我们设计了新的图标,明明可以用全球通用的图标,却非要搞成:“哦,如果我们用一个有点像相机但又不太像的图标,主要是个 AI 的样子,上面还有些小圆点跟另一个产品关联起来,是不是很酷?“但人们需要的只是一个相机。放一个相机图标就好。也许你可以在上面加一点小东西——就是这样才能让人们真正使用你的产品。如果你做到这三件事,我觉得通常都能做得不错。然后,抱歉,第四点算是个尾声:保持谦逊。不断地质疑自己,倾听他人,倾听用户,敞开心扉接受自己可能是错的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我很喜欢这几条。关于第三点,我觉得”AI Mode”这个名字就是”清晰”的一个绝佳案例。这是什么?这就是 AI Mode。
Robby Stein: 我们内部也讨论过。你去看标签栏里,所有人都知道——你一看到就知道它是什么。如果我们给它起个莫名其妙的随机名字,那又是什么呢?那你就等于在跟自己较劲。
Lenny Rachitsky: 如果让我总结你这三条——基本上就是你会写来帮助人们打造更成功产品的这本书——那就是:深入理解你为人们解决的问题是什么。他们雇佣你去完成什么任务?我喜欢你说的,是小写的待办任务(jobs to be done),不是那种所有人都要——
Robby Stein: 对,绝对是小写的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的。就是——人们为什么雇佣你的产品来帮他们解决问题?他们解决的是什么问题?所以基本上就是弄清楚他们的问题是什么,然后通过数据深入理解这个问题,以及你是否真正解决了它。然后就是保持简单,清晰胜过巧妙。
Robby Stein: 没错,是的。还有保持谦逊。
Lenny Rachitsky: 还有保持谦逊。好的,很重要。有没有一个我们还没聊过的案例,能把这些要点串联起来展示?就是——好,这是我们发现的问题,这是我们如何找到解决方案的,以及我们是否在成功解决它,然后这是一个非常简洁的解决方式。
Close Friends 的失败与重生
Robby Stein: 说实话,Close Friends 这个例子就很好。我可以给你讲更多 Instagram 时期的故事,但那个确实很离谱。Close Friends 花了两三年才真正跑通,我觉得人们可能不知道,它最初完全失败了。这个功能是让你添加一个私密好友列表,然后你可以发一条 Story,只有那些人能看到。就像一个专属的私密空间,让你能更自在地分享可能更私密的内容。
Lenny Rachitsky: 哦,绿圈。
Robby Stein: 绿圈,对。至少在我还在的时候,它是 Stories 里最受欢迎的功能之一,数据表现非常好。但它一开始完全失败了。我觉得我们发现的是,你实际上可以用到我们说的这些方法。首先是系统层面的问题——我们最初把它设计成一个整体系统性的功能,你可以在任何内容上使用 Close Friends 发布。你可以发 Feed 帖子,也可以发 Story,而且还有一个 Close Friends 个人主页——如果 Lenny 去了 Robby 的主页,而我们是密友,你会看到”哦,你可以在我主页上看到额外的内容”。我们发布了,觉得会很棒。这就到了”保持谦逊”那一步——结果并不好。各种问题,超级混乱。你会在信息流里看到一张精美的照片,紧接着就是一张模糊的、某个人想跟朋友分享的非常脆弱的瞬间——放在 Feed 里感觉完全不搭、很怪异,因为人们使用 Feed 的理由本来就不一样。而且它很令人困惑,因为帖子上多了个绿色小标记,但 Stories 那边却没有。如果你打开 Story,里面有绿色的标记,人们就完全搞不懂了。
列表本身也有问题——就像我说的,列表不好使,因为翻译有误,人们不理解。我记得它最初可能叫”收藏”(favorites),这就导致人们只往里面加一两个人。而它的运作方式又是……所以这就回到了那个框架。深入理解人——人们用这个功能到底想做什么?他们想做的是分享一些脆弱的东西:“嘿,我好孤独。嘿,最近怎么样?有人醒着吗?“这感觉非常像一个朋友圈的场景。
从失败到成功:Close Friends 的迭代过程
Robby Stein: 而如果你的列表上只有两个人,我们实际上在做的任务是帮你连接朋友。如果你没有收到回复的私信,这个功能就失败了。所以我们真正在做的是让你收到私信,让你建立连接,让你感受到与密友之间的联系感。这就是待办任务(Jobs to Be Done)。
其实 Clayton Christensen 在书里讲的所有内容都适用于此——效用性任务和情感性任务。人们通常大大低估了情感性任务。这个功能在情感层面上的需求丝毫不亚于效用层面,所以产品就是坏的。人们甚至不知道那是密友 Story,他们只是看到一个小头像,因为必须点进去才能看到内容。于是人们就不再用了。
我们经历了一轮又一轮的修改——简化它,更新它,过一遍变更清单:把这个去掉,把这个去掉,改名字。然后我们发现,那些往列表里加了 20 到 30 个人的人,使用效果非常好。因为当你把 30 个人放到列表上,其中两个人会通过私信回复你,闭环就形成了,你会感到和这些人有了连接。这是成功的。所以我们围绕这一点重新设计了整个系统,而且只限于 Stories 内使用。我们在看数据,试图理解它在哪里有效、在哪里失败,然后把名字改成 Close Friends,这样它不会让人感觉像收藏(favorites)。所以列表不再是三个人,而是 20 个人。
在列表方面,我们做了一个列表构建器,根据一位工程师开发的算法推荐一组人。我们还更新了设计,把绿圈放在 Story 的外圈,这样设计是为了清晰。之前我们太耍聪明了——当时觉得,“哦,这是个秘密 Story 什么的,你点开才能看到。”
但人们对这完全不清楚。所以我们把绿圈放在外面,这样用户在 Story 栏里看到就会想,“咦,那个绿色的小东西是什么?”
然后他们点进去一看,“哦,这是给我的私密 Story。“这个系统奏效了,而且效果非常好。这就是我们遵循的整个过程——从一个彻底的失败,变成了一个非常成功的产品。
Lenny Rachitsky: 这是一个非常棒的例子。你说这个过程花了两三年?
Robby Stein: 对,花了挺长时间。那其实是我们做的最长的项目之一。但促使我们做这个功能的原因,是当我们去深入理解人的时候,问大家”你为什么不在 Story 上发内容?是什么阻止了你?”
每个人都说了一些类似的回答:“嗯,我前任在上面。我有个老师在上面。哦,有个特别爱评判人的朋友在上面。”
共同点就是受众问题——有人对他们被观看这件事有顾虑。这让我们有了坚定的信念,愿意在这上面死磕这么久,因为我们知道这是产品的一个核心问题。
Finsta 现象与受众分层
Lenny Rachitsky: 这和 Finsta、Rinsta 的趋势也有关吗?
Robby Stein: 确实有关。我觉得那给了我们启发。每个人都有一个 Finsta,还有一种叫 Binsta。
Lenny Rachitsky: Binsta 是什么?
Robby Stein: Best friend Insta,最好朋友的 Instagram。
Lenny Rachitsky: 明白了。
Robby Stein: 不一样,这是把人分层的——从 20 个 Finsta 一路往下,到你伴侣的 Pinsta。基本上就像——好吧,这个是我编的,我不确定是不是真的存在,但我猜肯定有人这么叫过。我们当时就觉得,“哇,人们明显是在试图黑进 Instagram 来创建这些私密的小圈子,所以我们应该直接做一个产品。“
测试策略:跨国灰度发布
Lenny Rachitsky: 你们实际上是怎么做测试的?是按比例灰度发布吗?还是先在新西兰之类的国家上线?
Robby Stein: 对,我们确实在其他几个国家先上线了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的。
Robby Stein: 我们有一组国家来做测试,然后去做调研。那个项目的话,我记得澳大利亚是第一批之一。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的。我正想问能不能分享具体是哪个国家。所以是澳大利亚。
Robby Stein: 我觉得那是比较早的一个。不过每次发布新产品,原因都略有不同。
Lenny Rachitsky: 哦,有意思。所以不总是澳大利亚先拿到所有新功能。
Robby Stein: 不是,不过有时候确实是。澳大利亚和加拿大会拿到很多东西,只是因为团队更容易看到来自他们的反馈。
Lenny Rachitsky: 对,说英语。
Robby Stein: 对,没错。
精简团队的迷思与资源投入
Lenny Rachitsky: 好,我们换个方向,聊聊你有一个犀利观点的话题。现在很多人在讨论精简团队、小团队、限制资源、完全不招人。你的观点恰恰相反——你认为实际上需要大量资源才能构建真正的重大突破。讲讲你在这方面的经验。
Robby Stein: 嗯,我觉得这显然取决于你要建什么,历史上也确实有精简小团队做出大影响力产品的著名案例。但我认为现在有一种对精简、拮据、快速、尽快扔出产品、保持移动的崇拜。我觉得在某种程度上,这对内部建立信心是有道理的。但要构建一个能为大量用户服务、基于技术突破的产品,很多时候我看到团队放弃得太早,或者在产品上投入不足。当然,领域很关键。如果你做的是一个单一产品——一个用数字应用做点什么的、比较直接的东西,那和做一家机器人公司是不一样的。所以你要做的东西确实会有影响。
但即使对于软件来说,面对真正困难的技术问题,想想团队在构建基础模型上花了多少时间和精力,需要多少年、几百号人才能实现。再想想那些对人们产生了巨大影响的大公司,我认为特别是在大公司内部,我看到的一个现象是——反而过于精简了,因为产品永远积累不起足够的动能,质量永远不够好,然后就夭折了。而如果你投入更多人,当然也要小心不能太早投入太多。但我看到相反的情况更普遍——人们在精简小团队上坚持太久,然后要么花永远的时间才能到达你想要的结果。
我前面提到的 Close Friends 的例子,其实就是一个精简小团队。它花了我们那么长时间的原因之一就是团队保持得太小、太拮据了。那个迭代循环太短了,按创业公司的标准你可能早就死了。所以在更大的公司里你也许可以这样搞,但作为创业公司,我不确定你有没有这个奢侈。所以我认为你需要真正思考:要构建一个出色的版本,我需要什么样的团队?从第一性原理出发认真思考,而不是盲目地信奉”我们就两个人,一直到这东西达到产品市场契合为止”——这并不总是对的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 这确实和 Twitter 上流行的叙事相反。你能不能分享一些你用来判断”精简到什么时候该扩大”的经验法则?我知道不会有什么第一步、第二步、第三步,但我听下来觉得是——从小团队开始验证概念,一个设计师、一个产品经理、一个工程师。你觉得什么时候扩大投入是合理的?
Robby Stein: 对,我觉得主要就是当你达到确信时刻的时候。我认为有两个大的里程碑。第一个是内部确信。对你自己来说,你是否相信它?而你之所以相信它,是因为有了一些外部验证——你的朋友,你让20个朋友试用了它。顺便说一句,我在做创业公司的过程中很快就发现,如果你让20个朋友试用某个东西,他们不会给你太多面子。他们不会仅仅因为是你的朋友就连续30天、60天、90天每天使用你的产品。除非你做的东西对他们真的有用,否则他们不会用。于是你获得了所有这些反馈,看到人们真的喜欢它。你就到达了那个时刻。
但这还算不上一个能在外部市场获胜的产品,因为如果就这么发布出去,它会有各种问题,体验不够好。所以我认为你需要投入足够的资源,做出最好的版本——或者在你能力范围内尽可能好的版本——把它发布出去、交付上线。我觉得最终的心态应该是”我要做出正确的产品”,而要做到这一点,你只能靠一个合适的团队。
AI Corner:AI 在多模态与灵感激发中的应用
Lenny Rachitsky: 接下来我想进入播客的一个固定环节,我叫它 AI Corner。
Robby Stein: 好的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 在你的工作或生活中,有没有什么你发现 AI 特别有趣、特别有帮助的用法,可能也能启发其他人?
Robby Stein: 我觉得有史以来最酷的趋势之一,就是 AI 如何影响人们多模态的视觉和灵感需求。我们还处于早期阶段,这也是我目前正在做的一个项目。但现在你想想 AI 迄今为止主要做了什么——它诞生和成长于文本模态,就是聊天。所以长期以来,如果你问它”帮我想一个漂亮的书架重新装饰方案”,它会用文字向你描述,因为那是它所擅长的。但越来越多的,AI 将被解放出来,在各种可能的模态中提供帮助。
这一点我们从 Google Lens 以及我们的图片搜索、图片功能的爆发式使用中已经看到了很多,有了这种深度理解。我实际上开始在内部使用一些东西,还有一些我们很兴奋的、即将推出的内容——我们实际上在 I/O 上已经公布了,接下来会构建更多——就是 AI 如何帮助激发灵感,AI 如何帮助购物,帮助你在更偏向灵感类需求方面真正把事情做成,而不是那些代码、数学、作业这类核心工具型场景。
我对即将推出的功能非常期待,你可以向它提出灵感类的任务,而且从我看到的来说,它正在做出一些非常有趣的东西,希望很快能分享更多。但有一点我可以分享的是,我们在 I/O 上谈到了一个视觉版的 AI Mode,你可以参考那些主题演讲,它正在逐步推出中。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好神秘。
Robby Stein: 这样你现在就可以问”给我一个中世纪现代风格的漂亮办公室设计,深色主题”,它就能生成一个灵感图片板,而且你可以多轮对话。你可以接着说,“其实我想要更浅的色调,更奶油色一点,更有加州感,更有海岸氛围。“它就会照做,它能理解你的意思,而且它真的能”看到”图片,能像文本对话那样和你交互,这会非常酷。所以我认为这将是 AI 领域近期最令人兴奋的新功能之一。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我听到的就是 Nano Banana 整合进了 AI Mode。成功的秘诀啊。
Robby Stein: 其实和 Nano Banana 不太一样,因为 Nano Banana 是一个图片编辑器。这个更像是帮你在网上找到图片,所以更偏向 AI 灵感、AI 图片搜索,让你可以用自然语言与视觉化的搜索结果进行对话。所以这个跟”编辑这张照片让它发生变化”还是有点区别的。不过让 AI 拍一张你客厅的照片然后帮你改造,这也是一个有潜力的有趣方向,AI 最终应该也能帮上忙。
Lenny Rachitsky: Pinterest 有麻烦了,感觉人们用 Pinterest 就是干这个的——各种灵感图片。现在 AI 全帮你搞定了。话说回来,Nano Banana 这个名字是怎么来的?
Robby Stein: 我其实……我忘了。有个什么故事,但我现在确实想不起来了。不过那个团队本身就是一群拮据式精简的有趣的人在做这个东西,他们想取个好玩的名字——
Lenny Rachitsky: 对,感觉这也是事情开始奏效的原因之一——就是有更多乐趣、更多惊喜、更多天马行空的东西冒出来。
Robby Stein: 确实。感觉有点像我第一次在 Google 的时候,就是现在这种状态——到处都是各种项目,这种有趣的探索精神在发生,人们想尝试新东西、想发布新东西。是的,希望这能持续下去。
Lenny Rachitsky: 对,感觉 Veo 3 如果也有个古怪的名字可能会更成功。我喜欢这恰恰和你之前关于”清晰命名”的建议相反。我根本不知道 Nano Banana 是什么,但它奏效了。
Robby Stein: 是啊,凡事都有另一面嘛。没有哪条建议是放之四海而皆准的,对吧?不过没错,Nano Banana。
保持好奇心
Lenny Rachitsky: Robby,还有什么想分享的吗?在进入非常精彩的闪电问答之前,有没有什么最后的金句想留给听众的?
Robby Stein: 一个概念:保持好奇。我把所有东西归结起来就是——真的就是关于好奇心。就是想知道为什么一切是这个样子。为什么有人在做什么事?为什么有人和我的看法不同?为什么这个可能行不通?那些真正拥有这种强烈好奇心、并且一直追根究底直到弄明白的人,我认为这会对你大有裨益。这就是我唯一的临别赠言。
Lenny Rachitsky: 让我顺着这条线再聊聊,因为这可能是过去几个月播客上最火的关键词了——好奇心。每当我问别人”你在教孩子什么、在 AI 时代你拥抱什么”的时候,好奇心总是被反复提及。有没有什么帮助你培养好奇心的方法?还是说就是”我天生擅长这个,我天生好奇,我就是觉得这很有价值”?有没有什么你可以分享的、帮助你自己或身边的人真正践行好奇心的方法?
AI 作为好奇心引擎
Robby Stein: 我的意思是,AI 显然是终极的好奇心引擎,这也是它最酷的地方——你现在可以问任何问题,直接获得信息。我发现人们真的很感激自己能学到关于任何想学的东西。但同时,我认为这很大程度上也取决于你去钻研你想了解的东西,并且知道那些知识的分支在哪里。很多时候,如果我想学习某方面的统计知识,我会去读网上免费的老论文和 PDF,我觉得人们低估了这些东西的价值。那些经典的老派学习方法非常棒,而 AI 可以帮你发现它们。我自己就在用 AI,特别是在 Google,用它来发现各种有趣的链接和阅读材料。但我发现这是一种有趣的混合方式——不仅仅是依赖 AI,而是更多地回到原始资料上去。我在聊天里提到的那些书,我觉得你需要把所有这些东西结合起来,才能真正把事情弄透彻。
Lenny Rachitsky: 也就是说,要去读原文本身,而不是只读原文的摘要。
Robby Stein: 对。
孩子与 AI 时代
Lenny Rachitsky: 我再问你一个问题,这也是我一直在问所有站在 AI 前沿的人的。你有孩子,在 AI 不断发展并成为世界重要组成部分的当下,你有没有在思考、或者在着重帮助孩子学习和发展什么?
Robby Stein: 我做的最大一件事——我的孩子还小——就是让他们使用 AI 的实时对话版本,现在他们可以直接跟 AI 聊天了。说来也巧,我们这周刚把搜索实时功能从 Labs 里正式推出了。你可以用对话式语音跟搜索进行实时 AI 交互。开车的时候开启语音,你可以直接用语音对话的方式使用我之前提到的那些 Google 的知识能力,就像正常对话一样。我发现这对孩子来说非常容易上手。我所有的孩子回到家都会问:“我能跟 Google 聊聊吗?”——“你要聊什么?你想说什么?“然后他们打开我的应用,点击实时按钮,就开始跟它聊天了。他们想了解动物,想了解某些历史知识,或者在学校学了什么新东西。这种学习方式对他们来说如此自然,我认为这比其他任何事情都更能帮助他们成为 AI 原住民。
Lenny Rachitsky: 当父母的生活以后也太轻松了吧,孩子一有问题就说”去跟 AI 聊聊”——不过我觉得这也没什么不好。这个功能是在 Google 搜索应用里面的吗?有一个实时按钮,怎么找到它的?
Robby Stein: 对,完全正确。你打开 Google 应用,就是 App Store 里的那个 Google 应用。打开之后主屏幕上就有一个实时按钮。点进去就是 AI Mode 的实时对话版本,你可以直接对着说话。它是全屏体验,会提示你开始说话。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我会在节目说明里链接一个项目,是 Eric Antonow 做的,我特别喜欢。它 basically 教你怎么把一个小扬声器塞进一个毛绒玩具里,然后把扬声器连接到 Google Live 或者 ChatGPT,随你喜欢,用语音模式。你用一个小磁铁把它固定在肩膀上,然后你的孩子就可以跟这只”鹦鹉”聊天了。你还可以告诉它”用海盗的口音说话”,于是他们就真的在跟一个海盗鹦鹉对话了。
Robby Stein: 哈哈,这也太搞笑了。好吧,确实很可爱。
Lenny Rachitsky: 整个过程只需要十五分钟。拿一把美工刀,缝几针塞进去,挺有意思的。我给我侄子做了一个,他就带着那只鹦鹉到处找宝藏。
Robby Stein: 太可爱了,我一定要去看看。
闪电问答
Lenny Rachitsky: Robby,那么我们进入非常精彩的闪电问答环节。我有五个问题。准备好了吗?
Robby Stein: 好,准备好了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 有两三本你会反复推荐给别人的书吗?
Robby Stein: 当然是我前面提到的两本——Clayton Christensen 的《与运气竞争》,以及 Don Norman 的《设计心理学》(Design of Everyday Things)。不过我还很喜欢一本小说,叫《Aurora》,David Koepp 写的。讲的是太阳发出的电磁脉冲把一切都瘫痪了的故事,纯粹是消遣性质的虚构小说。它真的是一本很棒的沙滩读物,据说本来要拍成 Netflix 剧集的,但后来没谈成。我也不知道怎么回事,看到这个项目黄了还挺遗憾的。但书本身真的很好看。
Lenny Rachitsky: 有一本类似风格的书我也很喜欢,叫《Hail Mary》,他们正在拍电影。
Robby Stein: 哦,我正在读这本书,读到一半了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好极了,英雄所见略同。
Robby Stein: 对。
Lenny Rachitsky: 是吧,他们正在拍电影呢。
Robby Stein: 我读到一半了。我读到的那个地方已经开始变得离奇了,我很期待后面会怎么发展。
Lenny Rachitsky: 后面会更离奇。尤其是结尾,特别离奇。
Robby Stein: 真的吗?好的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 做好心理准备。
Robby Stein: 好。
Lenny Rachitsky: 最近有没有一部你特别喜欢的电影或电视剧?
Robby Stein: 我很喜欢《The Bear》,我觉得这部剧绝对是精彩绝伦。当然还有《Dune》。还有新的《Top Gun》,虽然现在看有点久了,但我觉得新版《Top Gun》真的又好玩又精彩。
Lenny Rachitsky: 最近有没有发现什么你特别喜欢的产品?不能说 AI Mode。
Robby Stein: 我要说一个非数字产品。
Lenny Rachitsky: 完美。
Robby Stein: 我最近超级迷恋一款新枕头,叫 Purple Pillow,我已经推荐给了公司里所有人。我们现在都有一个枕头聊天群了,这已经成了一件事了——大家讨论各自在买什么枕头。但这款枕头真的很酷,它用了一种新技术,里面有蜂窝状聚合物结构,所以能给你很好的支撑,而且有微孔设计不会发烫。真的很酷。大粉丝。强烈推荐 Purple Pillow。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我从来没听过这个东西,我有点兴趣了。我最近买了一个牛油果枕头,主打低毒性。
Robby Stein: 哦,那个也不错。我听说过那款也很好。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好吧,我也得加入这个枕头的……Pillow talk 倒是个好名字。
Robby Stein: 原来你也迷枕头啊,太好了。
Lenny Rachitsky: 超级迷。
Robby Stein: 我爱寝具。
Lenny Rachitsky: 不,我开玩笑的。
Robby Stein: 哈哈,好的。
Lenny Rachitsky: 不过我确实升级了我的枕头。这个不是那个 Mr. Pillow,那个什么人的枕头,对吧?就是那个有争议的枕头大王。好吧。
Robby Stein: 不是那个。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好。Purple Pillow。我要去问问 AI Mode。
Robby Stein: 对,你应该去搜一下。
Lenny Rachitsky: 就现在。
Robby Stein: 一定要。
Lenny Rachitsky: 下一个问题。你有没有一个最喜欢的人生座右铭,是你在生活中会反复回想的?
保持好奇
Robby Stein: 就是保持好奇。我差点给一家公司取名叫 Curious。我只是觉得好奇心真的很棒——不管是在做成事情方面,还是在理解世界、理解他人、理解你的孩子和家人方面。你总是想要了解更多,去质疑自身之外的事物,而不是觉得自己什么答案都有了。我觉得这非常重要。
Lenny Rachitsky: 我喜欢这个。最后一个问题——好吧,说到创业,你当年创办了一家叫 Stamped 的公司,后来被 Yahoo 收购了。我听说有个故事,你把 Justin Bieber 拉到了你们的应用上,那是一件大事,也是这个应用成功的一个重要拐点。能讲讲这个故事吗?
Stamped 与 Justin Bieber 的故事
Robby Stein: 可以,这个故事挺疯狂的。先交代一下背景。我那时25岁,刚从 Google 离职——之前在纽约做 IC PM——和几个 Google 的朋友一起创办这家公司。所以非常早期,也许好的方面是,我完全不知道自己在做什么。基本上,我们决定 Stamped 的概念是让你在自己喜欢的东西上盖上你的印记,从朋友和你信任的人那里获取推荐。你可以想象一个类似 Twitter 的信息流,但里面全都是人们觉得酷的东西。
Lenny Rachitsky: 哪些产品。
Robby Stein: 比如书、餐厅、美食。产品,没错。
Lenny Rachitsky: 枕头,可能也有。
Robby Stein: 枕头也可以在上面。我完全可以给这个枕头盖个章,然后你就能发现它。而冷启动问题很明显——你需要一群已经在使用它的人,其中要有一些有品味引领力的人。我们有几位厨师,也有一些文学圈的人。然后我们想再找几个音乐人、艺术家,这些有影响力的人。
我和联合创始人 basically 拿到了 Scooter Braun 的联系方式——他是 Justin 的经纪人——我们就发了一封邮件,说:“嘿,我们在纽约,明天会去 LA。“我好像说了什么来着,具体细节记不清了,但大概就是明天。
Lenny Rachitsky: 而你们其实明天并不打算去 LA。
Robby Stein: 不去,没打算去。
Lenny Rachitsky: 好的。
Robby Stein: “你碰巧也在那边吗?”
他就回了一行字,类似:“某点在某酒店一起吃个早饭。”
我们就想,“哦,好的。”
我们真的立刻就去了机场。我只记得基本上就是直奔机场,飞到 LA 去见他。我们做了完整的推介,展示了产品,然后他说:“好的,我觉得这会很酷。我们可以参与进来,也许你们可以让我做个顾问。”
后来我们又回去见了 Justin,给他展示了产品,还跟他拍了一些小视频片段。真的很好笑,是一个非常有趣的时刻。当然,他在上面给自己喜欢的东西盖章。然后大家就会去看:“哦, Justin 喜欢这首歌,他喜欢这个东西”,然后把那些内容发出来。
这是我们让大量用户来试用、了解我们在做什么的方式之一。这是一个小小的拮据式精简时刻,但我觉得它体现了一个很好的教训——立刻行动,保持拮据式精简,立刻执行。强烈的紧迫感通常胜过长时间深思熟虑,这件事确实证明了这一点。
Lenny Rachitsky: 太精彩的故事了,谢谢分享。有太多可以借鉴的经验了。最后两个问题——大家在网上哪里可以找到你,如果想联系你或者了解更多你在做的事情?另外,听众怎样才能帮到你?
联系方式与结尾
Robby Stein: 在 X 上 @rmstein 应该是最好的单一联系方式。至于帮忙的话,给我反馈就好。DM 我,@ 我,找我,告诉我 Google 产品的问题,AI 相关的问题,但其实什么都行。就像我之前说的,你必须始终倾听用户,理解他们的体验,所以尽管把想法和反馈发过来。这是最好的帮忙方式。
Lenny Rachitsky: 哇,你即将迎来一波关于搜索体验的反馈轰炸了。
Robby Stein: 没问题,请尽管来。
Lenny Rachitsky: “Robby,为什么这个链接排第二?为什么我的网站不在最前面?“我简直能想象大家会抱怨什么。Robby,非常感谢你来。
Robby Stein: 谢谢你,很棒的经历。
Lenny Rachitsky: 确实很棒。大家再见。
Robby Stein: 保重。
Lenny Rachitsky: 非常感谢你的收听。如果你觉得这期节目有价值,可以在 Apple Podcasts、Spotify 或你最喜欢的播客应用上订阅。也请考虑给我们评分或留下评论,这真的能帮助其他听众找到这个播客。你可以在 lennyspodcasts.com 找到所有往期节目或了解更多关于这个节目的信息。下期见。
术语表
| 原文 | 中文 |
|---|---|
| AEO | AEO(保留原文) |
| AI Mode | AI Mode(保留原文) |
| AI Overviews | AI Overviews(保留原文) |
| Alex Rampell | Alex Rampell(保留原文) |
| Ask Jeeves | Ask Jeeves(保留原文) |
| Aurora | 《Aurora》(保留原文) |
| big hire | 大雇佣(big hire) |
| Binsta | Binsta(Best friend Instagram 的缩写,保留原文) |
| bottoms up | 自下而上 |
| Brian Balfour | Brian Balfour(保留原文) |
| Clayton Christensen | Clayton Christensen(保留原文) |
| Close Friends | Close Friends(保留原文,Instagram 产品功能名) |
| code execution | 代码执行 |
| cold start | 冷启动 |
| Competing Against Luck | 《与运气竞争》 |
| David Koepp | David Koepp(保留原文) |
| Design of Everyday Things | 《设计心理学》(Design of Everyday Things) |
| Don Norman | Don Norman(保留原文) |
| Eric Antonow | Eric Antonow(保留原文) |
| favorites | 收藏(favorites) |
| fine-tuning | 微调 |
| Finsta | Finsta(Fake Instagram 的缩写,指 Instagram 上的私密小号,保留原文) |
| first principles | 第一性原理 |
| foundational model | 基础模型 |
| GEO | GEO(保留原文) |
| Hail Mary | 《Hail Mary》(保留原文) |
| IC PM | IC PM(Individual Contributor Product Manager,保留原文) |
| instrumentation | 度量体系 |
| ISO 27001 | ISO 27001(保留原文) |
| J-curve | J曲线 |
| Jobs to Be Done | 待办任务(Jobs to Be Done) |
| Justin Bieber | Justin Bieber(保留原文,国际知名人物但中文语境中通常保留原名) |
| keyword ease | 关键词惯性 |
| Lenny Rachitsky | Lenny Rachitsky(保留原文) |
| marginal return | 边际收益 |
| modality | 模态 |
| Nano Banana | Nano Banana(保留原文) |
| Nesrine Changuel | Nesrine Changuel(保留原文) |
| parametric memory | 参数化记忆 |
| Pinsta | Pinsta(Partner Instagram 的缩写,保留原文) |
| post-training | 后训练 |
| primitives | 原语 |
| Purple Pillow | Purple Pillow(保留原文,产品名) |
| query fan-out | 查询扇出 |
| Reels | Reels(Instagram 产品名,保留原文) |
| retention | 留存率 |
| Rinsta | Rinsta(Real Instagram 的缩写,指主要公开账号,保留原文) |
| Robby Stein | Robby Stein(保留原文) |
| S-curves | S曲线 |
| Scooter Braun | Scooter Braun(保留原文,人名) |
| scrappy | 拮据式精简 |
| Snapchat | Snapchat(保留原文) |
| SOC 2 | SOC 2(保留原文) |
| Stamped | Stamped(保留原文,产品/公司名) |
| Stories | Stories(Instagram 产品名,保留原文) |
| tastemaker | 品味引领者(tastemaker) |
| Theodore Levitt | Theodore Levitt(保留原文) |
| Tony Fadell | Tony Fadell(保留原文) |
| Transformers | Transformers(保留原文) |
此文档由 AI 分片翻译(translate_long_document)
Inside Googles AI turnaround: AI Mode, AI Overviews, and vision for AI-powered search | Robby Stein
Gemini’s Rise and Google’s Internal Shift
Lenny Rachitsky: It feels like something has changed internally at Google. Just last week, Google Gemini hit the number one app in the App Store. I feel like nobody saw this coming.
Robby Stein: Google’s mission around have any information be universally accessible, this very enduring, very motivating thing, and it feels like with the AI moment, we can actually achieve that more than ever before. What I’m feeling now is just an incredible sense of focus and urgency. Things have hit a tipping point where these models are now truly able to deliver for consumers.
Product Philosophy: Relentless Improvement
Lenny Rachitsky: As ChatGPT emerged over the past couple of years, as Perplexity emerged, a lot of people were just like, “Google is dead. Nobody wants to sit through search results and click links.”
Robby Stein: The core Google search isn’t really changing, in my opinion. We’re not seeing that people come to search for just ridiculously wide set of things. They want a specific phone number, they want a price for something, they want to get directions. I think the vastness of that is underappreciated by many people. AI is expansionary. There’s actually just more and more questions being asked and curiosity that can be fulfilled now with AI.
Introducing the Guest
Lenny Rachitsky: You’ve built a lot of very successful products. You used this phrase: embodying relentless improvement.
Robby Stein: You need to be the physical manifestation of two pieces of things. One is just relentlessness, just complete effort that is always exerted in a direction of positive productivity. And then the second is make things better. You have to always make things better. You’re never content.
Behind Gemini’s Rise
Lenny Rachitsky: You build and launch Stories at Instagram back in the day is quite controversial because it basically took what Snapchat was doing really well and then like, “Hey, let’s bring it to Instagram.”
Robby Stein: Not every great thing is going to be invented by you. Facebook probably created the modern feed, but there’s a feed for every single product. At the end of the day, you’re just robbing your user base of the opportunity to have a better product.
From Tech Lead to Consumer Breakthrough
Lenny Rachitsky: Today my guest is Robby Stein, Robby’s VP of Product for Google Search and is responsible for essentially the entire Google search experience, including the new AI Overviews, AI Mode, multimodal AI experiences like Google Lens, the ranking algorithm, and a lot more. He’s at the forefront of one of the biggest shifts in Google’s history, and has already made a massive dent in Google’s trajectory. He’s also made a massive dent in the trajectory of Instagram where he was head of product, and led the launch of Instagram Stories and Reels and Close Friends, and through that, grew Instagram to half a billion daily active users. He’s also on the founding team of Artifact with Mike Krieger and Kevin Systrom. Started two companies of his own. Very few people have had this level of impact on two global consumer products at this scale. And Robby shares all of the biggest lessons that he’s learned about building great and successful consumer products, along with a bunch of insights into where Google is headed in the world of AI.
A huge thank you to Bart Stein for suggesting topics for this conversation. If you enjoy this podcast, don’t forget to subscribe and follow it in your favorite podcasting app or YouTube, it helps tremendously. And, if you become an annual subscriber of my newsletter, you get a year free of 15 incredible products including Lovable, Replit, Bolt, n8n, Linear, Superhuman, Descript, Whispr Flow, Gamma, Perplexity, Warp, Granola, Magic Patterns, Raycast, ChatPRD, and Mobbin. Head on over to lennysnewsletter.com and click Product Pass. With that, I bring you Robby Stein.
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Robby, thank you so much for being here, and welcome to the podcast.
Google’s Focus and Urgency
Robby Stein: Thanks so much for having me.
The Death of Search Didn’t Happen
Lenny Rachitsky: This is such a cool week to be recording this podcast. So just last week, Gemini, Google Gemini hit the number one app in the App Store. I have it right here, it’s still number one in the App Store. It’s above ChatGPT. I feel like nobody saw this coming. I feel like everyone’s always like, “Google, what have you guys been doing? You guys build all this amazing tech and why didn’t you have anything working in consumer? Why is ChatGPT doing? Why are all these amazing companies doing better than Google?”
So first of all, let me just say congrats on, I know this isn’t all you. I imagine you had some part in this, so just congrats.
Robby Stein: Many, many more people, yes.
Three Core Components of AI Mode
Lenny Rachitsky: It feels like something has changed internally at Google. It feels like things are starting to really work, especially on the AI consumer side. So in terms of the growth, is Nano Banana the source of a lot of this recent growth or is there something else?
Integrating AI Features
Robby Stein: People are really excited about Nano Banana to be clear, very much so, but I think also people are recognizing that there’s just so many cool things that you can do across the Google set of products and they’ve become quite powerful. I’m always shocked, even for things in search, people, we think they’re very obvious. They sit right in the core search experience and then on X, I’ll go look and like, “Oh, I just found out about this AI thing,” and it seems very obvious, but I think a lot of people are just discovering quite how powerful these tools are.
Google’s Defining Moment
Lenny Rachitsky: Now. So to go one level deeper, to your point, there’s been all this incredible tech. You guys wrote the original transformers paper that have powered so much of the innovation and it’s just like, “Where’s Google been? And actually, why aren’t they building the thing that’s winning?”
What has changed? Is it just like, okay, has there been major reorgs? Has there been new leaders put in place? Is there just a new philosophy in the past couple of years that have led to this moment where Gemini is now the top app in the world?
Robby Stein: Yeah, I mean, look, I’ve been to Google now, this is my second time at Google, so I started at Google in 2007, done a bunch of things in between, and I’ve been back at Google now, so I can’t speak to that whole period for many, many years back to today. But what I can tell you about what I’m feeling now is just an incredible sense of focus and urgency to deliver great products quickly. I think that that is in part leadership for sure. I think the people who are, we work very closely with our partners at DeepMind and Google DeepMind. We work very closely obviously across the organization and there’s just an incredible group of people and also an incredible group of researchers and technical thinkers who’ve been thinking about this for a while. When you have that energy, and I think the product teams and the tech, the research groups are working really closely together, we’re able to move and we’re getting a lot done.
I don’t think there’s any one thing that has happened. I think that a lot of times people ascribe a lot of momentum to a one time change or a single person. I find a lot of this is actually this compounding effect when you think about just every month ruthlessly improving the product or the models and just every day getting better, and then it just hits this tipping point where people just like it, they use it more, they enjoy it. And that’s more of the feeling that I’ve had is just we’ve had, I think the right investment and focus and then it just hit a moment where people are seeing the effects of that now.
Back to Ask Jeeves
Lenny Rachitsky: As ChatGPT emerged over the past couple of years, as Perplexity emerged and all these other chatbots, a lot of people were just like, “Google is dead. Nobody wants to sit through search results and click links. Why not just get your answer right there?”
And it feels like that’s not at all happening. It feels like you guys are doing just fine. What can you share about just the, I don’t know, the state of Google search specifically, and then we’ll talk about AI Mode. Just how is traffic going, how is search going considering all these things are out there, and just what are you seeing in the data since the launch of say ChatGPT?
Robby Stein: Yeah. Well, what’s interesting is people come to search for just ridiculously wide set of things, like all kinds of things. They want specific phone number, they want a price for something, they want to get directions, they want to find a payment web page for their taxes. Every possible thing you can imagine. I think the vastness of that is underappreciated by many people. And what we see is that it’s not changing. AI hasn’t really changed those foundational needs in many ways, and what we’re finding is that AI is expansionary, and so there’s actually just more and more questions being asked and curiosity that can be fulfilled now with AI. And so that’s where you get the growth.
All the core Google search isn’t really changing, in my opinion. We’re not seeing that, but you’re getting this expansion moment. What we’re seeing is a few examples is you can now take a picture of something and ask about anything you see. And Google Lens, one of the fastest growing products out there, it’s growing 70% year-over-year increase in visual searches, which is already at a massive scale. It’s billions and billions and billions of searching in that way.
But you can take a picture of your shoes, say, “Where can I buy this?”
Or take a picture of your homework, say, “I’m stuck on question two.”
And then just take a picture of your bookshelf and say, “What are the books I should get based on these books?” And AI can help you with those things now, just an example of I think why there’s so much growth left and why we’re so excited.
AEO, GEO, and Search Optimization Evolution
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay, so you’re not seeing the death of search.
The Mechanics Behind AI Answers
Robby Stein: No.
Lessons from Building AI Products
Lenny Rachitsky: And along the same lines, you guys recently launched AI Mode, which I don’t think enough people are talking about. I think you get there at google.com/ai, is that the right URL?
Robby Stein: Yep.
Practicing Relentless Improvement
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay, cool. I’ve been playing with it as we were prepping for this conversation. It’s really incredible. I asked it what is the best newsletter on product and growth and it’s very smart. Said Lenny’s Newsletter. So that’s my eval.
Robby Stein: Fantastic. Okay, one of one, perfect eval.
The Birth of AI Mode
Lenny Rachitsky: It’s perfect. Also, just if you go to it, there’s these recommendations for things to ask it that are just like, “Wait, how did you know I care about this stuff?” So it’s like, “Help me switch to product management,” just on the front page.
I’m like, “How did you know?” And it tells you that it’s based on your Google activity. Talk about just what people should know about AI Mode, maybe what they don’t really understand about the power of this thing.
Robby Stein: I can tell you there’s three big components to how we can think about AI search and the next generation of search experiences. One is obviously AI Overviews, which are the quick and fast AI you get at the top of the page many people have seen, and that’s obviously been something growing very, very quickly. This is when you ask a natural question, you just put it into Google, you get this AI now, it’s really helpful for people.
The second is around multimodal. This is visual search and lens. That’s the other big piece. You go to the camera in the Google app and that’s seeing a bunch of growth. And then really with AI Mode, it really brings it all together. It creates an end-to-end frontier search experience on state-of-the-art models to really truly let you ask anything of Google search. You can go back and forth, you can have a conversation and it taps into and is specially designed for search. What does that mean?
And one of the cool things that I think it does is it’s able to understand all of this incredibly rich information that’s within Google. There’s 50 billion products in the Google shopping graph, for instance. They’re updated 2 billion times an hour by merchants with live prices. You have 250 million places in maps. You have all of the finance information, and not to mention, you have the entire context of the web and how to connect to it so that you can get context but then go deeper. You put all of that into this brain that is effectively this way to talk to Google and get at this knowledge. And that’s really what you can do now.
You can ask anything on your mind and it’ll use all of this information to hopefully give you super high quality and informed information as best as we can, and you can use it directly at this google.com/ai. But it’s also been integrated into our core experiences too. We announced you can get to it really easily if you can ask follow-up questions of AI Overviews right into AI Mode now. Same for the lens stuff. Take a picture takes you to AI Modes, you can have this back, you can ask follow-up questions and go there too. So it’s increasingly integrated experience into the core part of the product.
Product Ideals vs. Metric-Driven Growth
Lenny Rachitsky: I imagine much of this is wait and see how people use it, but what’s the vision of how all these things connect? Is the idea continue having this AI Mode on the side, AI Overviews at the top and then this multimodal experience, or is there a vision of somehow pushing these together even more over time?
Robby Stein: I think there’s an opportunity for these to come closer together. I think that’s what AI Mode represents, at least for the core AI experiences, but I think of them is very complimentary to the core search product. You should be able to not have to think about where you’re asking a question ultimately, you just go to Google. Today, if you put in whatever you want, we’re actually starting to use much of the power behind AI Mode right in AI Overviews. So you can just ask really hard, you could put a five sentence question right into Google search. You can try it and then it should trigger AI at the top. It’s a preview, and then you can go deeper into AI Mode and have this back and forth. So that’s how these things connect.
Same for your camera. So if you take a picture of something, “What’s this plant?” Or, “How do I buy these shoes?” It should take you to an AI little preview. And then if you go deeper, again, it’s powered by AI Mode. You can have that back and forth, so you shouldn’t have to think about that. It should feel like a consistent simple product experience ultimately, but obviously this is a new thing for us, and so we wanted to start it in a way that people could use and give us feedback with something like a direct entry point like google.com/ai.
Stories: Birth and Reflections
Lenny Rachitsky: I recently had Brian Balfour on the podcast and he showed this quote that’s really stuck with me that I think about as you talk about all this, it was by Alex Rampell, this idea that startups is a game of getting distribution before incumbents can innovate fast enough.
And it feels like you guys are finally there where it’s like, “Oh man, now here comes Google.” I don’t know if I have a question here, but it just feels like there’s been all this time for people to find distribution, and now it’s like, okay, now Google is coming.
Making It Your Own
Robby Stein: What we found is that people are asking these questions in Google. They’re trying to get this out of Google. And so if you can just have an AI that’s powerful enough to answer a really hard calculation someone’s trying to figure out, or take a picture of multiple choice homework question for a chemistry question, people are doing this. And so now that you have this really sophisticated AI that’s based on our frontier models, we can just handle increasingly more and more stuff for people and so hopefully that’s the more natural on ramp here. And then we just need to make it easy enough for people to use, because these are new products, and people are used to using Google in a specific way.
They type in keywords, we call it sometimes keyword ease, but you can actually use natural language in Google. That’s the biggest shift. We’re seeing people asking real long, hard, complex questions. You just don’t think, “Oh, I can go to Google and type in what’s a great place for a date night? I already went to these four restaurants. I’m looking for outdoor dining and my friend has this allergy.” You could put that into Google. And I think that’s the kind of thing that we’re excited to continue to make easy for people.
The Copying Controversy
Lenny Rachitsky: It’s interesting, and we’ve come around to back in the day there was Ask Jeeves, which was this whole just ask a question as if you’re asking a human and then it’ll give you a really good answer.
And then we moved into Google just, “No, no, just type the thing you want and figure out how Google likes it.”
And now we’re back to, “Okay, just ask your question and it’ll give you a really good answer.”
Robby Stein: Yeah, Ask Jeeves was surprisingly prescient on that, huh? They had material, they had something way before its time that we think looks to rally around now.
Growing a Mature Product
Lenny Rachitsky: Oh, man. What’s your take on this whole rise of AEO, GEO, which is this evolution of SEO? I’m guessing your answer is going to be just create awesome stuff and don’t worry about it, but there’s a whole skill of getting to show up in these answers. Thoughts on what people should be thinking about here?
Adding Products Cautiously
Robby Stein: Sure. I mean, I can give you a little bit of under the hood how this stuff works because I do think that helps people understand what to do, but when our AI constructs a response, it’s actually trying to, it does something called query fan-out where the model uses Google search as a tool to find to do other querying. Maybe you’re asking about specific shoes, it’ll add up and append all of these other queries like maybe dozens of queries and start searching basically in the background. And it’ll make requests to our data back end, so if it needs real time information, it’ll go do that. And so at the end of the day, actually something searching, it’s not a person, but there’s searches happening and then each search is paired with content. And so if for a given search your web page is designed to be extremely helpful and you can look up Google’s human rater guidelines and read, it’s a very long document that’s been thoughtfully crafted for decades now around what makes great information.
This is something Google has studied more than anyone, and it’s like, do you satisfy the user intent, what they’re trying to get? Do you have sources? Do you cite your information? Is it original or is it repeating things that have been repeated 500 times? And there’s these best practices that I think still do largely apply because it’s going to ultimately come down to an AI is doing research and finding information. And a lot of the core signals, is this a good piece of information for the question? They’re still valid, they’re still extremely valid and extremely useful, and that will produce a response where you’re more likely to show up in those experiences now.
I think the only thing I would give advice to would be think about what people are using AI for. I mentioned this as an expansionary moment. It seems to be that people are asking a lot more questions now, particularly around things like advice, or how to, or more complex needs versus maybe more simple things. And so if I were a creator, I would be thinking, what kind of content is someone using AI for? And then how could my content be the best for that given set of needs now? And I think that’s a really tangible way of thinking about it.
Optimizing Existing Products vs. Big Bets
Lenny Rachitsky: It’s interesting your point about how it goes in searches. When you use it, it’s searching a thousand pages or something like that. Is that just a different core mechanic to how other popular chatbots work because the others don’t go search a bunch of websites as you’re asking?
Robby Stein: Yeah. This is something that we’ve done uniquely for our AI. It obviously has the ability to use parametric memory and thinking and reasoning and all the things a model does, but one of the things that makes it unique for designing it specifically for informational tasks, we wanted to be the best at informational needs, that’s what’s Google’s all about, and so how does it find information? How does it know if information is right? How does it check its work? These are all things that we built into the model, and so there is a unique access to Google. Obviously, it’s part of Google search, so it’s Google search signals everything from spam, what’s content that could be spam? And we don’t want to probably use in a response all the way to, wow, this is the most authoritative helpful piece of information. We’re going to link to it and we’re going to explain, hey, according to this website, check out that information and then you’re going to go probably go see that yourself. That’s how we’ve thought about designing this.
The Journey of AI Mode
Lenny Rachitsky: You’ve worked on a lot of AI products at this point, and it’s not just Google or Artifact and Instagram, you did a lot of AI stuff. What’s something you’ve learned about building AI products that you find maybe people don’t truly understand, maybe something that’s surprised you by building successful AI products?
Robby Stein: I think the most recent one, and this is true, something even within the last week or two, is that it’s so obvious how human-like the interface is becoming with how you can communicate and steer AI. I think it used to be even just months back that you had to do a lot of work to get the AI to do the thing you’re trying to get it to do, right? You had to do these incantations, you had to prompt in a really specific way. People would have all these hacks like, “Hey, act like you’re a coach and you do these things,” and you have to really push it, or to use a tool more on the technical side. You had to do post-training, you had to take this foundational model and you had to show it data, you had to train it and actually update its weights to do more sophisticated things.
Tell it, “Hey, here’s documentation for an API. If you ever have a problem, ping this API. Here’s the data,” as if it’s an engineer that you had that you could talk to and it would have no idea what to do with that, or it would have some idea and wouldn’t really do it.
But increasingly, you can just use language. Almost if you were to write up an order, you could be like, “Wow, I’m a new startup. Here’s my data internally. Here are the APIs to it. Here’s the schema and the URL. Here’s when to use it. By the way, make sure that if you get this kind of a question, you really make sure to get it right.” And that’ll end up doing a lot in the model.
The model’s been now encoded to be able to say, “Okay, I’m going to use more reasoning or thinking budget for that kind of a question.”
Or, “I’m going to use tools or code, use code execution in order to connect to this API I’m told about.” That’s a relatively new thing. So I think it’s going to open up a lot of this democratization of accessing these models and building incredible things because you don’t even need to do a lot. To get the most sophisticated outcomes increasingly, I don’t think you need to do a lot of this heavy duty fine-tuning.
Concept to Launch in One Year
Lenny Rachitsky: It makes me think about, I had this recent guest, Nesrine Changuel, on the podcast. She was a PM at Google, she worked on Google Meet, she was a delight PM working on at making products more delightful. And she talked about the reason Google Meet did so well and is now feels like it’s killing Zoom is they compared the experience of Google meet to a human meeting versus making it the best possible video conference, make this as good as a human experience. And that’s interesting what you’re talking about, how that’s almost the goal here with AI is just make you feel like you’re just talking to a person.
Robby Stein: Exactly.
Positioning AI Mode
Lenny Rachitsky: Might be obvious, but think about that. Okay, let me zoom out and talk about, and let’s talk about just broader lessons you’ve learned over the course of your career. You’ve built a lot of very successful products, which I’ve shared in the intro at this point.
Robby Stein: Many also on the other side of the spectrum, we got the whole portfolio.
Three Lessons in Product Philosophy
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay, perfect. We’ll talk about some of that. I asked you as we were getting ready for this conversation, what’s one thing you wanted to get across in this conversation? What’s something you think would be really helpful for product builders to hear to help them build more successful products? And you used this phrase: embodying relentless improvement. Can you just talk about that? What does that mean? Why is this so important?
Chapter Two: Analytical Rigor
Robby Stein: Of course, I mean, I think that you need to be the physical manifestation of two pieces of things. One is just relentlessness, just complete effort, but is always exerted in a direction of positive productivity. And then the second is make things better. You have to always make things better, you’re never content. And I think this actually came out of a story, a little bit of a funny story where I was at Instagram at the time doing a big all team meeting, one of my first, and they had this icebreaker, what’s one word to describe yourself?
And so in the backstage area, I texted my wife really quick. I was like, “Hey, just one word to describe me, first thing that comes to your mind.”
And she just wrote back, “Dissatisfied.”
I was chuckling in the back room because I was first of all kind of offended because I was like, “It’s not loving, caring, something good?” And then I saw her little bubble thing.
She’s like, “Okay, there’s more.” And then she wrote me this really thoughtful thing that was like, “It’s not that you’re just unhappy. It’s like you want the world to be better. You’re driven out of a deep desire. It’s that you feel this sense of dissatisfaction with what the world gives you. You want to make it better, and you’re pushed and motivated to do that.”
And I thought about that after. And it wasn’t until we built a bunch of products, some that didn’t do well, some that have had a lot of really large success now, billions of people use them, where it felt like one of the big differences, obviously a lot of it is just the conditions of the product and a little bit of luck here and there too. But for the things that went well, there was always this spirit of just we’re going to get it eventually if we just make two more moves to make it better. And then eventually, as I talked about before earlier in our conversation, you get this tipping point where it just tips over into being net useful to people because of just that amount of compounding effort that you put into something because you’re just always so… You’re the harshest critic and the most dissatisfied person in the room about your own work basically.
And I think that’s really meaningful. And there’s this other incredible story that Tony Fadell told on a TED Talk 10 years ago. You can look it up. I think it’s something around Think Younger as a title. And he talks about what it means that as we grow up in age and become grownups, I have two little kids so that’s something I think about a lot. We habituate to everything. We accept and we tolerate what the world gives us everywhere, and we just go, “Oh, that kind of sucks. Oh, well,” we shrug our shoulders and we move on.
But if you don’t do that and you ask, “Why? This sucks, why am I tolerating this and how do I make it better?” He has this incredible story about going grocery shopping, and he goes on for 10 minutes about this story almost it felt like where he talks about getting a piece of fruit like a plum or a peach, and how it has that sticker on it and it’s got that sticker and who put that sticker there?
And then when you get home, you take your fruit out of your bag, you’re ready to eat it, you’re all excited, you stick your thumb under the sticker, it punctures the flesh. He goes into just incredible detail about how it punctures the flesh of the fruit. The sticker comes off now, the fruit’s bleeding, then you flick the sticker. The sticker misses the garbage, you bend over and pick it up, you put the sticker back in.
And I was like, “Wow, that is embodying this mentality of just why is this here? How can this be better?” And I think the best product people, the best thinkers in the space, that’s how they think, in my opinion.
Chapter Three: Designing for Clarity
Lenny Rachitsky: I imagine there are many examples of you doing this in the many products you worked on. Is there one that comes to mind as a good example of this inaction of this actually working really well and delivering something really huge?
Close Friends: Failure and Rebirth
Robby Stein: I mean, honestly, a big thing is working on AI Mode. I think a lot of it was we saw in AI Overviews that people were trying to ask harder questions and we weren’t able to answer a bunch of them, or AI Overviews just didn’t show up. And so a bunch of us sat around and we’re like, “Why can’t you just do this for everything?”
Instead of saying, “Oh, we don’t need to solve for that,” or, “That’s not something that’s in the most addressable next thing.”
It’s like we actually saw people in the query stream putting the words AI at the end of their queries because they’re trying to get the AI to do the thing. We would look at that and be like, “This is ridiculous. We need to build something here.”
And that was one of the big motivations, was actually identifying that user problem, being very disgruntled on behalf of the user. We’re just failing the user every day. We are not helping them actually get their thing better understood, and we’re going to go build a whole thing because of it, because that’s hard to do by the way, to build all of that. But it just was so obvious that that’s what we needed to do.
Lenny Rachitsky: There’s two buckets of people. Let’s say hypothetically, one bucket is just make things better, make amazing experiences, you’re going to do great. There’s another bucket that’s like drive metrics, drive goals, hit our KPIs. I know what you’re not saying is just work on things, just make things better, relentlessly, make things better. How do you just think about, I guess that overlap of okay, makes things better, but also here’s what we really, here’s the strategy, here’s the vision. How do you think?
Close Friends: Iterating from Failure
Robby Stein: Yeah, I don’t think of them as an or. I think they have to be intersected because basically the way I think about it is you actually start with a problem or the inverse of that, which is a vision, but they’re connected. Most great companies, most great products come out of a problem, but out of the problem becomes like, “Here’s a better way.” What if instead of this crappy thing or way of living or thing that we all tolerate and accept, some entrepreneur comes up and says, “What if we did this other thing?” So it comes out of this dissatisfaction and this sense of better that you need to make things better, but then you’re going to build, and at the end of the day, you need your instrumentation to know if you’re on the right track.
And that’s where you bring tools like, okay, you build your first version of the product, do people like it? And then each product goes through its journey. The way understand that people like it is you scrutinize. Typically, you talk to people, but you also add some analytical tools there. You might look at something like a J-curve. This is the retention, the percentage of people still using the product day seven, day 30, day 90, and does it flatten or do people just drip out of there? Over time, it’s just not exciting people. And that would go to zero if on a long enough timeline, no one’s going to use it. You don’t get past that, you toast right then. Okay, some people are doing it, okay, great. We need more people to do it, and it needs to be good enough that people talk about it and then it grows. And so that’s another gate.
And then there’s another one which is, well, how big can this get actually, is it a small thing? Is it a medium thing? And I think most companies, you have an aspiration of being big, but you can’t start big. Everyone’s got to go through that journey. No product has started big. Even ones that get big really quickly, even a week quickly, they had something. And then even internally, they started small. They started small with a hundred to 100 people, and so you have to be metrics focused, I think in order to know if you’re doing the right thing.
And then the other thing is, on the other side of the spectrum, you’re running a big thing, and there, you need metrics to be your guide. If your product, let’s say, let’s say our core metrics down 5% this week, it’s like, well, what’s going on? And so you be really close to root cause analysis there and say, “Well, actually it turns out that it’s an issue. Is it in a region? Is it on a device? Is it in a demographic? Is it in a use case? Where does my problem lie?”
And then when you get to it, you understand the problem and then this improvement thing comes back where it’s like, “Okay, I’m going to fix that thing. What’s the treatment for that disease?” And then you’re back to growth again, and so you need this and you always are looking at what’s the system that I’m working on and what are my instruments? I’m a pilot to know if this thing is going and flying correctly, but then it doesn’t tell you exactly what to do, you have to thank for yourself how to make it better. I can just show you a little bit of the way.
The Finsta Phenomenon and Audience Segmentation
Lenny Rachitsky: I love that you just gave a master class on just how to prioritize and pick what to work on. I want to go on a quick tangent. Speaking of products that have done really well and become really big, Stories, you build and launched Stories at Instagram. It’s quite an infamous product launch back in the day, it was quite controversial because it basically took what Snapchat was doing really well and then, “Hey, let’s bring it to Instagram,” and it was not great for Snapchat. Now that it was so long ago and just, it’s so far in the past, I’m so curious just to hear about that time reflecting on just that decision, what you guys talked about, how you decided to go ahead with that and anything just, I don’t know, you think about looking back at that.
Robby Stein: I think there’s a couple of really important lessons from that launch. And I mean we went on afterwards to launch Reels, a bunch of updates to direct messaging, we had feed rank game. There was just a huge era there when I was there between 2016 and 2021 or so where just so many new products got built. I think an interesting lesson in all of those, and particularly in Stories was you have to really understand why someone uses your product and know when something is actually an existential question because there’s just a better format or a different way of doing something that has worked and works and you need to figure out what that might mean for you, because not every great thing is going to be invented by you. But I think that a lot of these things are, they can become formats that you can make your own and you need to learn from the world and what’s happening out there in order for your product to always give the best thing to its users.
And so for Stories, we looked at Instagram like, what’s the point of Instagram? It is sharing your life and connecting with people ultimately. And if there’s a way to do that, that lowers the pressure because it doesn’t have likes or it’s just ephemeral format and it’s optimized well for mobile because it’s this full screen experience. It’s a really great format and kudos to Snapchat for inventing it. We didn’t think of that as a deterrent, that we had to go make Instagram photo clock. And actually, there were early versions of this idea where you try to take the core Instagram feed and make it ephemeral. And whenever you try to mix a core product that’s very cemented in someone’s mind and physically looks a specific way and you’re trying to make, contort it to do something new, it’s usually a bad recipe. And so we knew we needed to do something new and then it was so clearly was critical to the core essence of what the product could do, could fit in naturally.
But the question was how do we make it our own? And how do we build on this? And so if you think, there were a bunch of things that we did that made it Instagram. For example, it had different creative tools and it had things like neon drawing and these really sophisticated filters that people loved. We also looked at this talk about being dissatisfied. People took, a lot of times they want their main camera to take a picture of something and then they want to upload it to Instagram because they want to save it and they want it to be in a very high quality, high resolution photo, because it’s a memory. And Snapchat at the time didn’t allow you to upload photos, it was like you have to use the Snap camera. And so we made a bunch of decisions like that where why don’t you just let people upload their photo? This is back to the dissatisfied point, that’s frustrating.
Or there’s another example where you couldn’t pause if you were consuming a story. You couldn’t pause it, it just would go through and be done because it was this ephemeral thing and you wanted to create safety. Why can’t you just pause? It goes by too fast. So we added this pause, it’s such a small thing, but you put your finger down to pause the story now. And so there were a whole set of those things that were shipped that made Stories feel Instagram. It wasn’t like you just had some other thing. And then it turns out that worked incredibly well, and so much to the fact that someone on the team mentioned that they always felt like at the time, they didn’t realize it, but it was almost like it was missing the story size holes at the top of the page and it completed the product in some weird way for them. And so that was, I think an important lesson.
Testing Strategy: Global Staged Rollouts
Lenny Rachitsky: Instagram definitely got a lot of hate for that moment from a lot of founders. It was just like, “Hey, you guys just stole this idea and that sucks.”
How did you guys just deal with that internally? It was just this is, “We got to do this. We got to focus on our shareholders and grow this thing,” and that’s how it goes sometimes?
Robby Stein: I mean, I think it’s more that we’re focused on our users and the people who are loving Instagram and it’s denying them the opportunity to have an easy way to just share a photo and have the thing go away. I mean, that’s ultimately what we were trying to add. At the end of the day, that is a format that people adopt. In the same way that you think about feeds, I think we talked about this at the time too when we shipped it. Facebook probably created the modern feed, but there’s a feed for every single product. There’s a LinkedIn feed and there’s a feed for DoorDash.
These things become core primitives quickly and formats, and then at the end of the day, you’re just robbing your user base of the opportunity to have a better product if you’re not making the best possible product for your use cases. And for Instagram, it’s used differently. People use Instagram differently than they use other products. And it turns out that there were these experiences in WhatsApp and in Messenger and in many other social products over time, and they all were used differently actually, which is fascinating.
Lean Team Myths and Resource Investment
Lenny Rachitsky: Something else I want to talk about is you came into two products that were already doing really well, Instagram and Google. And on the Instagram side, a transformative growth and improvement. Google is happening, we’re in the middle of the improvement and growth you’re driving. Not a lot of people get to do this where they go into an existing product, make it grow significantly. A lot of people want to do this. They have a product that’s been around for a long time. Hey, how do we make this grow and be more successful? Is there anything specifically that you’ve learned about just coming into an existing product, figuring out where the big opportunities are and then just hockey-sticking growth? Because this is what everyone wants to do.
Robby Stein: There’s a couple lessons here. And I think, by the way, the first lesson is to be humble always because it’s extremely incredible to be able to work on products that have such impact on people. I view product like golf, you’re always one stroke away from shanking. And as soon as you think you’re good, you’re not, you don’t know anything. The world changes quickly. You have to always be a servant to your user base and the people that are out there and learn from them. The first thing I always do and think about is you get in touch in terms of why are people using this product, and where are the areas of growth? And so usually even in a big product or a mature in a complex system, there’s a part of it that’s growing. There’s a part of it that’s mature, there could be a part of it that’s declining or isn’t growing as much.
Certainly in Instagram, there’s been a big shift over the years of sharing into public very large broadcast posts and feed into these more lightweight formats like Stories and DM actually private sharing as well. And so you have to observe that because every month, every year, the world changes, people’s needs change. First thing you do is you get a sense of what do people want out of this product? What’s its true essence? I think a lot about this job to be done framework, which is one of the things that I’m a big fan of and Clayton Christensen’s book on Competing Against Luck is one of my favorite books on this topic where you have to really be a student of causation. Why is someone using this product? What are they doing with it and what are they trying to get done with it?
And that usually leads you to do bigger next stage ideas, and it removes this belief that you need to solve the problem with the current tools. In the Instagram version, it was like you have to make a square photo do more for people. That would be how you increment the product. Or in Google’s example, there’s something very specific with the core search experience that needs to change, it’s a subtle tweak. You have to think, well, what’s the big thing? Someone’s trying to ask a really hard question out of Google? What’s the best way to do that for them? And so it makes you think more first principled and that’s the first basis of this.
And then once from first principles, you’re like, “Oh, this newer thing.” And it could be a shift, it could be a new form. In many ways, the AI version of Google and Stories and Reels, they’re all similar in that they’re new formats in the world that people are expecting and wanting more of.
And by adding them, it becomes complementary, not replacement. And in both cases, Stories didn’t replace Instagram, it expanded in the same way we’re seeing for AI. And so what’s interesting is then you think, well, how do I bring that into my world? You have this big mature product. The best way I’ve seen is by making it complimentary, having it be a core part of the experience, but clearly defined as a distinctive thing that has its own attributes associated with it because people think spatially. So if you have a feed and you have holes with pictures, they expect those holes to do things. And so if you make one of those holes with a little clock and that one goes away the next day or you can’t like it or it operates differently than the other parts of your feed, it’s going to be super confusing for people. It sucks.
And so you have to add product carefully, but it needs to feel coherent but different. Stories, it has similar aesthetic. It obviously uses your camera roll in the same way it works that you can share it in DM, it works in the system, but it has a different primitive in the same way Google AI, it’s a full page experience that you can pop out now. You can have follow up conversation with it. People have a set of expectations you need to snap to for those use cases. And then you are constantly learning how to best make these new products work within your world.
You never just want to snap in something that’s working, you have to make it work for your users, your expectations, and what people are trying to do with your product. It’s actually one of the things I see people fail on the most is they assume something working for one system will work in your world, but someone else’s system is on totally the types of users they have with the consumer expectation of that product, that’s totally different set of expectations. You have to respect that and say, “What can we learn from that,” and bring it here. I guess if you were to talk about the method that I’ve seen now or twice, I guess that’s how these products have developed.
AI Corner: Multimodal AI and Inspiration
Lenny Rachitsky: I love this topic. It makes me think about just this balance. People always try to find between optimizing something they’ve already got versus trying to take a big bet on something. You’ve had so many examples where you’ve taken a big bet on something totally new and it’s worked out incredibly well. Do you have just a heuristic in how you structure teams and prioritize across, okay, we have amazing Google experience today, what percentage of resources go into improving that versus trying something totally new?
Robby Stein: That’s one where I actually do feel like the more analytical, systematic thinking helps a lot because you’re trying to produce value in the world, you want to quantify it some way. And so if you’re seeing this growth curve and you’re trying to understand, wow, people are using it more and more to liken this product. And when products are young, they grow, and then eventually things mature. You can break out product suites and different features of products all along the same way. Certain features that are growing fast, other features that are not. You get to these points of just diminishing marginal return in every system where it feels like you could put 50 people on this project, it’s just not going to dramatically move the needle. Part of it is this bottoms up thing with your own team being really thoughtful about what is the expected value of that investment, and knowing when it’s starting to approach zero or diminishing marginal return.
And then when that happens, these are these moments that usually coincide with something fundamental changing. Either people’s expectations, externally, market saturation, there’s something happening where you need to adjust. You then find your next growth driver or set of drivers. That’s where you need to go more first principled and try these new things more. Then when you land a new thing that creates this new little growth engine and then you put people on it and you optimize it because each change is like 10% win, 20% win, 4% win.
It’s clearly still has so much value in headroom and to make it better for people, and you can see that in the data. And so that becoming, I talked about this instrumentation, it becomes your guide for knowing if you’re making good calls. Otherwise, if you don’t know where you’re headed and you don’t have a goal of what you’re trying to do more quantitatively, it’s really hard to know if the thing you’re doing is mattering to anyone. I think I made the product better, but is anyone using it? Does anyone care? Or are we just congratulating ourselves? Ultimately you want to have impact on people and that’s what matters.
Always Stay Curious
Lenny Rachitsky: So it says essentially tracking S-curves on every product and understanding if you’re in the plateau and if it’s time to invest heavily somewhere else.
AI as a Curiosity Engine
Robby Stein: Yes.
Children and the AI Era
Lenny Rachitsky:
Maybe it would be helpful to talk about the journey of AI Mode, just how it emerged and the steps that you took to now it’s just such a big part of the Google search experience. When did this start? How did you decide this is worth betting on? And then what are the steps to get it further and further rolled out?
Robby Stein: I mean, I think it probably started earlier on with AI Overviews actually, which was the first way we brought generative AI to search. And in that world, we noticed that people were asking these questions and many people were actually trying to put natural language questions into search. And so how can you provide helpful context links to go deeper and make an AI that made sense for Google? That was our first version of these models that could do this for people. And then by building into that and seeing this observation around people wanting more of it, direct access to it, and then being able to ask follow-up questions. You need a new modality. It’s going to be really hard to build all of that within the construct of the core search experience. And so that led us to have form a small team of folks, a few people that were technical leaders, a couple designers very small to just prove out what if there was on, almost blank screen, delete, make a little fresh doc with a blinker.
What if there’s a new page and you can ask the question, you can ask whatever you want of it. You can tap right into the AI that was originally powering this top of the experience in search. But we invested in making it much more powerful in the ways I described before was in it could search for you. It had reasoning as a part of its model capability, it had multi turn context, so if you had a conversation with it could keep track of that context so it had some unique pieces to it. And what would happen if we tried that quickly. And we basically got, I mean, this was probably five to 10 people worth of people originally.
Lightning Q&A Session
Lenny Rachitsky: And how long ago was this team formed?
Always Keep Curious
Robby Stein: This was probably over the last year, last summer basically, into the fall.
Lenny Rachitsky: Wow, so about a year ago.
The Stamped and Justin Bieber Story
Robby Stein: Yeah, maybe about a year ago. It was where maybe it started. We were really plugging away on it, and then we saw this little version of it emerge that wasn’t very good, but it had this moments of brilliance. It’s actually, again, it’s kind of like golf where you hit the perfect shot and you’re like, “Oh my God.” You get that feeling where it’s just everything worked. And I asked it a question about, I forget, I was doing something with my daughter and I was planning an experience and it found all this incredibly useful information about park information. It had links to go to the site and confirm a bunch of things. It had Google Maps information that for my daughter, you could walk up, it was walkable. There was early examples like this where it just, it blew me away of what it could find and how helpful it was.
It gave us conviction that we should go and go further. And obviously there’s lots of people involved in this type of a decision, tons of support from leaders across the organization. But it just says a little working team that initially, you got to build something and then you have to feel it yourself and it is very entrepreneurial in that way. And then when you see it tangibly, you’re like, “What’s a version of that? That’s good and that could work?” And that gave you hope. And so then we basically built it out and built the first version that launched in Labs basically.
Lenny Rachitsky: So the first big milestone was this is working. It was just a qualitative experience of, “Oh wow, this has really, there’s magic here.”
Contact Info and Wrap-up
Robby Stein: Yes, it’s working. And then we did bring it before labs actually to trusted tester group. There were maybe 500 people externally that we added onto it, and we had pings with them. Some of them were, we actually had friends and family. We tried to treat it a little more like a startup where, because we feel like you got to have people test it to tell you the truth, and tell you when it sucks, because it probably does.
And then they’d message you. So I had a friend who was loving it, but also hating it for lots of good reasons and would just be messaging me all the time, screenshots, “This broke, this broke, this makes no sense.”
We had that for a while, and then we got to a point where it was feeling good, the trusted testers were liking it, reporting good stuff, and then we it to this Labs moment where anyone could turn it on and then we used that to make it better with real query data. We could actually see what people were using it for at more scale and so that could tune it to make it better. And then we launched it out to everyone, or at least in the US, and then we’ve now been on this journey to expand it to all countries and languages and have more people be able to access it.
Lenny Rachitsky: It’s incredible that Google went roughly in a year from idea to a significant change to the search experience that’s AI powered. I think this is not what people imagine Google is like, and it feels like things are different and things have changed in how you guys operate. What has allowed this to happen so quickly? What’s changed? Is it just top-down leadership, we need to get shit done, or is there something more?
Robby Stein: No, I mean I think it’s interesting how organizations change. I think when you feel like there is a moment in time that is clearly critical to deliver for people, people are trying to get information from Google. We are not able to answer certain things or help people in certain ways and there’s this technology that can do it, that creates urgency, and obviously there’s lots of people building lots of things and the market’s crazy and there’s lots of things shipping all the time.
There’s a really exciting and healthy moment for us to build and build quickly and I think it’s just exciting to be able to capture that opportunity because I think people believe, and I certainly believe that the next year or so of product is going to establish how people use the next wave of products for many years. And so at least I can only speak for myself, I feel this obligation to our users to give them the best version of Google that’s powered by AI and that gives them the full knowledge of everything Google knows about the world and information to people and accessible with AI. That’s driving a lot of the excitement.
Lenny Rachitsky: Yeah, it’s such a good point that people are building their new habits. It’s wild how many people just now rely on ChatGPT and how quickly that happened. And I could see Google being worried that, oh, shit, everyone’s changing their habit from searching Google to searching ChatGPT. And the fact that now Gemini is number one. I was actually looking at the list of top, so in the top 15 apps, Google is I think five of them, a third. It’s out of control, killing it. When people look at AI Mode versus ChatGPT or Claude or let’s even say Perplexity, what’s the way you think about the positioning of AI Mode versus these other tools? Is it trying to be a direct competitor or is it just like, “No, it’s actually pretty different and here’s what it’s for?”
Robby Stein: Yeah, I mean AI Mode’s a way to ask search anything you want. It’s designed and specially created for information. And so really, it should give incredible helpful responses for the things that people come to Google for. Think about you’re planning a trip, you’re trying to buy something, you’re working through a question for your research project. It needs information and that’s really, it’s less focused on things like creativity, although there’s things that can do that are nice there. It can help you. Just like any kind of core AI product, you can ask it to rewrite something for you, it’ll do that. But we are less focused on creativity, productivity, upload a spreadsheet and output graphs for me, we’re not focused on that.
We’re really focused on what people use Google for, and making an AI for that so that you can come to Google, ask whatever you want and get effortless information about that and context and links to then also verify, dig in and go to the authoritative sources ultimately that people want, and we hear from people. So those ends up becoming the distinct qualities of this product versus more of a chatbot. Maybe you would talk to it like you maybe even have a bit of a, “Hey, how are you doing today,” with that chatbot that we have some of that, we see that a little bit, but people are usually coming for information. They’re trying to learn something and we focused our product on that.
Lenny Rachitsky: Got it. Okay, AI Mode is not your therapist. Maybe zooming out again a little bit and reflecting on all the amazing products you’ve worked on, all the places you’ve worked, if you had to pick two or three just core product principles or philosophies that have helped you build such amazing and successful products, what would those be? What comes to mind?
Robby Stein: I mean, there’s typically three things I think about. If I were to write a book about how to build great products, there’d be three chapters. I mean there’d probably more than that, but three chapters.
Lenny Rachitsky: I love that. I love how short that would be. That’s the ideal book.
Robby Stein: I’ve thought about these three areas now for a while and it’s like they’re always consistently the three things. The first is deeply understand people, and I think we talked about this a little bit with the jobs to be done point and Clayton Christensen’s book, which I loved around Competing Against Luck. It really helps you be a student of why someone ends up, in his words, hiring a product. Don’t think of users as using your product. Think of users as hiring you to do something for them.
There’s this famous quote, I think it’s Theodore Levitt had, “People don’t want a quarter inch drill, they want a quarter inch hole.” So what is someone trying to do? You have to understand that deeply and then you can build an amazing product. And also by the way, when you go back, why someone not using your product?
And so it focuses on these techniques to extract causation. So he actually talks a lot about this interview. He calls it an interrogation where you talk to a user like, “Hey, why do you use my product? Where were you? Were you in bed? Were you at work? What were you doing?”
“Oh, I was talking to my wife in the morning.”
“Okay, well, what brought it up?”
“Well, I guess I was reading the newspaper.”
“Okay, well why?”
And then you have this aha moment like that when they first decide to use your product, he calls it the big hire. That is information that you obtain ends up becoming the most critical because that is what caused someone to use your product. And if you can study that and understand it, you’ll be much more on your way than just building things that sound cool. And so that’s the first chapter is deeply understand people.
Second is really around analytical rigor and understanding your problems. You have to understand your problems. And this got is a little bit of what we were talking about about root cause analysis and understanding, okay, the metrics are dropping. Why? If someone’s not using your product, why? And really being able to dissect that to get to true root causes. It’s like, well, they went all the way to the end and then bailed, and then you understand what turns out that it was most, we actually learned about this and there’s a story in Close Friends at Instagram where it just totally failed at first in a bunch just when we shipped it. And it turned out that we looked at the data and people were only adding one close friend to their list because it was mistranslated as best friend in many markets. So people just put one person and then the probability that person saw it and wrote back to you was zero. It’s a product which is broken. So it’s like you got to understand your problems.
And then the third one’s around really designing for clarity instead of cleverness. A lot of people are like, “Oh, we’re going to differentiate the design,” and we talked about this a little bit with Stories. We’re going to make a new version of something, but if something’s a standard and people understand it, if you lean into it, you’re going to get so much leverage than if you reinvent it, and you have to be really thoughtful around when you reinvent and where you don’t.
And I think on this one, there’s this great, Don Norman’s book. Obviously, Design of Everyday Things is a big one, but he has this incredible chapter in there about doors, and why is it that after all of these years you walk up to a door, and based on how they’re designed at times, people still don’t know if you should pull or push that door because if you try to build the as beautiful symmetric two handles on each side on a glass door, it doesn’t communicate in for any information to you.
And there’s lots of, I’ve seen all the time we’ve designed new icons when we could have used global icons like, “Oh, wouldn’t it be so cool if we used a camera that’s kind of a camera but is mostly an AI looking thing and then is mostly, but then has this dots in it that connects it to this other product?”
And you’re like, people just, it’s a camera. Just put the camera in. Maybe you could add a little thing to it, and that’s how you get people to use your products. And if you do those three things, I think you typically can do well.
And then, sorry, the fourth one would be more of the coda is be humble. Constantly and always question yourself. Listen to others, listen to users and be open to being wrong.
Lenny Rachitsky: I love these. On that third point, I feel like AI Mode as the name is such a good example of clarity. What is this? This is AI Mode.
Robby Stein: We talked about it internally. If you look at it in the tab, it’s like everyone know, it’s like you see it and you’ll know what it is or we could call it something random, but then what is that? And now you’re working against yourself.
Lenny Rachitsky: If I were to reflect back these three pieces of basically this is the book you would write to help people build more successful products, it’s understand the problem you’re solving for people deeply. What’s the job they’re hiring you to do? I love the, it’s lowercase jobs to be done. It’s not like the rigorous whole thing that everyone-
Robby Stein: Exactly. Lowercase for sure.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay. This is just like why are people hiring your product to solve a problem for them? What problem are they solving? So it’s like basically figure out what problem they’re having then very, through data, understand the problem and whether you are solving it. And then it’s just keep it really simple. Clarity over cleverness essentially.
Robby Stein: Exactly, yes. And be humble.
Lenny Rachitsky: And be humble. Yes. Okay, important. Is there an example that we haven’t talked about that shows this in action of just, cool, here’s the problem we found. Here’s how we figured out this is the solution and if we’re succeeding, and then here’s a very simple way of solving it?
Robby Stein: I mean honestly, this Close Friends example, I can give you more from Instagram days was really wild. It took two or three years to get Close Friends to work, and I think people, it totally failed originally. This is the product that lets you add a private list of people and then you can post to your story and then only those people see it. It’s like this very exclusive private space so you can feel really comfortable sharing maybe more.
Lenny Rachitsky: Oh, green circle.
Robby Stein: Green circles, yes. It’s one of the most popular, at least when I was there, was one of the most popular features of Stories and did really well, but it totally failed. And I think what we found out was that you actually used a bunch of these techniques here. So one was we first thought about it as an overall system problem and you could add a Close Friends post for anything. So you could do a feed post or a Stories post, and you also had a close friend’s profile. You could see, if Lenny went to Robby’s page, we were Close Friends, you would just be like, “Oh, you get to see extra stuff from me on my profile too.”
So we shipped it, we thought it would be great. This is the be humble part, wasn’t great, had a bunch of, it was just super confusing. You would see this really beautiful photo and then in the feed right after it, this blurry, very vulnerable moment someone’s trying to share with their friends, just felt so out of place and weird for the reason people use feed. And then it was just confusing because it had an extra little green thing on it, but it was like that got a green thing and the Stories one didn’t. If you open the story, it had a green thing inside the story, and people were just so confused.
And it had this other issue with the list where you’re like, “Okay, the list doesn’t work because it’s mistranslated and people don’t get it.” I think it was actually called originally favorites, I want to say, and that encouraged people to just do two people on it. But then the way that it worked was, so this gets to the framework, I guess. So deeply understand people. What are people trying to do with this?
What they’re trying to do is share a vulnerable thing and be like, “Hey, I’m lonely. Hey, what’s going on? Are people up?” And it feels very much like a friend group thing.
And if you only have two people on it, the job that we’re doing is actually connecting you to your friends. And if you don’t get a DM back, it’s broken. And so really what we’re doing is getting you a DM and we’re getting you connection. We’re getting you a sense of being connected to your Close Friends. That is the job.
It’s actually everything Clayton Christensen talked about in the book is there are utility jobs and there are emotional jobs. People usually discount the emotional ones a lot. This was really an emotional thing as much as it was utility one, and so product’s broken, right? And people don’t even know that it’s a close friend story, they just see the little head because you have to click on it to see the thing. And so it just, people stopped using it.
We went through and we did these revs where we would simplify it and we would update it and we would go through this change list. Okay, take this out, take this out, change the name, here. And then we saw it was that it was working really well for people who added 20 to 30 people to their list. Because what would happen is you put 30 people on your list and then two of them would write back to you on DM and now you have closed the loop and you feel connected to those people. It’s a winning thing. And so we designed the whole system around that, and also only worked in Stories. We were looking at the data, we were trying to understand where it was working and where it was failing, and then we updated the name to Close Friends so it didn’t feel like favorites. So it wasn’t three people, it’s 20.
In the list, we built this list builder where we recommended a set of people based on some cool algo that was created by an engineer. And then we updated the design to put the green ring on the outside of the story so that this was the design for clarity. We were being cute. We thought, I think at the time it was like, “Oh, it’s a secret story or something, and if you open it, you see it.”
It just was not clear to people. And so we put the green ring on the outside so that users would see it in the tray and be like, “Ooh, what’s that little green guy?”
And then they’d click on it and be like, “Oh, this is a private story for me.” That system worked and did incredibly well, and that was the process we followed from a total flop to something that was very successful.
Lenny Rachitsky: That is an awesome example. And this took two or three years, you said this process?
Robby Stein: Yeah, it took a while. That was actually one of the longest projects we worked on, but that actually came, the reason we did it was when we asked people to understand people like, “Why aren’t you posting to your story? What’s preventing you from doing it?”
And everyone had some version of, “Well, my ex is on it. I have a teacher on it. Oh, a friend that kind of is judgy is on it.”
It was like this commonality was audience problem. Someone had an issue with people watching them. And so that gave us conviction to go this hard at it for so long because we knew that that was a core problem with the product.
Lenny Rachitsky: Was this connected to the Finsta, Rinsta trend also?
Robby Stein: It was actually. I think that informed us. Everyone had a Finsta and there was a Binsta.
Lenny Rachitsky: Was is a Binsta?
Robby Stein: Best friend Insta.
Lenny Rachitsky: I see.
Robby Stein: Different, it’s this layering of people 20 Finstas down to your partner, Pinsta, and then it’s basically like, I made that up. I don’t know if it’s true, but I’m sure it was out there somewhere. We were like, “Wow. People clearly are trying to hack Instagram basically to create these private smaller group settings, and so we should just make a product.”
Lenny Rachitsky: How did you actually do this testing? Was it rolled out to some percentage? Was it rolled out in New Zealand or whatever?
Robby Stein: Yeah, we rolled it out in a few other countries, exactly.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay,
Robby Stein: Got it. We had a basket of countries that we tried it in and then we would do research. I think it was Australia was one of the first ones for that one.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay. I was going to ask if you can share the country. So Australia.
Robby Stein: I think that was one of the earlier ones, yeah, but every time you ship something there’s a slightly different reason why.
Lenny Rachitsky: Oh, interesting. So it’s not always Australia gets all the new stuff.
Robby Stein: No, although it sometimes is. Australia and Canada get a lot of stuff just because easier for the teams to see feedback from them.
Lenny Rachitsky: Yeah, speak English.
Robby Stein: Yeah, exactly.
Lenny Rachitsky: Awesome, okay, let me go in a different direction and talk about something that you have a hot take on. There’s a lot of talk these days about lean teams, small teams, just creating limited resources, not hiring at all. You have an opposite perspective of you actually need a lot of resources to build really big breakthroughs. Talk about your experience there.
Robby Stein: Yeah, I mean I think there’s obviously, depends on what you’re trying to build and there’s been famously small teams building big impact products, but I think there’s this cult of lean, scrappy, fast, throw away your product quickly, keep moving. And I think at some level it’s true for internal conviction, but to build a product that works for a lot of people that is based on a technological breakthrough. A lot of times, I see teams just give up to early or under invest in the product, and obviously the space matters. And if you’re building a single product that is a way to, I don’t know, do something with a digital app that’s fairly straightforward, that’s going to be different than building a robotics company. So what you’re building does change.
But even for software, I mean I think for really hard technical problems, think about the amount of time and effort it took for teams to build a foundational model, and how many years and hundreds and hundreds of people that were needed for that to happen. And you think about these large companies that have had huge impacts on people, and I think particularly for bigger companies internally, something I’ve seen is it’s almost too scrappy because it never gets enough momentum. The product never gets good enough internally and then it just dies on the vine. Whereas if you put more people on it, you have to be careful not to put too many too soon. But I see the opposite more true where people hold on to small teams too long and then you, either takes forever to get to the thing you’re looking for.
This Close Friends example I mentioned this actually was a small team. One of the reasons it took us forever was it kept the team so small and scrappy. That loop cycle was so short and by a startup age you’d be dead probably. So you can maybe do that in a bigger company, but as a startup, I don’t know if you have that leisure. And so I think you need to actually think what is the group I need to build a version that’s great. And from first principles, really think about it instead of just embracing blindly, okay, we’re going to be the two of us until this thing has escaped velocity market fit, which it’s not always true.
Lenny Rachitsky: This is definitely counter to the narrative we see on Twitter. Anything you can share about just the heuristic you use to decide here’s how long to keep it small? I know there’s not going to be this step 1, 2, 3, but just like what I’m hearing is start small to prove out the concept designer PM engineer maybe. When do you find that makes sense to go big?
Robby Stein: Yeah, I think that it’s mostly when you’ve hit the conviction moment. I think there’s two big milestones. There’s internal conviction. For yourself, do you believe in it? And you believe in it because there’s some external validation, your friends, you put 20 friends on it. And by the way, I found out very quickly building startups that if you put 20 friends on something, they’re not going to do you that many favors. They’re not going to use a product every single day because they’re your friend 30 days in, 60 days in, 90 days in. They’re not using your product unless you’re doing something that’s useful to them. And so you get all of this feedback and you’re seeing people really enjoy it. You get to that moment.
And then I think that’s not a product that would win externally because if you were to ship it, it’s broken, doesn’t work great. And then you need to, I think invest enough to make the best version of it or as good a version as you can to get it out the door and to ship it. And I think that that, it’s like you want to build the right product eventually is the mentality and you can only really do that with the right group.
Lenny Rachitsky: I’m going to take us to a recurring segment on the podcast that I call AI Corner.
Robby Stein: Okay.
Lenny Rachitsky: What’s some way that you’ve found use for AI in your work, in your life that is really interesting, really helpful, maybe other people can be inspired by?
Robby Stein: I think one of the coolest trends ever is how AI is affecting multimodal visual and inspirational needs for people. And we’re early in this and I think this is something that I’m actually working on as a project as well, but right now if you think about what AI has done in large part, it was born and grew up in this text modality, it was chat. And so for a long time, if you were to ask it to help you, what’s a cool way to redecorate your bookshelf behind you? It’s going to describe that to you in text, because that’s what it knows. But increasingly, AI is going to be liberated to help in every possible modality.
This is something that we’ve seen a lot with this explosive use of Google Lens and our image search and image features and with this deep understanding, and what I’m actually starting to use internally and some things that we’re excited about more coming up that we actually announced at I/O that we’re going to going to be building more of was how AI can help with inspiration, how AI can help with shopping and helping you really get things done that are more in the inspiring bucket of needs versus these core utilities like code, math, homework side of things.
And I’m really excited for things that are coming where you can ask it for inspirational tasks and it’s starting to do really fascinating things in terms of what I’m seeing and hopefully we’ll share more on that soon. But I think the one thing I can share is there’s a visual version of AI Mode that basically we talked about at I/O, and so you can reference some of those keynotes, but that’s in the process of being rolled out.
Lenny Rachitsky: Mysterious.
Robby Stein: And so you’re going to be able to now ask what’s a mid-century modern beautiful office design with dark themes? It’ll be able to produce this image board that’s inspirational and you can do multi-turn with it. And so you’ll be able to go and say, “Actually, I want more of a light theme, more creamy, more California, more coastal vibe.” And it’ll do that and it’ll understand that and it’ll actually see the images and be able to turn with you in the way that text works, which is going to be really cool. So I think that’s going to be one of the more exciting things that will be new to AI soon.
Lenny Rachitsky: What I’m hearing is Nano Banana integrated into AI Mode. Recipe for success.
Robby Stein: Well, it’s a little different than Nano Banana because Nano Banana is an image editor. This is more like helping you find images on the web, so it’s a little bit more like AI inspiration, AI image search, and allowing you to then talk with two effectively visual responses with natural language. So that’s going to I think, be a little bit different than edit this photo so that it changes it. Although potentially an interesting idea too, to have an ability to take a picture of your living room. And I think AI will help with that too ultimately.
Lenny Rachitsky: Pinterest is in trouble, feels like this is what people use Pinterest for. Here’s all the inspiration. Now it’s just AI doing it all. By the way, Nano Banana, where does this name come from?
Robby Stein: I don’t actually, I forget that. There’s a story somewhere. I forget it now honestly. But the team I think came from a scrappy, fun group of people building this and they wanted to go for something fun for folks to-
Lenny Rachitsky: Yeah, it feels like that’s a part of the reason things have started to work. There’s just more fun and delight and random crazy stuff coming out.
Robby Stein: It does. It feels a little more like when I was at Google the first time through right now where you just have so much stuff and this kind of fun curiosity happening where people want to try things and ship things and yeah, hopefully that continues.
Lenny Rachitsky: Yeah, it feels like Veo 3 would be even more successful if it had a wacky name. And I like that this is the opposite of your advice of clarity. I don’t know what Nano Banana is, but it worked.
Robby Stein: Yeah, it’s the other thing. No advice is right universally, right? But yeah, Nano Banana.
Lenny Rachitsky: Robby, is there anything else that you wanted to share? Anything else you want to leave listeners with as a final nugget of wisdom before we get to a very exciting lightning round?
Robby Stein: This concept: be curious. I think of embodying everything as like it’s really about curiosity. It’s about wanting to know why everything is the way it is. Why is someone doing something? Why does someone have a different opinion than I do? Why might this not be working? And the people who really have that level of intense curiosity and they chase things down until they know, I think you’re well served by that. That would be my only parting thought.
Lenny Rachitsky: Let me follow that thread actually, because it’s maybe the most trending term on the podcast over the past few months is curiosity. It comes up a lot when I ask people, what are you teaching your kids and embracing with the rise of AI and curiosity comes up all the time. Is there anything that helps you? Is it just like I am good at this and I am curious innately and I’m just, “This is valuable.” Is there anything you can share that helps you or others around you embody that and actually be curious?
Robby Stein: Well, I mean AI is obviously the ultimate curiosity engine, and that’s what’s so cool is you can now ask anything and just get information. And so I find that people just appreciate just how much they can learn about whatever they want. But also, I think that a lot of this also comes down to studying what you want to know about, and knowing where the branches of knowledge live there. A lot of times I’ll read old papers and PDFs that are free online on a statistics thing if I want to learn about that and I think people under appreciate those. There’s analog old school great learning and AI can help you discover them. I’m using AI, I’m particularly at Google to help discover all these cool links and things to read, but I find that that is an interesting hybrid where it’s not just AI but really going to original sources more. I find that these books I mentioned on the chat here, I find that you need a blend of all of those things to ultimately really get to the bottom of things ultimately.
Lenny Rachitsky: Actually reading the thing, not just reading the summary of the thing.
Robby Stein: Yes.
Lenny Rachitsky: Let me actually ask you this question I’ve been asking all these people that are at the cutting edge of AI. You have kids, is there anything you’re thinking about and leaning into helping them learn, develop as AI emerges and becomes a big part of the world?
Robby Stein: The biggest thing I’m doing, I have younger kids, so the biggest thing I’m doing is they’re using live versions of AI that they just talk to now much more. And so funny enough, we actually just launched search live actually out of Labs this week. And so you can talk to search in a live AI setting, which is conversational voice. Voice on when you’re driving, you can just talk all the knowledge I talked about where you can do with Google, you can talk to it in a normal conversation with your voice. And I found that to be incredibly accessible for kids.
And I hear all my kids come home, they’re like, “Can I talk to Google about something?”
“What do you need? What do you need to say?”
And then they go to my app, they hit the live button and they just start talking to it. They want to know about animals, they want to know about certain, I don’t know, history things. They learn about something in school, and it’s so natural to learn in that way that I think that that’s helping them become much more AI native than any other thing I’m doing.
Lenny Rachitsky: Life as a parent is going to be way too easy now whenever kids have questions, “Just go talk to the AI,” but I don’t think that’s bad. So this is within the Google search app. There’s a live, how do you access this?
Robby Stein: Yeah, that’s exactly right. You go to Google app, so there’s one of the apps in the App Store you mentioned. You open Google and there’s a button now that’s live on it, right on the home screen. And if you tap on, it’s a live version of AI Mode that you can just talk to. It’s a full screen experience, and we’ll say start talking.
Lenny Rachitsky: In the show notes, I’m going to link to this project that somebody built, Eric Antonow, which I love. It basically shows you how to put a little speaker into a little stuffed animal and you connect the speaker to, it could be Google Live or it could be ChatGPT, whatever you like, in voice mode. And you put it on your shoulder, you get a little magnet that attaches, and your kids could talk to this parrot, for example, and you could tell it, “Talk in a pirate voice,” and so they’re talking to his pirate.
Robby Stein: Oh, that’s really funny. Okay, that’s really cute.
Lenny Rachitsky: It takes 15 minutes. You could get an X-Acto knife and sew it and stuff and it’s fun. I made one for my nephew and he was looking for treasure with this parrot.
Robby Stein: That’s really adorable, I’m definitely going to look into that.
Lenny Rachitsky: Robby, with that, we’ve reached our very exciting lightning round. I’ve got five questions for you. Are you ready?
Robby Stein: All right, I’m ready.
Lenny Rachitsky: What are two or three books that you find yourself recommending most to other people?
Robby Stein: I mean, definitely the two I mentioned here. Clayton Christensen, Competing Against Luck. Don Norman, Design of Everyday Things. But I also really love this for fiction, Aurora, which is this book David Koepp wrote. It’s about electromagnetic pulse in the sun that knocks out, it’s fiction for just fun. And it was a really fun beach read and apparently it was going to be made into a Netflix show, it didn’t work out. I don’t know. It was sad to see that fall apart, but so it’s a really fun book.
Lenny Rachitsky: There’s a book along those lines that I love, they’re making a movie of it right now called Hail Mary.
Robby Stein: Oh, I’m in the middle of reading that right now.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay, awesome.
Robby Stein: Yes.
Lenny Rachitsky: Of the same mind.
Robby Stein: Yes.
Lenny Rachitsky: Yeah, they’re making a movie of it. How about that?
Robby Stein: In the middle of reading it. It’s getting wacky where I am right now, but I’m excited to see where it goes.
Lenny Rachitsky: It gets wackier. The ending especially wacky.
Robby Stein: Oh, really? Okay.
Lenny Rachitsky: Just prepare yourself.
Robby Stein: Okay.
Lenny Rachitsky: What is a recent movie or TV show you’ve really enjoyed?
Robby Stein: I love The Bear. I think that’s just absolutely awesome show. Dune, of course. And I thought the new Top Gun is a little old now, but I think the new Top Gun was so fun and awesome.
Lenny Rachitsky: Is there a product you’ve recently discovered that you really love? It cannot be AI Mode.
Robby Stein: I’m going to use a non-digital product.
Lenny Rachitsky: Perfect.
Robby Stein: I’m super into this new pillow that I got called Purple Pillow, and I’ve been recommending it to everyone at work. We’re on a pillow chat now. It’s a thing. It’s like you talk about what pillows we’re getting, but it’s this really cool thing where it’s got this new technology of this honeycomb polymer that’s inside and so it supports you and it has these little micro holes so it doesn’t get hot. It’s really cool. Big fan. Strongly recommend Purple Pillow.
Lenny Rachitsky: I’ve never heard of this thing, I am excited. I recently got an avocado pillow, focusing on low toxins.
Robby Stein: Oh, those are good. I’ve heard good things about those too, yeah.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay, I got to join this pillow. Pillow talk is a great name for it by the way.
Robby Stein: You’re into pillows too. That’s great.
Lenny Rachitsky: Huge.
Robby Stein: I love bedding.
Lenny Rachitsky: No, I’m just joking.
Robby Stein: Yeah, great.
Lenny Rachitsky: But I did upgrade my pillow. This is not Mr. Pillow, whatever that guy is, right? Is that guy that, there’s like a controversial pillow guy. Okay.
Robby Stein: No.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay. Purple Pillow. I’m going to ask AI Mode.
Robby Stein: Yeah, you should.
Lenny Rachitsky: This.
Robby Stein: Definitely.
Lenny Rachitsky: Next question. Do you have a favorite life motto that you find yourself coming back to in life?
Robby Stein: This is be curious. I think I almost named a company Curious. I just think it’s a really awesome, there’s one thing in life. It’s that in terms of getting things done, in terms of understanding the world, people, your kids, your family. You always just want to know more and question things outside yourself, not feel like you have all the answers. I think that’s really important.
Lenny Rachitsky: I love that. Final question, okay, so speaking of startups, you started a company called Stamped back in the day, it got acquired by Yahoo. I hear there’s a story where you got Justin Bieber on your app and that was a big deal and a big inflection in the success of the app. Can you just tell that story?
Robby Stein: Yeah, it’s a wild story. Just to scene set a little bit. I was 25 right after Google being an IC PM in New York with some Google friends building this company. So very early on, and maybe in a good way and no idea what I was doing. But basically we decided that the concept of Stamped was to put your stamp on your favorite things, get recommendations from friends and from people that you trust. And so you think of a Twitter feed, but it’s all stuff that people think is cool.
Lenny Rachitsky: Which products.
Robby Stein: It’s like books, restaurants, food. Products, exactly.
Lenny Rachitsky: Pillows, possibly.
Robby Stein: Pillows could be on there. I would totally stamp this pillow and then you could discover it. And one of the cold star problems was obviously you want a group of people that are on it that are already using it, that could have some tastemaker type folks. We had a bunch of people that were chefs and we had people who were literary folks. And then we wanted to get a couple people that were more musicians, artists, and these influential folks.
My co-founder and I just basically got the contact of Scooter Braun, who’s Justin’s manager, and we just sent out an email and we were like, “Hey, we’re in New York. We’re going to be in LA tomorrow.” I think we said something, I don’t remember all the details, but it was something like tomorrow.
Lenny Rachitsky: And you were not going to be in LA tomorrow.
Robby Stein: No, no.
Lenny Rachitsky: Okay.
Robby Stein: “Do you happen to be there?”
And he just wrote back some one line thing like, “Meet me at this hotel for breakfast at something.”
And we’re like, “Oh, okay.”
We literally went immediately to the airport. I just remember just basically going straight to the airport, flying to LA meeting with him. We gave him the whole pitch, we showed him the product, and then he was like, “Okay, I think this would be super cool. We can be involved and maybe you can help be an advisor.”
And we ended up going back and meeting with Justin and showing him the product and even filming some little clips with him. It was actually really funny and it was a really fun moment. And obviously he was using it to stamp his favorite stuff. And so people would go, “Oh, Justin’s into this song, or he is into this stuff,” and would post that.
It was one of the ways that we got lots of people to try out and see what we were doing. That’s a little extra scrappy moment in time, but I think it embodies a good lesson. Just do it now, be scrappy, be immediate. Intense urgency usually wins over thinking about it for a long time, and that’s certainly proved to be true on that one.
Lenny Rachitsky: Incredible story, thank you for sharing that. So many lessons to take away. Two final questions, where can folks find online if they want to reach out, maybe learn more about what you’re doing and how can listeners be useful to you?
Robby Stein: Yeah, I think on X @rmstein is probably the best single place. And then to be helpful, send me feedback. DM me, just mention me, ping me, let me know problems with Google products, with AI in general, but also just anything. As I said before, you have to always listen to people understand their experiences, so ping the ideas and feedback. That’s the best way to be helpful.
Lenny Rachitsky: Wow. What an onslaught you’re about to receive of feedback on the search experience.
Robby Stein: No problem. Yes, please do.
Lenny Rachitsky: “Robby, why is this link second? Why is my site not at the top?” I can only imagine the kind of stuff people complain about. Robby, thank you so much for being here.
Robby Stein: Thank you, it was great.
Lenny Rachitsky: It was great. Bye, everyone.
Robby Stein: Take care.
Lenny Rachitsky: Thank you so much for listening. If you found this valuable, you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Also, please consider giving us a rating, or leaving a review as that really helps other listeners find the podcast. You can find all past episodes or learn more about the show at lennyspodcasts.com. See you in the next episode.
Glossary
| English | 中文 |
|---|---|
| AEO | AEO(保留原文) |
| AI Mode | AI Mode(保留原文) |
| AI Overviews | AI Overviews(保留原文) |
| Alex Rampell | Alex Rampell(保留原文) |
| Ask Jeeves | Ask Jeeves(保留原文) |
| Aurora | 《Aurora》(保留原文) |
| big hire | 大雇佣(big hire) |
| Binsta | Binsta(Best friend Instagram 的缩写,保留原文) |
| bottoms up | 自下而上 |
| Brian Balfour | Brian Balfour(保留原文) |
| Clayton Christensen | Clayton Christensen(保留原文) |
| Close Friends | Close Friends(保留原文,Instagram 产品功能名) |
| code execution | 代码执行 |
| cold start | 冷启动 |
| Competing Against Luck | 《与运气竞争》 |
| David Koepp | David Koepp(保留原文) |
| Design of Everyday Things | 《设计心理学》(Design of Everyday Things) |
| Don Norman | Don Norman(保留原文) |
| Eric Antonow | Eric Antonow(保留原文) |
| favorites | 收藏(favorites) |
| fine-tuning | 微调 |
| Finsta | Finsta(Fake Instagram 的缩写,指 Instagram 上的私密小号,保留原文) |
| first principles | 第一性原理 |
| foundational model | 基础模型 |
| GEO | GEO(保留原文) |
| Hail Mary | 《Hail Mary》(保留原文) |
| IC PM | IC PM(Individual Contributor Product Manager,保留原文) |
| instrumentation | 度量体系 |
| ISO 27001 | ISO 27001(保留原文) |
| J-curve | J曲线 |
| Jobs to Be Done | 待办任务(Jobs to Be Done) |
| Justin Bieber | Justin Bieber(保留原文,国际知名人物但中文语境中通常保留原名) |
| keyword ease | 关键词惯性 |
| Lenny Rachitsky | Lenny Rachitsky(保留原文) |
| marginal return | 边际收益 |
| modality | 模态 |
| Nano Banana | Nano Banana(保留原文) |
| Nesrine Changuel | Nesrine Changuel(保留原文) |
| parametric memory | 参数化记忆 |
| Pinsta | Pinsta(Partner Instagram 的缩写,保留原文) |
| post-training | 后训练 |
| primitives | 原语 |
| Purple Pillow | Purple Pillow(保留原文,产品名) |
| query fan-out | 查询扇出 |
| Reels | Reels(Instagram 产品名,保留原文) |
| retention | 留存率 |
| Rinsta | Rinsta(Real Instagram 的缩写,指主要公开账号,保留原文) |
| Robby Stein | Robby Stein(保留原文) |
| S-curves | S曲线 |
| Scooter Braun | Scooter Braun(保留原文,人名) |
| scrappy | 拮据式精简 |
| Snapchat | Snapchat(保留原文) |
| SOC 2 | SOC 2(保留原文) |
| Stamped | Stamped(保留原文,产品/公司名) |
| Stories | Stories(Instagram 产品名,保留原文) |
| tastemaker | 品味引领者(tastemaker) |
| Theodore Levitt | Theodore Levitt(保留原文) |
| Tony Fadell | Tony Fadell(保留原文) |
| Transformers | Transformers(保留原文) |
Reformatted by reformat_english.py