Airbnb Co-Founder Joe Gebbia on Why You Need to Make It Easy for Customers to Buy Your Product

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Airbnb Co-Founder Joe Gebbia on Why You Need to Make It Easy for Customers to Buy Your Product 

By Christine Lagorio-Chafkin | Inc Magazine | March  12, 2024

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Joe Gebbia, the former chief product officer and co-founder of Airbnb, is at it again.  This time, he’s building small, pre-fabricated, energy-efficient dwellings known as ADUs, or accessory dwelling units, that are designed to be installed in backyards. If it sounds like a perfect match for Airbnb, it is: Gebbia incubated the company, called Samara.

Gebbia left his operational role at Airbnb in the summer of 2022 but kept his seat on the company’s board of directors. He also sits on Tesla’s board of directors.  At SXSW in Austin on Monday, Inc. editor-in-chief Mike Hofman asked Gebbia what he’s applied from his learnings at Tesla to Samsara. “There is inspiration in the sense that Tesla has made it really easy to buy a car,” Gebbia explained. “You don’t have to go to a dealer anymore. You can literally just buy it online.”

Tesla illuminated to him that even for a major purchase in the tens of thousands–or hundreds of thousands–of dollars, shopping convenience is important to consumers. Part of Samara’s simplicity for customers is that its ADUs can be customized and purchased online. Then, Samara takes care of the typical property headaches of dealing with local permitting and construction.

Now that Gebbia is starting up again, he says the primary hurdle his company faces is customer-awareness. “We have an amazing product. We spent five-and-a-half years on it. It’s super dialed,” he said. “It’s got everything that we know people need. Now, the real challenge is just connecting to the market.”

He takes time to advise founders of small companies, too. He says a common problem he hears is that innovative technology is challenging to bring to market. “One of the pieces of advice that I always give is ‘find the problem,'” he said. “Don’t find the technology. Get married to the problem and work backward from that, and then find the right technology.”

3 key takeaways from the article

1. Joe Gebbia, the former chief product officer and co-founder of Airbnb is building small, pre-fabricated, energy-efficient dwellings known as ADUs, or accessory dwelling units, that are designed to be installed in backyards. The startup called Samara.
2. In addition to Airbnb’s board he also sits on Tesla’s board of directors.  When asked what he’s applied from his learnings at Tesla to Samsara. “There is inspiration in the sense that Tesla has made it really easy to buy a car,” Gebbia explained. “You don’t have to go to a dealer anymore. You can literally just buy it online.”
3. A common problem he hears is that innovative technology is challenging to bring to market. “One of the pieces of advice that I always give is ‘find the problem,'” he said. “Don’t find the technology. Get married to the problem and work backward from that, and then find the right technology.”

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Topics:  Startups, Entrepreneurship, Product