Verifying if Following an AI-Generated Roadmap for Product Development Leads to Success①

1. Introduction

I am currently developing a product called Evame, and I'm writing this article about that process.

It's a service that provides simultaneous translation of articles, aiming to facilitate knowledge and story sharing among people worldwide and contribute to human progress.

If you switch the language selection below your username to English, you should be able to read the English version.

However, I'm an engineer, and I'm a beginner in product marketing and management; I don't know much about it. Several months into development, I still don't know how to attract users, monetize, and sustain the product's operation.

Therefore, I decided to have AI create a roadmap and develop the product accordingly. I'll let AI be the product manager.

I used ChatGPT's o1 pro, currently one of the most intelligent models.

I'm paying $300 a month for this. I absolutely need to get a return on my investment.

Below is the roadmap generated by AI.

2. Roadmap

Phase 0 (Preparation: 1-2 weeks)

1. Organize current functions and define requirements.

   • LLM Gemini API integration (Translation enabled by registering an API Key).

   • Implement a system to automatically generate English-Japanese translations when posting.

   • Identify missing functions (access analysis, payment system, administration screen, etc.).

2. Establish project structure and environment.

   • Prepare a Git repository, task management tool, and staging environment.

   • Prepare a small amount of test data (several articles) and verify the translation behavior.

No external marketing yet; monetization is not required at this stage.

Phase 1 (MVP Development: 1-2 months)

1. Implement the minimum necessary functions.

   • User authentication: SNS login or email + password.

   • Article posting, editing, and translation generation: Automatically generate English-Japanese translations when an article is first published.

   • Implement access analysis: Visualize PV and user behavior with Google Analytics or Mixpanel.

   • Admin screen: Allows operators to check and delete posts and user information.

2. Closed alpha testing.

   • Have people close to me and internal members use it to verify UI/UX and translation quality.

   • Collect specific feedback (frequency of mistranslations, ease of operation).

3. Light marketing measures.

   • Recruit testers on SNS: Post on Twitter and Facebook that "we are recruiting closed alpha testers for an English-Japanese translation blog platform".

   • Aim for several dozen testers.

4. Handling of monetization in the MVP.

   • No full-scale monetization yet (first increase the number of users and solidify UI/UX).

   • For paid plans, only indicate "Coming Soon".

Phase 2 (Beta Release & Increased Customer Acquisition: Months 3-4)

1. Reflect feedback & improve UI/UX.

   • Ease of editing translations, preview display, retry processing in case of translation failure, etc.

   • Respond quickly to the top 3 user requests.

2. Enhance access analysis reports.

   • Allow users to check their article PV count and regional access.

   • Monitor the number of posts/translation requests on the operator's dashboard.

3. Marketing measures.

   • Press release: "New blog platform beta version that automatically generates English-Japanese translations".

   • Twitter campaign: Create a hashtag "#EvameChallenge" to encourage posts.

   • Request trial use from English learning and study abroad influencers: Have them spread success stories (such as comments from overseas) on SNS.

4. Test partial monetization.

   • Set a limit on the number of translated characters and guide users exceeding the limit to a paid plan (e.g., $10/month).

   • Verify during the beta period for bugs and payment issues.

Phase 3 (Official Release & Enhanced Monetization: Months 5-6)

1. Stabilize the payment system.

   • Automate recurring billing and cancellation flows with Stripe, etc.

   • Consider support for corporate invoice payments.

2. Team plan and B2B expansion.

   • User management function by organization, permission settings (viewing/editing).

   • Added value: enable companies to create internal and public relations materials in English-Japanese bilingual format.

3. Full-scale marketing.

   • Online webinar: "How to share knowledge and stories to the world with English-Japanese translated articles".

   • Test ad campaigns: Invest a small amount in Facebook/Twitter/Instagram ads to measure CTR and CVR.

   • Set numerical targets: Quantitatively evaluate such as "New users x people," "Paid conversion rate x%".

4. Enhance monetization measures.

   • Individual standard plan ($10/month and up).

   • Corporate plan ($50/month and up / unlimited translation volume / team management function).

   • Premium service: Manual native check (x dollars per article).

Phase 4 (Multilingualization & Global Expansion: Months 6-12)

1. Multilingual support.

   • As the number of languages supported by the LLM Gemini API increases, sequentially expand to languages other than English-Japanese (Chinese-Japanese, Spanish-Japanese, French-Japanese, etc.).

   • Multilingualize the interface (Japanese/English UI switching).

2. Enhance community functions.

   • Promote mutual following, comments, and feedback among users.

   • Form a community that activates the "sharing of knowledge and stories" and contributes to human progress.

3. Enterprise sales & international influencer collaboration.

   • Sales to large companies and international organizations, creating introduction cases.

   • Introduce the service through collaboration videos with multinational creators and educational YouTubers.

3. Current Progress

The MVP is now complete, and we are in Phase 1.

We conducted closed alpha testing with acquaintances, and there didn't seem to be any major bugs. (Although I'm still struggling with a mysterious bug where the first line of text always becomes normal text when writing an article on an iPhone).

In short, this article is

Recruiting testers on SNS: Post on Twitter and Facebook that "we are recruiting closed alpha testers for an English-Japanese translation blog platform".

a recruitment post.

If you're interested in participating, please log in, write or read articles, and send us your feedback.

4. Future Marketing and Verification Policy

Once we've received sufficient feedback, we'll move on to Phase 2 and publish the results here again.

According to o1 pro,

The goal is to achieve 1,000 new users and 2,000 articles within 3 months.

So I have to work hard.

5. Conclusion

If this product grows significantly, I believe that people from different language backgrounds can easily share knowledge and stories, contributing to human progress.

The reason I started creating this product in the first place is that I wanted everyone in the world to be able to read the Buddhist scriptures, the Tripitaka, which the monk Xuanzang sought, in their own language.

I plan to publish specific figures on the actual results a month later, based on how things turn out following the AI roadmap, so please look forward to it.