The Empty Box Problem
Show useful outcomes inside the product before asking customers to adopt it
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 96%
A product can possess strong functionality while still appearing useless because a new visitor encounters an empty environment. The Empty Box Problem is solved by putting valuable information, experiences, and representative use cases inside the product before expecting broad adoption. Contributors create something audiences already want, such as an industry guide or working template, and distribute the hosted result. Visitors arrive for that result, experience the product in context, and discover workflows they can reproduce. This replaces an abstract explanation with visible proof and turns content seeding into both product education and distribution.
Origin
Extracted from Marketing Against The Grain through Kip Bodner and Kieran Flanagan's analysis of ClickUp paying professionals to publish useful content inside its software.
Core principles
- 01Infrastructure has little perceived value without useful content or experiences
- 02Concrete use cases communicate value better than abstract claims
- 03Let prospects encounter the product while pursuing an outcome they already want
- 04Seed enough examples to make discovery and imitation possible
How to run it
- 1
Find the Empty State
Experience the product as a new user and identify where missing content, examples, or activity makes its value difficult to understand.
Pro tip Focus on the first moment where a prospect must imagine the outcome instead of seeing it.
Watch out Do not assume functionality alone communicates the use case.
- 2
Seed Valuable Outputs
Recruit users or experts to create professional, audience-relevant material inside the product.
Pro tip Choose outputs people would seek even if they were not evaluating the product.
Watch out Low-quality filler makes the product look less valuable rather than more complete.
- 3
Distribute the Use Case
Promote links to the hosted output so audiences encounter the product through something useful.
Pro tip Frame promotion around the result, not a generic software pitch.
Watch out Do not obscure that contributors are being compensated when disclosure is required.
- 4
Convert Observation into Usage
Show visitors how to duplicate, adapt, or extend the demonstrated workflow in their own account.
Pro tip Provide a template or one-click copy mechanism when possible.
Watch out Exposure without a clear next action may generate traffic without adoption.
In the wild
ClickUp offered to pay professionals to create relevant content for their followers, place that content in a document hosted on ClickUp, and share the link. People would visit for the professional material while being exposed to the software and its possible uses.
→ Useful hosted content simultaneously demonstrated the product and created a distribution channel.
Early PayPal accounts included money users could give to friends. The balance prevented the account from feeling empty and gave people an immediate reason to interact with the payment product.
→ Users learned the product through actual usage, reportedly driving a significant share of signups.
Common mistakes
Explaining Instead of Demonstrating
Feature descriptions leave prospects to imagine the value. Populate the product with outcomes they can inspect and reproduce.
Seeding Content Nobody Wants
Content only solves the empty box when it has independent value for the intended audience.
Generating Visits Without Activation
A hosted artifact needs a clear path from viewing the example to using the product personally.
Is it for you?
Best for
It is best for platforms, tools, marketplaces, and configurable products whose value depends on what users create or discover inside them.
Not ideal for
It is less useful for simple products whose value is immediately obvious without content, configuration, or network participation.
From the transcript
“It's a problem you and I talk a lot about offline called the empty box problem.”
“And so fixing the empty box problem, whether you're a manufacturer, whether you're a technology business, whether you're anywhere in between, is a core way…”
“it's actually quite smart if you have a front facing product to actually find really great use cases and then promote the product through the…”
From the episode
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