The market is a blob of decision making agents that speaks with money.
You speak to the market with an offer.
The market gives you money, which means "Yes".
Or does not give you money, which means "No".
The no may mean the market:
The relationship between a human and the market is like that between a dog and the farmer. The dog can roam a bit but ultimately the farmer holds the power.
As a builder, should you ever mute the market?
To mute the market is to ignore the "Nos" and continue to invest in your offering. Instead of pivoting to something the market will say "Yes" to today, you work on something that the market currently says "No" to, but you have the belief that at some point the market will change.
To mute the market is to understand something about the world the market currently doesn't get, and to have the conviction that it eventually will.
I think as much as you can, you don't want to mute the market. Instead, listen to the market and think "okay, what is the market telling me it wants, and how can I deliver that in a way that helps me gain the resources to build what I want." Continue to iterate with creative offerings that are both something you want to offer and something the market wants to say "Yes" to now.
The selection pressure the market provides can be very helpful. You are getting the wisdom of the crowds to rank your ideas. I can definitely imagine that sometimes the market is too short-term focused and muting it is potentially the right way, but when you do that you also mute a great source of free feedback.
Despite my warnings, if you decide that a short term muting of the market is necessary, then you may have to go to extreme measures. Ideally, you've got a warchest. Perhaps savings, a good investment, investors who have bet on your vision, a grant, or something along those lines. With that capital you can mute the market for a period of time and try to invent a breakthrough new technological path. Without that capital the best advice comes from Hermann Hesse via his novel Siddhartha: "I can think. I can wait. I can fast." You will need to cut your expenses to the bone, and then use the bone for soup and cutlery. It can be done but you will have to push yourself to extreme measures you didn't know you were capable of. I'm not sure it's ever the right strategy. (But then sometimes I wonder whether it's the only strategy for true breakthroughs).
Along these lines, as an angel investor one thing I've learned is that you may be hurting a startup by investing, as you are enabling them to mute the market for a prolonged period of time. The pressure of the market is uncomfortable but honest and necessary. It's more relaxing to mute the market but you'll never find out if your ship floats nor carry passengers across the sea.
Occasionally I mute the market more than I should. I am building something that I think most of the world may love in the future, even if the short term feedback from the market has been crickets.
The offering I'm working on is novel, so the market hasn't quite understood what I'm offering yet. It's a challenge because the path is so different than what's popular in the market that I have to see many branches ahead on my own and then communicate what I see and why it's a path worth traveling. I think I'm getting better at explaining it, and I think once the market understands it, the market will want it. I think soon many people will not be able to get enough of it.
But I'm also listening closely to the market, and trying to create offerings that use our technology that are more in tune with what the market wants.
The scary part about muting the market is the branch you are pioneering may be a dead end. It is a lot of work to see so many branches ahead to figure out if it's a path the market should go down. You don't want to blaze a trail to a dead-end, but even worse would be to mislead passengers down a dead-end trail.
The other scary part about muting the market is the old aphorism from finance: "markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent".
But perhaps sometimes it must be done.
You learn to be deeply grateful and appreciative of the early adopters who break from the mainstream and come check out your fledgling path.
Whether it's the consumer market, the b2b market, the research market, or the investor market, communicating with the market is fun.
You get to create new offerings, put them out there in the marketplace, and listen to what the market says.
Stick to your convictions when you're confident in your model, but do your best to not mute the market.