How do you answer "is this a product?" when a non-PM asks you?

It's the most common question I see from builders who've never worked with a PM -- they've made something and they genuinely don't know what they have. Is it a feature? A business? A hobby project with delusions of grandeur?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. The canonical literature - Christensen, Blank, Fitzpatrick, Perri, Cagan - gives us the frameworks, but none of it was written for someone who just pushed to Vercel at 11pm and is wondering if they accidentally built something real.

What do you actually tell these people? And is there a sequence that works -- problem legitimacy before customer specificity before WTP - or do you find yourself jumping around based on what they give you?

Genuinely curious how experienced PMs handle this conversation.