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WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

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Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#31

Post by sigh400 »

spydertennis wrote: post #20
maxklein wrote: post #12

I want my money back, and I'm going to request it till they do. I feel cheated - fitbit is shipping, and what the hell is this bullshit about premium analytics?! When I pre-ordered there was no indication that there was going to be a monthly fee - and now they are delayed and can't even say when it will appear. And they are talking of MONTHS of delay? I was really impressed when I first saw the company, but my mood h…

I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars. We've developed some great premium features in addition to the existing product. The main features are still free. We're working really hard to get the product out. It's difficult to launch quickly and iterate with hardware and we want the product to be amazing. I can promise that it will definitely…

"I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars."

Wow, this comes across as bitter and nasty. How about:

"I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your money," or the like. Seriously. Your previous comment is such bad business just based on how demeaning it comes across. Better yet:

"I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your money. However, we've developed some great premium features that you may be interested in; and of course our the main features are free. Can we convince you otherwise?"

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#33

Post by [deleted] »

sigh400 wrote: post #31
spydertennis wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars. We've developed some great premium features in addition to the existing product. The main features are still free. We're working really hard to get the product out. It's difficult to launch quickly and iterate with hardware and we want the product to be amazing. I can promise that it will definitely…

"I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars." Wow, this comes across as bitter and nasty. How about: "I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your money," or the like. Seriously. Your previous comment is such bad business just based on how demeaning it comes across. Better yet: "I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your…

[deleted]

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#34

Post by kilian »

Wakemate is really handling this situation poorly. Yes, delays due to hardware are a good reason. But introducing pay-for features as compensation for those delays is not.

It seems that this is a classic case of engineers doing bizdev. Those two have virtually no overlap. For example, "I'm really sorry you feel this way" is the equivalent of "quit whining" and you should never say that to anyone unless you actually mean "quit whining".

Bizdev is hard. I got bitten by it hard when I started my company. Nowadays, each mail me and colleagues send get meticulously checked by the others, and any bullshitting gets taken out. I think they would do good to do something similar. Let me know how it works ;-)

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#36

Post by daleharvey »

maxklein wrote: post #26
teej wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The negative tone in this thread is incredibly out of character of Hacker News. What happened to civility? If you have a problem with the way they handled these delays, I can understand. Getting delayed -sucks- and getting a crappy response sucks worse. It reminds me of dealing with airlines - they already have my money and can't manage to give me a straight answer. But please consider giving these guys a break. Hard…

You know why I'm harsh now? Because this is just a small community. They are dealing with a mass-market product - if they discover the things that piss off customers now, they will know better how to do things in the future. Yes, hardware is hard, but if you coddle a business then it will grow in expectancy that things will just fall in their lap. They made a serious mistake - it annoys me, and I'm telling them. If t…

you have implied that they lied about ever having a product and that their company is falling apart behind the scenes because their shipping was delayed and mentioned they have premium features. both of which I think everyone expected anyway.

I dont think they announced their premium stuff in the best way, but you went well past the stage of giving constructive advice, or "tough love"

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#37

Post by bhousel »

kilian wrote: post #34

Wakemate is really handling this situation poorly. Yes, delays due to hardware are a good reason. But introducing pay-for features as compensation for those delays is not. It seems that this is a classic case of engineers doing bizdev. Those two have virtually no overlap. For example, "I'm really sorry you feel this way" is the equivalent of "quit whining" and you should never say that to anyone unless you actually m…

Good point, this is one of the things that always bothers me too.

Real apologies don't start with "I'm sorry that you.." Real apologies start with "I'm sorry that I.."

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#38

Post by gommm »

sigh400 wrote: post #31
spydertennis wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars. We've developed some great premium features in addition to the existing product. The main features are still free. We're working really hard to get the product out. It's difficult to launch quickly and iterate with hardware and we want the product to be amazing. I can promise that it will definitely…

"I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars." Wow, this comes across as bitter and nasty. How about: "I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your money," or the like. Seriously. Your previous comment is such bad business just based on how demeaning it comes across. Better yet: "I am really sorry you feel that way let us refund your…

I would take the "you feel that way" out and replace it by:

"I'm sorry with our miscommunication, let us refund you your money. However, we've developed some great premium features that you may be interested in; and of course our the main features are free. Can we convince you otherwise?"

"I'm sorry you feel that way" makes it seems that it's the customer's fault and not their fault, it's demeaning to the customer.

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#39

Post by colinplamondon »

spydertennis wrote: post #20
maxklein wrote: post #12

I want my money back, and I'm going to request it till they do. I feel cheated - fitbit is shipping, and what the hell is this bullshit about premium analytics?! When I pre-ordered there was no indication that there was going to be a monthly fee - and now they are delayed and can't even say when it will appear. And they are talking of MONTHS of delay? I was really impressed when I first saw the company, but my mood h…

I'm really sorry you feel that way. Of course if you want your money back we have no problem refunding your 5 dollars. We've developed some great premium features in addition to the existing product. The main features are still free. We're working really hard to get the product out. It's difficult to launch quickly and iterate with hardware and we want the product to be amazing. I can promise that it will definitely…

"Sorry everyone, we really fucked this one up! Chalk it up to a massive learning experience for our entire company. This being our first mass email, we didn't phrase anything well enough, we didn't check it thoroughly enough, and we didn't properly communicate our business model and what people are really paying for. Like I said, we fucked this one up.

Here's the deal- the hardware delays are due to us finding some very cool improvements that increase the accuracy of the device 50% and reduce power consumption significantly. Since this is a hardware product, we don't want our first users stuck with a shitty revision that's significantly worse than a version we ship in three months. To do this only takes a one month delay, and the logistics of shipping two versions, one for people who want the 'old' version now and one for people who want the 'new' version in a month just wouldn't work. There's only three of us, so we have to make some gut decisions.

However, we didn't communicate the premium features well at all- we haven't even begun working on them yet! They have nothing to do with the delay, and, though very cool, they don't affect the core functionality of the product- helping you wake up more refreshed every single morning. This is more for folks who love geeky graphs like us :) We'll be charging something trivial like $3.99/month, but felt it would be a nice token of appreciation to people who had to have their product delayed.

Again, my apologies for all of this- we'll definitely improve how we communicate with our customers starting immediately. And, if anyone has any questions, here's my email so you can get ahold of me directly : [ceo's email here]."

Re: WakeMate (YC S09) Shipping Delayed

#40

Post by sounddust »

I think they should give the premium features to those of us who pre-ordered, for free, permanently.

It wouldn't cost them anything extra to do so (maybe a few dollars/year in server costs for the entire pre-order userbase). Sure, they will lose potential subscriber costs for some pre-order customers, but if they can't sell enough WakeMates to make the pre-order crowd an insignificant blip, then they are not going to be able to succeed anyway. Furthermore, the pre-order crowd is the group you really, really want to be happy. They are going to be the first to give their impressions to the world, and those tweets/reviews/blog posts are going to be at the top of Google's search results for near-infinity.

I feel like a pre-order was a commitment to Wakemate, and they are not honoring their side in expecting us to pay more to fully utilize the product. They can say that the premium model has features in addition to what was initially planned, but I think that anyone who planned to buy the product expected the free service to improve and add features over time anyway, so it seems that effort is instead being redirected to the premium version.

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