Coincidentally I wrote about this same subject this week. But I went a step further than that. It's not about the pen.
http://www.akitaonrails.com/2017/06/01/conference-talks-inte...
An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
51–59 of 59 posts
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unlimited ink? How do I ask for a shipment- through a form or a human? What happens when I request to much ink or pens? Do you conveniently forget to place my order? How hard is it to cancel? What does the price tiering look like? When you are acquired, will I still receive my shipments? All of these are arguments for why the "subscription market" is absolutely bogus
Which is why every major operating system (except iOS) in the world is now free, has free upgrades and updates and if it wipes your system, well tough, that's in the EULA. Cancel? You can't, you can only revert your account to the unpaid plan. We also reserve the right to take our pens back whenever we want. Now, we could setup a special "enterprise-level" plan for you, with onsite production, dedicated management, a…
The only solution to all of this is libre/gratis hardware, software, hard work, and delayed gratifcation ^.^
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#53Sales, then and now, 10-minutes exercise comparing two links. How we approach sales in innovation and startups has changed a lot recently, but not for everyone. Enter the "sell me this pen" as seen in "Wolf of Wallstreet". It's a sales classic. You inspire desire in your customer in your sales pitch, and quickly he wants to buy, at any price. I frequently talk to startups about sales, but coming from a product manage…
The examples given for "vitamin" and "painkiller" are poor, or at lease not describing differences in products, but in marketing strategy. Also, the idea that "vitamins" are poor product is betrayed by the success of many, many madly successful "vitamin" products, not least including literal vitamins. The product-load-feature that is described in the entrepreneur.com article as a "vitamin" mere seems poorly marketed.…
When you look at how the actual vitamins are marketed in many countries, you discover it's not so rare people claim it is actually a painkiller: http://www.economist.com/news/business/21665064-despite-scan...
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#54Sales, then and now, 10-minutes exercise comparing two links. How we approach sales in innovation and startups has changed a lot recently, but not for everyone. Enter the "sell me this pen" as seen in "Wolf of Wallstreet". It's a sales classic. You inspire desire in your customer in your sales pitch, and quickly he wants to buy, at any price. I frequently talk to startups about sales, but coming from a product manage…
The examples given for "vitamin" and "painkiller" are poor, or at lease not describing differences in products, but in marketing strategy. Also, the idea that "vitamins" are poor product is betrayed by the success of many, many madly successful "vitamin" products, not least including literal vitamins. The product-load-feature that is described in the entrepreneur.com article as a "vitamin" mere seems poorly marketed.…
If you haven't read Paul Graham's essay on startup ideas, and why they should address problems that really exit, I suggest: http://paulgraham.com/startupideas.html
Some product like Skype, Facebook, Dropbox spread just by word of mouth. They address pain people really feel (for some, you might need to dig deeper what it is). Other products need national TV commercials and still have a hard time to sell what they have. Big difference.
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right, the strategy is very depended on answers that the candidate is going to get and it is hard to see how to continue with less favorable answers: * Q: Do you remember what kind of pen that was? * A: Yes, it was my favorite pen that I got from my wife for our anniversary * Q: Do you remember why you were using it to write? * A: I signed a credit card receipt in Walmart.
This is a special pen, and you just carry it around with you at Walmart? I shudder to think what would happen if you were to drop it -- that happens all the time, people drop pens and stuff, and they practically never get it back! See, this is the BIC Premier. It's a nice, classy pen, it writes smoothly with no clumps or leak -- and it's $14.95 for a box of ten, so you can just have a few in your pocket, in your bag,…
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Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
The examples given for "vitamin" and "painkiller" are poor, or at lease not describing differences in products, but in marketing strategy. Also, the idea that "vitamins" are poor product is betrayed by the success of many, many madly successful "vitamin" products, not least including literal vitamins. The product-load-feature that is described in the entrepreneur.com article as a "vitamin" mere seems poorly marketed.…
When you look at how the actual vitamins are marketed in many countries, you discover it's not so rare people claim it is actually a painkiller: http://www.economist.com/news/business/21665064-despite-scan...
Well, if you compare with what used to pass for health scams, it's quite a good deal :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Radithor_bottle_(25799475...
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These were outlawed when, after being marketed as improving male libido, someone drank 1400 of these and died. But he did not die before getting a horribly disfigured jaw that actually fell out before the eyes of the doctor. He was buried in a lead lined coffin, after an agonizing death.
I must say I am a bit worried about "poly-unsaturated fats", which I must say I'd be amazed if they weren't bad for you (they result in a great many secondary chemicals, and if just one of those is dangerous, ...), but I doubt they'll make anyone's jaw fall off before slowly and painfully killing them.
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#57Seriously? All he managed to sell was the aesthetics feel. It's like selling email marketing software solely for the design. How about selling a pen by pitching the frustrations it solves? Pens get lost. Pens stop working randomly. Pens finish without much of a warning. If you're using it after a while, you have to rummage for a paper to scribble before you use it. It's hard to recall any pen which solves any of thes…
I have a clear fountain pen. It solves most of the issues. It can still get lost, but because it's more expensive than a disposable I'm more careful with it. If it stops working it's probably clogged, the nib is easy enough to wipe off to clear the clog. If it's really bad an alcohol swab might be needed. It's clear, I can see the ink level. The "scribble before use" thing is because ink on the ball dries out. Not so much an issue when there's no ball.
And of course there's the classic issue of people stealing your pen, but most people don't know the technique to write with a fountain pen so it rarely gets borrowed.
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#58When they ask this question, what kind of pen is it? The author's pitch compares against a cheap Bic (which I imagine is something like this [1]), so I assume it is usually something fancier and/or more expensive, but are we talking a Uni-ball micro roller [2] level of fancier, or a Montblanc Meisterstück Moon Pearl LeGrand Rollerball [3] level of fancier?
PS: so, what pens do other HN readers use? I used to use the Uni-ball micro roller pens, but I've since switched to the Pilot G2 gel roller with the ultra fine (0.38mm) tip. I switched for the ultra fine tip, which makes superscripts and subscripts easier. There are Uni-balls with ultra fine tips, but last time I bought a few boxes of pens they were harder to find.
For pencils, I use a Uni-ball Kuro Toga [4]. It has a clever mechanism that slightly rotates the lead every time you put tip to paper, so that it wears evenly from all sides, keeping the look and feel uniform throughout your writing. Here's a video showing how it works [5].
[1] https://www.amazon.com/BIC-Cristal-Stic-Medium-Point/dp/B000...
[2] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00006IE8R/
[3] https://www.amazon.com/Montblanc-111694-Pearl-LeGrand-Roller...
[4] https://www.amazon.com/uni-ball-KuruToga-Mechanical-Pencil-0...
Re: An answer to the “Sell Me This Pen” interview challange
#59When they ask this question, what kind of pen is it? The author's pitch compares against a cheap Bic (which I imagine is something like this [1]), so I assume it is usually something fancier and/or more expensive, but are we talking a Uni-ball micro roller [2] level of fancier, or a Montblanc Meisterstück Moon Pearl LeGrand Rollerball [3] level of fancier? PS: so, what pens do other HN readers use? I used to use the…
I use a Zebra 402 0.7mm
Compared to kids these days, I used to write a lot in high school and college and the only memorable pen in terms of comfort, color and thickness that stood out was the Zebra. I write much less now and mostly use it for quick notes and back of envelope schematics.
My #2 choice would be a Parker Jotter ballpoint, which is quite similar in form and weight.
I absolutely hate gelpoints and any other sort of gel pens.