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I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

joshliu.co

1–10 of 47 posts

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#2
First thing, TechCrunch isn't the be-all-end-all of tech sites. Number two, Mike Butcher's self proclaimed description of himself is "Butcher by name, Butcher by nature"

It's a real shame that a lot of people think TechCrunch is the place you need to go to "Make It"

So you got a bad review, pfff

My only advice would be, pick yourself up, dust yourself off and try, try, try again.

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#4
Thanks for writing this up—usually being TechCrunched is a very positive thing for a startup, but sometimes it's not.

I'd actually say that it was, in the long run, a positive experience. You improved your product. The negative press probably brought in a lot of users. And now you're in a better position.

Good on you. Keep working at it.

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#5
There is no such thing as bad publicity, as someone once said. Now, that's not strictly true in general - but for a startup a bad piece of press does at least get your product/service out there. It also gives you a great opportunity to show that you listen to feedback by iterating on your offering. Fix the things people don't like and then put up a blog post saying: "Hey, we fixed it!"

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#6
post #4

Thanks for writing this up—usually being TechCrunched is a very positive thing for a startup, but sometimes it's not. I'd actually say that it was, in the long run, a positive experience. You improved your product. The negative press probably brought in a lot of users. And now you're in a better position. Good on you. Keep working at it.

OP here. Just to be clear, I'm not Josh, just saw this in his twitter feed and thought it would be of interest to HN.

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#7
Congratulations-- you did a nice job of deriving some useful lessons from this experience. And, as you no doubt realize, none of the lessons have anything to do with TechCrunch at all, but are things all start-ups should always be keeping in mind.

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#9
All tech entrepreneurs are hoping to get coverage from TechCrunch. It is the best way to get early adopters, early traction and recognition. It gives you a sense of pride as well. Once your start-up is covered by TechCrunch, you feel you are finally a proper tech entrepreneur.

Can I suggest caring less? You can take external validation from many places. Users are a good option: they pay money, care about the space, are less jaded, and are friends with people like themselves.

TC is not a good place to recruit early users, unless you are building an app for poor geeks with short attention spans. If you are, you have bigger problems.

Re: I got a bad review from TechCrunch, lessons learned

#10
> All tech entrepreneurs are hoping to get coverage from TechCrunch. It is the best way to get early adopters, early traction and recognition. It gives you a sense of pride as well. Once your start-up is covered by TechCrunch, you feel you are finally a proper tech entrepreneur.

Rubbish.

Get users, get revenue. Ignore bad reviews/haters.

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