Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

longform.asmartbear.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 97 posts

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#31

Post by hutzlibu »

gnicholas wrote: post #19
jraby3 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could test it by offering free memberships to a limited country or number if people.

How would one limit a free offer to a certain country? We could definitely to a user-limited free pass, but we'd want to have it exposed only to new users, so we don't lose existing recurring revenue.

"We could definitely to a user-limited free pass, but we'd want to have it exposed only to new users, so we don't lose existing recurring revenue."

That sounds like a recipe for alienating loyal customers, if they find out they still have to pay, but everyone new does not. Then they will just cancel their subscription and also become "new users".

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#32

Post by Arkhaine_kupo »

wiz21c wrote: post #22

One question is missing : "what if we had to pay for our environmental footprint" ? Since so few ask it in a meaningful way, I dare to say it is still, unfortunately, a pretty extreme questions for those it should be asked to.

Going one step further. "How do we meaningfully calculate the total life cost of products? "

Externalities, clean up costs etc are currently not being charged which makes some products economically viable when they probably shouldn't be.

For example in China Coal plants keep getting opened, because despite a cheaper lifetime cost for solar, coal has a much lower upfront cost and without meaningful costs for environmental damage well you can always sell the fully profitable plant before the late life costs come and bite you. (There is more to it, but thats the simplified version of it).

Same with single use plastics. They are really cheap to make, but what about cleaning them up, recycling them etc. Without counting that cost, yeah manufacturing plastic is extremely cheap compared to like a well made pottery plate. But in 50 years the clay plate is still around and the plastic one is just microplastics in the ocean forever.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#33

Post by pjc50 »

8n4vidtmkvmk wrote: post #11
chii wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if we switched the question around: you have to provide individualized tech support for each customer? Essentially, they would get hand-holding. What would need to change?

I'm trying to think of how that would change the product. I would have to hire a team of folks to actually provide tech support, for sure. But the product? Would need less attention to detail because we'd always be a phone call away. Edit: Maybe I can train a ChatGPT embedding on how to use my product and force customers to use that...

The support team will provide you with a set of suggestions as to how to change the product, unless you slap them down constantly.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#35

Post by pjc50 »

ankit219 wrote: post #27

Very thought provoking read. One question I do wonder at times, and is probably applicable here is: "what if I removed all the constraints, what would I do differently and how would things change?". Eg: Suppose nuclear fusion is successful, and you can actually power whole of earth for 800 years with 1 cup of hydrogen. That is, you don't have to worry about energy anymore. How would that change the human behavior bot…

> power whole of earth for 800 years with 1 cup of hydrogen

And no capex? I mean, renewables already consume zero "fuel", but they do have considerable capital investment.

"Cheap" energy in a box would obviously be completely transformative given how much of society is structured around extracting energy and using it efficiently to move things around or heat people or things. Depending on how cheap this is an even bigger transformation for developing countries.

You could even start to think about terraforming.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#36

Post by yccs27 »

gnicholas wrote: post #16
toast0 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because it would make it hard to start charging again later if we decided it was the wrong decision. You don't have to tell people it's free. Tell them it's free for the first year, and don't actually charge them for future years. Automatically extend their subscription at 30 days. Or only charge some people. Or cut them off when it expires, and then extend them 7 days after expiration. Lots of options if direct re…

Great suggestions. We've experimented with a free "student pass" (1/4 our users are university students), but it hasn't had a huge impact. This might be because there's some friction involved. Our current focus is on revamping our freemium structure, so that instead of 2 weeks of unlimited usage and then extremely limited functionality thereafter, it would instead offer indefinite usage on a limited number of website…

An idea about the student pass: The friction you mention is probably to provide verification, right? What if you removed that part entirely, and just trusted the user? There would certainly be customers lying about being a student, to use it for free - but you want more consumers to use your product, and after a few years you can still ask them to provide student verification / start paying.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#37

Post by nathias »

wiz21c wrote: post #22

One question is missing : "what if we had to pay for our environmental footprint" ? Since so few ask it in a meaningful way, I dare to say it is still, unfortunately, a pretty extreme questions for those it should be asked to.

enviromental effects are just one aspect of externalities, if you had to pay all of them, I wonder how many businesses would be left

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#38

Post by DrBazza »

ankit219 wrote: post #27

Very thought provoking read. One question I do wonder at times, and is probably applicable here is: "what if I removed all the constraints, what would I do differently and how would things change?". Eg: Suppose nuclear fusion is successful, and you can actually power whole of earth for 800 years with 1 cup of hydrogen. That is, you don't have to worry about energy anymore. How would that change the human behavior bot…

> "what if I removed all the constraints, what would I do differently and how would things change?". Eg: Suppose nuclear fusion is successful, and you can actually power whole of earth for 800 years with 1 cup of hydrogen.

Build cheap and plentiful desalination plants on the west coasts of Africa, South America and Australia, and possibly re-green the Sahara and Outback.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#39

Post by jansan »

toast0 wrote: post #14
gnicholas wrote: post #10

I like this. In the past, we've considered making our B2C products completely free, as a way to drastically increase our rate of adoption and spur further adoption of our B2B product (which is much more lucrative). But we've never pulled the trigger, out of a fear that we'd be giving up existing revenue, and because it would make it hard to start charging again later if we decided it was the wrong decision. Although…

> because it would make it hard to start charging again later if we decided it was the wrong decision. You don't have to tell people it's free. Tell them it's free for the first year, and don't actually charge them for future years. Automatically extend their subscription at 30 days. Or only charge some people. Or cut them off when it expires, and then extend them 7 days after expiration. Lots of options if direct re…

Or put an "Early Access" label on that product. This will justify about any change that you do later. Fortnite was "Early Access" until 2020, when it had already made an estimated $15 billion (yes, with a "b") in revenue.

Re: Extreme questions to trigger new, better ideas

#40

Post by jansan »

gnicholas wrote: post #10

I like this. In the past, we've considered making our B2C products completely free, as a way to drastically increase our rate of adoption and spur further adoption of our B2B product (which is much more lucrative). But we've never pulled the trigger, out of a fear that we'd be giving up existing revenue, and because it would make it hard to start charging again later if we decided it was the wrong decision. Although…

You should look for examples of other companies who did something similar and see how that went. I personally have the feeling that giving away free of charge a previously sold B2C spells the end of that product and is a signal that the product is not commercially viable.
Post reply on HN