We are not normal people • Hacker News Board

Re: We are not normal people

#31

Post by janj » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:17 PM UTC

ryanio wrote: post #27

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

Did you think this article was scummy? Probably not, it provided some real value and insight. And guess what, it was a piece of content marketing for his new book. I was pleasantly surprised at the end with his CTA (call-to-action). Marketing is just finding a way to communicate your value proposition to your target market. Yes, there are plenty of scummy ways out there -- but some awesome real-world examples come fr…

Maybe I'm just too cynical a person but I thought his CTA was awkward and couldn't help thinking about how giving his readers 'homework' was a great marketing technique to automatically place him in a mentor position in the minds of his readers, helping his readers justify buying his book.

But I get your point. This wasn't a scummy piece of marketing and I found it through a very neutral channel.

Re: We are not normal people

#32

Post by hyp0 » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:18 PM UTC

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

> building things that people enjoy

Knowing what people will enjoy is part of marketing. "Marketing" is commonly thought of as "advertising", but the full meaning includes choosing what to build - what do people need? What will help them?

Now, a favoured open source technique for doing this is to scratch your own itch... the thinking is that if it annoys you, it probably annoys lots of other people. A kind of marketing that requires a lot of faith! But is sometimes very effective.

We can go a step further, and ask now that we have solved this problem, it's not doing much good if the people who need it don't have it! How will they find out about it? This is getting pretty close to advertising... but the least-scummy way to do it is rely on word-of-mouth. This is actually how people find out about stuff in general. You can assist this process by just articulating just what it is you have, and what problem it solves, in a pithy, easy-to-remember, easy-to-pass-on phrase. You might have a little story (or joke) that helps carry it along. But the non-scummy part about this is that people problem won't pass it on if they don't think it's any good. They aren't getting paid to shill.

One interesting advertising approach is Dropbox's referral program (where you get extra storage by introducing someone to a free Dropbox account). It's hard to see this as scummy, but it's extremely effective "advertising". Even having a free version in the first place is an aspect of marketing.

Finally, consider the problems of a charity, whose only goal is to help people. What help is needed? How to get it to the people who need it? That is "marketing". And pg argues for it as a model for a startup: http://paulgraham.com/good.html

Re: We are not normal people

#33

Post by gesman » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:20 PM UTC

If you own the product to-be-built and it is your startup, then you need to think like a businessman and that includes listening to customers.

But if you work as a salaried employee or contractor - lets face it - you really in a position to care more about your personal income and care less about customers who will be buying the product you don't directly benefit from. You better realize that you can and will be let go on a minute's notice and no one is going to drop a tear that you're no longer there.

And hence your survival depends on convincing the management to build the product using technologies that you can benefit from by knowing them, just in case you decided to quit or will be let go.

Even though above may sounds selfish - this does not mean your personal interests are not aligned with the company you're working for.

Quite often the opposite - and quite often it's win win for everyone.

Re: We are not normal people

#34

Post by jh3 » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:21 PM UTC

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

> I love building things that people enjoy using but I hate sales and marketing.

What do you do to get paid?

Re: We are not normal people

#35

Post by tbirdz » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:27 PM UTC

ryanio wrote: post #27

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

Did you think this article was scummy? Probably not, it provided some real value and insight. And guess what, it was a piece of content marketing for his new book. I was pleasantly surprised at the end with his CTA (call-to-action). Marketing is just finding a way to communicate your value proposition to your target market. Yes, there are plenty of scummy ways out there -- but some awesome real-world examples come fr…

In all honesty, I starting reading the article because I was lured in by the title (even though it's a bit link baity). Why are these people not normal, and why am I one of them?

Then I started reading, realized it was about developers marketing. I have never really considered marketing my strong suit so I continued reading.

When he started talking about his book, I felt as though I had been tricked, and I got a little mad. To me, it cheapened the article, and made me feel as if the author didn't really care about informing people, but rather was just looking to promote his book. At that instant I knew he had posted this link on Hacker News not to be informative, but to prey on developers with weak marketing skills, and get them to pay for his book. I normally wouldn't comment on something like this, but since you said so anyway, I would say this is an unethical advertisement because it pretends to be an article, but it actually was an advertisement. If he had said right out, "I have written a book on marketing for developers, here is a sample, and if you are interested you can purchase it here", then I might have been more inclined to purchase it (of course the book isn't even finished yet, so there would be no way to buy it anyway even if I was interested, but that's a separate issue I won't get into here.) Rather, instead the article left a bad taste in my mouth and reinforced my opinion of marketing as something scummy I wouldn't want to get involved with.

Re: We are not normal people

#36

Post by JonnieCache » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:27 PM UTC

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

Here's an example of good marketing:

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/product-alerts-older-than-2-m...

The software is so good, he just has to make one post on a forum and people are queuing up to throw money at him. All he has to do is sit there and answer questions.

A sample quote from a user: "Bought it without demoing, Due to Sean's great support/dedication."

Note the length of the thread. Also have a look at the diagram on the last page. There is a lot people here could learn from smalltime audio software/hardware developers, who are quietly running scores of successful "lifestyle" businesses, away from the bright lights of the SAAS industry.

Here's another example of a product announcement thread on that forum from a popular indie developer: http://www.gearslutz.com/board/product-alerts-older-than-2-m...

But yeah, if you're looking for an example of good marketing from a big company, good luck I guess.

Re: We are not normal people

#37

Post by GotAnyMegadeth » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:28 PM UTC

sillysaurus2 wrote: post #22

jiggy2011 wrote: post #15

"increasing the technical challenge while creating a product does not increase the chance for more sales" This is true to a point, but if your strongest suite is your raw technical ability then it may be best for you to pursue problems that have remained unsolved because of technical challenges that have put others off. A significant technical barrier is also nice to have if it means you can get the market before you…

Even a mediocre implementation of something "impossible" can make a lot of impact. See bitcoin. Bitcoin was perhaps the worst possible example you could have chosen... The implementation was the opposite of mediocre; its code predicted and solved implementation problems that no one realized were problems, except Satoshi. And on a technical level, the client has only experienced one problem that had to be rolled back.…

Obviously what counts as mediocre is up for debate, but I think you could argue that the first mobile phones were a mediocre implementation of a very difficult technical problem.

Re: We are not normal people

#38

Post by tbirdz » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:30 PM UTC

jsaxton86 wrote: post #26

Pxtl wrote: post #18

On the barber anecdote, I think something that a lot of software solutions miss is how fast and flexible paper is. It's ready for you the instant you need it, and you can draw arbitrary shapes quickly and easily in addition to text. We're still feeling out getting this convenience into user's hands. Keyboarded platforms suck for drawing/using standing up, tablets suck for typing. Ultimately, the only thing I could of…

Does the barber need arbitrary shapes in this case? It looks like his pain point was that he was walking to a computer. Perhaps having a tablet by his phone could fix this problem? It could be as easy as the paper calendar solution, but since it's all being done electronically, you could allow people to schedule appointments online and such.

Or perhaps even some kind of advanced handwriting recognition, image recording system that would automatically scan the calendar and store the information in a database (probably not practical with current technology)?

Or for that matter why not some kind of automated voice recognition system that extracts the customers schedule date directly from the phone call?

Re: We are not normal people

#39

Post by janj » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:31 PM UTC

hyp0 wrote: post #32

janj wrote: post #21

I'm one of those developers who thinks that marketing in general is 'scummy' and this article has done nothing to change that perception. I'm willing to acknowledge that there can exist marketing that is not scummy but it's hard for me to think of real world examples. Can someone describe for me the difference between scummy marketing and, I guess I'll call it 'ethical' marketing? I love building things that people e…

> building things that people enjoy Knowing what people will enjoy is part of marketing. "Marketing" is commonly thought of as "advertising", but the full meaning includes choosing what to build - what do people need? What will help them? Now, a favoured open source technique for doing this is to scratch your own itch... the thinking is that if it annoys you, it probably annoys lots of other people. A kind of marketi…

Maybe the biggest problem in forming my perception of marketing is that the good, quality marketing is the marketing least likely to get noticed consciously. The scummy marketing might not be more prevalent but it's more obvious so that's what I've been using to form my opinion.

The marketing that I commonly notice is the kind born out of much research on manipulating the thoughts, desires and behaviors of people. It's easy to find examples of this everywhere and is used by most large corporations to achieve what you describe. When thinking about the companies I respect, like Airbnb and Parse, I think of their marketing as more going out and engaging and informing their customer. Should there be a distinction between the two kinds of marketing?

Re: We are not normal people

#40

Post by calinet6 » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 4:38 PM UTC

This is a useful perspective, but not the whole picture.

Quality drives a portion of sales. Technical ability to perform, create features, respond to customer needs, and maintain a service contributes highly to quality. The technology and tools and process chosen enable that technical ability to a large degree.

Therefore, some portion of your sales is driven by your technology.

It's useful and important to think at a high level about your customers directly, at times. This is your UX role, doing user research and understanding all the intricate details and desires of your users. It's also marketing, understanding the market and who the target consumers are.

It's also useful and important to ensure you get your process and systems right to meet that market head-on with the ability to solve the problem that you now understand. Ideally these are several roles communicating seamlessly. It's not always ideal, but that's the goal.