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Sales mistakes that software engineers make

pipelinedb.com

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Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#11

Post by benjiweber »

tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

I don't see listening carefully and asking open ended questions as a step towards simply building what the potential customer wants.

Quite the opposite: seeking to understand their underlying needs, the context they are in, and the factors influencing their thinking helps build empathy.

If we truly understand the needs we are trying to fulfil it is more likely that we will build a good product, it's a superficial understanding that tends to lead to products that are treating symptoms rather than causes and only minor improvements.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#12

Post by avinium »

option_greek wrote: post #2

>Sales Mistake #1 - Building Before you Start Selling What if the customer wants to see a demo ? Is it better to inform them from the very start that this is a conversation about the product that is non existent ? Isn't it better to have a MVP in place. Almost all the sales guides/people tell this. But this is also something I can't get my head around.

I want to hear from people who have actually done this. I suspect they all have well-known track records and are selling to people who trust them to deliver.

I still haven’t met anyone personally (myself included) who managed to presell software with nothing but a presentation.

I think the more common route is “find the first customer and build v1 for them as a consultant at a steep discount”.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#14

Post by matthewmacleod »

tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

So the entrepreneurs would rush to it's keyboard create a clone of the Tech and add the feature X.

The important thing to remember is that most software isn’t that special. Sometimes you will be redefining the whole market; more often you will be building a faster horse. But that’s okay! People using horses still want them to be faster, and it’s a valid and often successful business strategy to sell products which are similar to, but better/faster/cheaper than, your competitors’.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#15

Post by SimplyUnknown »

ainar-g wrote: post #10
tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

>"We are using [Insert Tech Name] and it doesn't support feature X" >So the entrepreneurs would rush to it's keyboard create a clone of the Tech and add the feature X. Uhm, why is this bad? Haven't we all seen examples of companies that do the same stuff as other companies but better and succeed? I'm pretty sure even pg wrote about this in one of his "How to start a start-up" essays.

There's nothing wrong with it. As you say, many quality products come from this kind of work.

However, you can read this article as saying: "The only way you can sell software is by listening to customers and building exactly what they want." Which often is "We are using [Insert Tech Name] and it doesn't support feature X."

This narrative is clearly false. Many good products are built and monetized by just building something what you think the world needs or you think is fun to build. Again, many more of these software projects have failed using this strategy. Many good products are built and monetized by listening to customers and building what they want. And again, many poor clones that add no value are built using this way.

It is a two-way street which is not reflected in the article.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#16

Post by Fergi »

tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

(Jeff from PipelineDB / author here)

Thanks for the honest feedback. You are definitely correct that there are many successful projects and businesses that did not start with a clear sense that people would use or buy their products. But there are a disproportionately large number of projects and businesses that have failed, precisely because they did not have a clear sense that people wanted what they were making and would pay for it.

Also, this post isn't saying that builders shouldn't begin with a strong, fundamental conviction about how things should be dramatically different. I, as the author, would actually argue the exact opposite. The point I'm making is that once we have our convictions, we should test and measure the extent to which those convictions are correct before investing large amounts of time, money, and energy into productizing them.

Lastly, the point about asking questions and then listening to customer feedback would only result in building minimally better products if the product hypothesis we start with is itself unimaginative. But that hypothesis can be literally anything. Customer feedback simply teaches us if market demand lines up with our assumptions about market demand.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#17

Post by dagw »

tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

The best way to do this is by asking good questions, and then listening carefully and taking notes

Even better is to watch people work. I've written software for domains where I'll never be an end user and knew very little about how the end users actually work. Talking to people and asking questions is of course nice, but nothing beats sitting behind an actual end user for 30 minutes and watching what they actually do.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#18

Post by fulafel »

tinyvm wrote: post #7

While the read was interesting and bring solid points, I strongly disagree with the majority of the arguments. >The biggest mistake I see developers make is assuming that they are building something that people both want and will pay a meaningful amount of money for. Lots of projects were build with no exact plan on how to monetize them of if there would be customers to buy it. They just had a vision about how X or Y…

But did Docker succeed in sales? They were acquired to gain control of the user base, without making money. Serverless seems headed the same way.

You need to succeed in sales if you want to make sales, otherwise not :)

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#19

Post by koliber »

I tried to correct some of these mistakes with my latest venture. In the past, I would build something that I thought was a pervasive problem with a demand, only to learn later that I was wrong. Ideas are worth very little until they are verified in the real world. You can get a lot done by just talking with people.

This time, I've spent a lot of time asking people what they thought of the idea, and hashing it out. I got a lot of positive feedback. People understood the problem. I got a feeling that they "got" the solution. When I sat down to build it, I had more confidence in it than prior projects.

There's still a lot more selling work ahead. The project is just starting to garner interest. I feel so out of my element selling, but I realize it is just another

P.S. The project is goodgrids.com. It's an API for converting CSVs to beautifully formatted Excel spreadsheets, and extracting data from Excel spreadsheets into CSVs for uploading into legacy systems.

Re: Sales mistakes that software engineers make

#20

Post by softwarefounder »

option_greek wrote: post #2

>Sales Mistake #1 - Building Before you Start Selling What if the customer wants to see a demo ? Is it better to inform them from the very start that this is a conversation about the product that is non existent ? Isn't it better to have a MVP in place. Almost all the sales guides/people tell this. But this is also something I can't get my head around.

Your 100% right.

Especially in mid to large B2B plays.

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