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

What I’ve learned from users

paulgraham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 339 posts

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#121

Post by inglor »

gnicholas wrote: post #114

Is this what VCs want when they ask what you have learned from your users? It sounds like most of the learnings are about what his users do wrong, and why. There's surprisingly little in the way of "our users told us X and we realized we need to do Y". I assumed that when people ask what you've learned from your users, they're not asking you to list how lousy your users are at doing various things, and why they just…

It's a literary device.

What he's telling you is that he learned:

- That founders don't believe YC-partners often because their advice is counterintuitive. The underlying message is that it's important to not only give advice (sell your service) but also understand if it's being taken (your service is being actually used).

- That founders (sers) come with presumptions and those affect how they apply your advice (use your product). In his "hack the test" example he emphasizes how important it is to persist in your advice (educate your users) so they unlearn old habits.

etc..

He skips directly spelling out the conclusions to encourage you to read more than headlines which makes the reading (IMO) more interesting.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#122

Post by christophilus »

tenpies wrote: post #115
lnwlebjel wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I rank buy a car from a new car salesman as the worst consumer experience of my life. So much so that I've since bought used cars and in the future hope to buy a Tesla in large part to avoid that experience. I understand that it could greatly benefit the salesperson in understanding the social psychology of the consumer ... but never again will I subject myself to that process.

> in the future hope to buy a Tesla in large part to avoid that experience And see Tesla knows this, which is why the margin on their cars is higher than most. You may have disliked that sales experience with a dealer or used car salesperson, but it quite likely got you a slightly better deal than had you tried to negotiate yourself.

The margin might simply be from cutting out the middleman while keeping the middleman price. So, the buyer is not necessarily better or worse off. But not having to go through a pushy salesman is a big win. It’s why I love Carmax (and would probably like Carvana).

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#123

Post by geph2021 »

phpthrowaway99 wrote: post #94

PGs take on why early stage VCs gain so much experience reminds me of my opinions on why car sales is the best sales experience. I sold cars for almost a decade and was pretty good at it averaging 30 cars a month. That means every year I helped people sign for $16 million of products. In the end I probably sold 3000 cars for over $100 million. (Note, I stayed in it way too long. I think most of these benefits would c…

In my experience[1], interacting with the salesperson and agreeing on the cars' price is about 25% of the sale process (and hassle). The salesperson nails down price, model/unit, with the customer, which already involves all manner of sleazy games on pricing.

After the "sale", there's a much longer gauntlet of pitfalls and traps to navigate: extended warranties, add-ons (roof racks, floor mats, etc...), financing, trade-in value, anti-theft, pre-paid maintenance, etc, etc... (it goes on and on, it's exhausting).

I'm going to guess, just based on the amount of manhours the dealership spends on the initial sale agreement, versus all the other crap, that the true money is not made by the dealership on the actual car sale, but on all these add-ons after the sale.

[1] - fairly limited, bought 3 cars over the ~15 years, 1 used, 2 new, and it's been about 8 years since my last purchase, not sure how much its changed since then.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#124

Post by enobrev »

tech_tuna wrote: post #108
lisper wrote: post #45

This essay is getting a surprising amount of hate, and I must confess that my first impression on reading it was that it sounded an awful lot like a Robert Kiyosaki book [1]. But then I followed the two links in the essay [2] [3] and that put it into perspective: the thing that Paul learned from his users is that they are looking for The Answer, the formula, the procedure for how to succeed, and there is no such form…

Quoted post unavailable.

Mine doesn't either.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#125

Post by peterkos »

phpthrowaway99 wrote: post #94

PGs take on why early stage VCs gain so much experience reminds me of my opinions on why car sales is the best sales experience. I sold cars for almost a decade and was pretty good at it averaging 30 cars a month. That means every year I helped people sign for $16 million of products. In the end I probably sold 3000 cars for over $100 million. (Note, I stayed in it way too long. I think most of these benefits would c…

I recognize that it could be a helpful and rigorous experience in sales, but most car people I've gone to across dealerships have tried to guilt trip and lie to me to get me to spend more money than I have. As a student paying full in cash, I was pushed ruthlessly despite firmly saying no, and ultimately I got my car somewhere else.

It reminds me how Best Buy used to have horrible customer experience, it was all commission-based, and you would be hounded when first walking in the store. Then Apple came along with the model of "don't force someone to do anything, and the right product for them might not be in the store, and that's fine". (Notably, Best Buy seems to have gotten better since.)

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#126

Post by jrm4 »

I think I very much understand the hate this article is getting, and perhaps it's a thing endemic to the entire concept of "investment."

People around here like "solving problems," and I'd go further to say that this is perhaps the most fulfilling thing one can do.

VC doesn't do that. VC is "just greed." This is not to say that VC's can't invest in companies that solve things. If they do, great. But what's perhaps irksome is, here we are watching money try to chase more money, and whether or not a problem is solved is irrelevant.

For those of us who have actually solved problems by means of a business -- watching this particular flavor of a mistake by wealthy (or wanna-be-wealth) people e.g. "oh, I wouldn't buy the product myself" is just annoying.

To those of us that solve problems -- we're now hearing about obviously just a complete f**ing idiot chasing money -- and worse, a space that still might give to him despite this.

I understand that this it just how it is sometimes, but I'm not surprised that this catches backlash.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#127

Post by clairity »

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #112

God, even as an open source maintainer, all of these insights SCREAM incredibly relevant. In fact, what is worse is that you don't realize your focus is totally wrong because you're not losing revenue. You might be losing eyeballs or growth and adoption, but that's easier to gloss over considering it's a factor of advertising. I constantly ask myself when looking at some of the de facto solutions in open source space…

this is why fair competition is so important in markets (not "free"). it's literally what makes markets efficient, not omnicient capitalists, as they'd love for you to believe. the market works because mistakes become directly apparent in the catchall metric that is price (and its derivatives, revenue and profit).

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#128

Post by ejb999 »

lnwlebjel wrote: post #102
phpthrowaway99 wrote: post #94

PGs take on why early stage VCs gain so much experience reminds me of my opinions on why car sales is the best sales experience. I sold cars for almost a decade and was pretty good at it averaging 30 cars a month. That means every year I helped people sign for $16 million of products. In the end I probably sold 3000 cars for over $100 million. (Note, I stayed in it way too long. I think most of these benefits would c…

Interesting. I rank buy a car from a new car salesman as the worst consumer experience of my life. So much so that I've since bought used cars and in the future hope to buy a Tesla in large part to avoid that experience. I understand that it could greatly benefit the salesperson in understanding the social psychology of the consumer ... but never again will I subject myself to that process.

I'd rather go get a cavity filled, then buy a new car. Do it as infrequently as possible (hoping to get another 10 years out of my 11 year old Toyota).

Every time I visit a new car dealer I feel a need to take a shower, just to get the stink off of me.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#129

Post by P5fRxh5kUvp2th »

mindcrime wrote: post #119
tech_tuna wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

The dude's shit doesn't stink. In his view. Isn't that true for most people? I mean "from their own view". We all tend to assume that we're right more often than not, no?

> We all tend to assume that we're right more often than not, no?

That is not what that phrase means.

It means someone thinks they're _better_ than everyone else. It's a lack of humility. It's arrogance.

It's the aristocracy looking down on its citizens. It's the software developer looking down on the men who pick up their garbage.

It is not simply about thinking you're right most of the time.

Re: What I’ve learned from users

#130

Post by asah »

phpthrowaway99 wrote: post #94

PGs take on why early stage VCs gain so much experience reminds me of my opinions on why car sales is the best sales experience. I sold cars for almost a decade and was pretty good at it averaging 30 cars a month. That means every year I helped people sign for $16 million of products. In the end I probably sold 3000 cars for over $100 million. (Note, I stayed in it way too long. I think most of these benefits would c…

best podcast ever: https://www.google.com/search?q=this+american+life+129+cars
Post reply on HN