9 ms·

The Art of Writing One-Sentence Product Descriptions

335 points by davesuperman 10y ago

tswartz 10y ago
A brief, but interesting post on how viral products are simple and can be easily described in one sentence. >The format of both descriptions is the same: “You do X and Y happens.” X is the input and Y is the output. This input-output pair matches our intuition about how software works. Simplifying the product as a straightforward input and desirable output creates the sense that it’s an ingenious idea. I think it's important to have a simple product and using a feature to explain it makes sense. However, this brought to mind the sales and marketing idea that it's better to sell benefits, not features. I'm not sure where I sit on which approach is better, I suppose they each have their purpose. I definitely find myself pitching my side projects based on the feature, not the benefit :)
- scribu 10y ago
  I think you can use both: Start with the lead feature, so that the potential customer has a simple idea to kick around in their head. Then, describe the benefits, giving them a fuller story for why they should use the product.
haswell 10y ago
I was hoping for more insight into how to distill a product into that one line sentence. Obviously there is no magic formula for this, but the article mostly consists of "You should be doing this" with little other substance. > I’d argue that even the most complex SaaS platforms can be simplified with an illustrative lead feature. Again, was really hoping for some insight into why he argues this. I work for a company that provides a SaaS/PaaS product that is immensely powerful but notoriously difficult to describe. The company is well established in the marketplace, but still has a difficult time getting 3rd party developers on board unless those developers had prior exposure to the product for some reason. I've often felt that the answer involves some distillation of the functionality into a ridiculously short description, but have not been successful in crafting such a description (yet).
- obstinate 10y ago
  It's easier to say it can be done than to do it. ;)
- mindcrime 10y ago
  You might find this book useful: https://www.amazon.com/What-Your-One-Sentence-Attention/dp/0735204632 https://www.amazon.com/What-Your-One-Sentence-Attention/dp/0... I'm part-way through it and have found the advice valuable so far. I don't think there's a "cookie cutter" formula, but there are exercises and things you can do to help you distill a pitch down to one sentence.
- Mendenhall 10y ago
  As someone who often has to distill ideas and words down to convey a message. I would say try to focus on the "emotion" more than functionality. Emotion>reason/facts in these sort of situations. What is the "frustration" your product solves for developers, appeal to that. Everyone wants their frustrations solved, just thinking about it is soothing. Things that stand out in your statement to me already are "powerful" and "developers". Also if a layman asked why your product is powerful for developers what would you say? Good luck! I always enjoyed these sorts of problems.
  - haswell 10y ago
    Thank you for the advice! Good food for thought.
- alexqgb 10y ago
  I'm sorry, but the writer was super clear about the exact formula. It's a simple I/O arrangement that opens with what a user does and closes with what happens (e.g. Push a button, get a ride). That's it.
  - haswell 10y ago
    Not sure if sarcasm? The writer was super clear about the desired end state, which is: "Write a statement that distills your product into Action/Output". But arriving at that action/output is far from simple, especially with products that aren't so simple. Take any major PaaS/SaaS/IaaS product (AWS, Heroku, SalesForce) and try to distill it into an action/outcome. Can it be done? Probably to a certain degree, but not every product can be described in terms of pushing a button to get something. Back to the original point and your assertion that the exact formula was provided, this really feels like the "Draw an Owl" meme to me. For those not familiar, here's how you draw an owl: 1. Draw some circles 2. Draw the rest of the fucking owl It's a great formula if you know how to draw the rest of the owl. But in general, not a great formula at all.
overcast 10y ago
Like most things, if it's too difficult to describe, it's probably too difficult to use. The lack of any core feature is the death of most products.
- goatherders 10y ago
  Well said. It shocks me how complex people make their value proposition for no real reason but vanity. "We are like Air BNB for lawn care with a focus on service and quick delivery." Ugh. How about "Push a button and your lawn is mowed in 48 hours." Every business should have a one sentence value prop: Twitter: "open the app and get the news in less than 5 minutes." Snapchat: "see what your friends did today in the time it takes to ride the elevator to your office." Stripe: "spend three minutes pasting some code and start accepting credit card payments." Devzilla: "create an account in two minutes and get more web development leads." So on and so forth....if you can't describe it like that then it is too hard to use.
  - vinceguidry 10y ago
    > Well said. It shocks me how complex people make their value proposition for no real reason but vanity. "We are like Air BNB for lawn care with a focus on service and quick delivery." > Ugh. How about "Push a button and your lawn is mowed in 48 hours." You use the former for a savvy investor whose already seen half a dozen lawn care startups and is looking for where yours is different. ("focus on service and quick delivery", different than focusing on price or on the user experience of the app) You use the latter to describe what your startup is doing to Uncle Shirley, i.e. potential customers. The difference is in what you're positioning yourself against. Either it's other startups or the neighbor kid down the street. Use the former pitch with the latter audience and it'll sail over their heads, the latter pitch with the former audience and they'll roll their eyes and tell you to get to the point. But you can't not position, marketing without positioning is education, and ain't nobody got time for that.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    > Every business should have a one sentence value prop: Sure, but the elevator pitch for customers is not the same as the elevator pitch for investors.
ohdrat 10y ago
Read old TV Guide plot summaries, e.g. Mr Ed, Season 1 Busy Wife: Carol gets wrapped up in a woman's club and completely ignores Wilbur. It's up to Ed to try and help her overcome the obsession.
- tutufan 10y ago
  "Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again."
- xxs 10y ago
  After the death of her parents, a young socialite wrecks a northern kingdom.
- JetSpiegel 10y ago
  And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage
- JetSpiegel 10y ago
  And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage
- JetSpiegel 10y ago
  And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage
pcrh 10y ago
In summary, absolutely nobody thinks about your startup or product as much as you do. You need to pitch at their level, not your own.
CalChris 10y ago
The elevator pitch is fundamentally a pitch. And a one sentence summary is fundamentally a summary. They're fundamentally different. I was sailing with a buddy (a made man in SV) and he asked me what I was working on. I blurted out a one sentence summary and did it ever hit. I hadn't even thought of running through an elevator pitch because I was racing and was really thinking about sail trim. But I remember the summary and I'll use it. I may even lead the pitch with it. BTW the worst single sentence summaries are the Hollywood summaries: this is Airbnb for Ubuntu distributions. That sort of summary says that you haven't really thought it out. It's a trope and their eyes just glaze over immediately.
- pilsetnieks 10y ago
  Because "this is X for Y" is technically one sentence but it needs a lot of work to decode. If you can deliver just a sentence, it should also be just a sentence of thought to parse. Instead we need to think about what is X, what is Y, substitute the variables, and now we're juggling a paragraph of incoherent thought. Whereas a "Do this, and that happens" doesn't need any of that.
- gnicholas 10y ago
  For better or worse, some people really want to hear your "We're the X for Y". My startup [1] isn't the X for any Y (the closest thing I've found is "we're the Dolby for reading" — but this is not a close fit and makes people think too hard), but I've heard from many mentors/investors that I should try hard to come up with an "X for Y" comparison because they and their colleagues like to hear them. I agree with you that these summaries are sometimes quite awful, but in some cases they are quite apt. The conclusion I've come to is that if a very good analogy exists, you should use it. But the bar for "very good" should be quite high, since a bad "X for Y" will do more harm than good. You end up in meta-conversations about the analogy itself, which isn't helpful. 1: http://www.BeeLineReader.com http://www.BeeLineReader.com
  - CalChris 10y ago
    With a summary, you're trying to get a value proposition across succinctly. And I (as in this is my opinion) don't think you can do that with X for Y. You push a button and in five minutes a Mercedes picks you up and takes you where you want to go. I know exactly what that means. I immediately see the value in it. As you say but this is not a close fit and makes people think too hard. That means they can't immediately see the value in it. That means you have to keep working on it. Bailey didn't say this was gonna be easy. BTW, the Kalanick summary personalizes brilliantly and name checking Mercedes sure doesn't hurt. The later Uber summary (“Tap a button, get a ride.”) does nothing for me. I only vaguely know what it even means because I already know it's about Uber. It could be talking about an FPS for all I know. Still, it is better than an iPhone app for taxis. But the bar for "very good" should be quite high. That's an awesome line.
mozumder 10y ago
There's a Facebook group that's dedicated to One Sentence Startup Pitches: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1500321840185061/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/1500321840185061/ "A dating site for vegans: NeverMetHerbivore" "A combined BBQ restaurant + strip club: Ribs for Your Pleasure" "Autocorrect for tattoos"
natvod 10y ago
Writing effective one sentence product descriptions can be boiled down to: Describe in simple terms a major product feature that either or both: a) solves the biggest pain point for your customer b) makes you the most different from your closest competitor Examples: https://heapanalytics.com https://heapanalytics.com: Automatically track all website and app user actions - no coding required https://mailchimp.com/ https://mailchimp.com/: Easiest to use email marketing platform https://www.pipedrive.com/ https://www.pipedrive.com/: Drag and drop interface CRM - view all deals by type at a glance https://www.getrevue.co https://www.getrevue.co - Effortlessly send a weekly newsletter to engage your audience http://www.artofemails.com/ http://www.artofemails.com/ - Proven prewritten sales email templates
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- hammock 10y ago
  You took one point from OP ("lead features") and missed the others. For example, the "input output" part. Without that you are probably missing some representation of the user/customer in your description. Ab rollers would never sell if they said "gives you rock hard abs" without the "just 20 minutes a week!" part.
todd8 10y ago
I marvel at how movie plots can be summed up in one sentence. On-line movie services (ATT UVerse, etc.) give such concise descriptions in so little space.
JohnJamesRambo 10y ago
"Something where you can type someone’s name and find out a bunch of information about them." Well Mark Zuckerberg nailed that one describing his Facebook.
ak39 10y ago
The inability to formulate a one-sentence product description is a symptom of an imprecise product strategy. It's not a case of "in spite of it". A mature & reliable product strategy (who you're targeting, what differentiated value you're adding to your targets etc) will automatically yield that one-sentence. No art about wordsmithing. All about a valuable product.
- mconnolly 10y ago
  Sort of, but for highly complex systems (take something like real estate for example) describing it in this way is difficult not because of lack of product and targeting knowledge, but because the customer is so far behind in their knowledge of how the process works.
davemel37 10y ago
one of the top branding experts in the world,Al Ries, says the purpose of a slogan is to give your users the tool for explaining why someone should use your product when discussing it with a friend. https://youtu.be/EAXCu1zeaaI https://youtu.be/EAXCu1zeaaI
jbreckmckye 10y ago
I prefer product haikus: --- This smart microwave, Explodes when our servers fail, Sorry about that.
sirgg0119 10y ago
what gets lost is the pitch changes depending on the audience... there is no one universal sale. Now I think the concept's valid, but focus differs

335 points by davesuperman 10y ago

A brief, but interesting post on how viral products are simple and can be easily described in one sentence. >The format of both descriptions is the same: “You do X and Y happens.” X is the input and Y is the output. This input-output pair matches our intuition about how software works. Simplifying the product as a straightforward input and desirable output creates the sense that it’s an ingenious idea. I think it's important to have a simple product and using a feature to explain it makes sense. However, this brought to mind the sales and marketing idea that it's better to sell benefits, not features. I'm not sure where I sit on which approach is better, I suppose they each have their purpose. I definitely find myself pitching my side projects based on the feature, not the benefit :)

scribu 10y ago
I think you can use both: Start with the lead feature, so that the potential customer has a simple idea to kick around in their head. Then, describe the benefits, giving them a fuller story for why they should use the product.

haswell 10y ago

I was hoping for more insight into how to distill a product into that one line sentence. Obviously there is no magic formula for this, but the article mostly consists of "You should be doing this" with little other substance. > I’d argue that even the most complex SaaS platforms can be simplified with an illustrative lead feature. Again, was really hoping for some insight into why he argues this. I work for a company that provides a SaaS/PaaS product that is immensely powerful but notoriously difficult to describe. The company is well established in the marketplace, but still has a difficult time getting 3rd party developers on board unless those developers had prior exposure to the product for some reason. I've often felt that the answer involves some distillation of the functionality into a ridiculously short description, but have not been successful in crafting such a description (yet).

obstinate 10y ago
It's easier to say it can be done than to do it. ;)
mindcrime 10y ago
You might find this book useful: https://www.amazon.com/What-Your-One-Sentence-Attention/dp/0735204632 https://www.amazon.com/What-Your-One-Sentence-Attention/dp/0... I'm part-way through it and have found the advice valuable so far. I don't think there's a "cookie cutter" formula, but there are exercises and things you can do to help you distill a pitch down to one sentence.
Mendenhall 10y ago
As someone who often has to distill ideas and words down to convey a message. I would say try to focus on the "emotion" more than functionality. Emotion>reason/facts in these sort of situations. What is the "frustration" your product solves for developers, appeal to that. Everyone wants their frustrations solved, just thinking about it is soothing. Things that stand out in your statement to me already are "powerful" and "developers". Also if a layman asked why your product is powerful for developers what would you say? Good luck! I always enjoyed these sorts of problems.
- haswell 10y ago
  Thank you for the advice! Good food for thought.
alexqgb 10y ago
I'm sorry, but the writer was super clear about the exact formula. It's a simple I/O arrangement that opens with what a user does and closes with what happens (e.g. Push a button, get a ride). That's it.
- haswell 10y ago
  Not sure if sarcasm? The writer was super clear about the desired end state, which is: "Write a statement that distills your product into Action/Output". But arriving at that action/output is far from simple, especially with products that aren't so simple. Take any major PaaS/SaaS/IaaS product (AWS, Heroku, SalesForce) and try to distill it into an action/outcome. Can it be done? Probably to a certain degree, but not every product can be described in terms of pushing a button to get something. Back to the original point and your assertion that the exact formula was provided, this really feels like the "Draw an Owl" meme to me. For those not familiar, here's how you draw an owl: 1. Draw some circles 2. Draw the rest of the fucking owl It's a great formula if you know how to draw the rest of the owl. But in general, not a great formula at all.

overcast 10y ago

Like most things, if it's too difficult to describe, it's probably too difficult to use. The lack of any core feature is the death of most products.

goatherders 10y ago
Well said. It shocks me how complex people make their value proposition for no real reason but vanity. "We are like Air BNB for lawn care with a focus on service and quick delivery." Ugh. How about "Push a button and your lawn is mowed in 48 hours." Every business should have a one sentence value prop: Twitter: "open the app and get the news in less than 5 minutes." Snapchat: "see what your friends did today in the time it takes to ride the elevator to your office." Stripe: "spend three minutes pasting some code and start accepting credit card payments." Devzilla: "create an account in two minutes and get more web development leads." So on and so forth....if you can't describe it like that then it is too hard to use.
- vinceguidry 10y ago
  > Well said. It shocks me how complex people make their value proposition for no real reason but vanity. "We are like Air BNB for lawn care with a focus on service and quick delivery." > Ugh. How about "Push a button and your lawn is mowed in 48 hours." You use the former for a savvy investor whose already seen half a dozen lawn care startups and is looking for where yours is different. ("focus on service and quick delivery", different than focusing on price or on the user experience of the app) You use the latter to describe what your startup is doing to Uncle Shirley, i.e. potential customers. The difference is in what you're positioning yourself against. Either it's other startups or the neighbor kid down the street. Use the former pitch with the latter audience and it'll sail over their heads, the latter pitch with the former audience and they'll roll their eyes and tell you to get to the point. But you can't not position, marketing without positioning is education, and ain't nobody got time for that.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > Every business should have a one sentence value prop: Sure, but the elevator pitch for customers is not the same as the elevator pitch for investors.

ohdrat 10y ago

Read old TV Guide plot summaries, e.g. Mr Ed, Season 1 Busy Wife: Carol gets wrapped up in a woman's club and completely ignores Wilbur. It's up to Ed to try and help her overcome the obsession.

tutufan 10y ago
"Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again."
xxs 10y ago
After the death of her parents, a young socialite wrecks a northern kingdom.
JetSpiegel 10y ago
And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage
JetSpiegel 10y ago
And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage
JetSpiegel 10y ago
And their crowdsourced spiritual successor: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/HomePage

pcrh 10y ago

In summary, absolutely nobody thinks about your startup or product as much as you do. You need to pitch at their level, not your own.

CalChris 10y ago

The elevator pitch is fundamentally a pitch. And a one sentence summary is fundamentally a summary. They're fundamentally different. I was sailing with a buddy (a made man in SV) and he asked me what I was working on. I blurted out a one sentence summary and did it ever hit. I hadn't even thought of running through an elevator pitch because I was racing and was really thinking about sail trim. But I remember the summary and I'll use it. I may even lead the pitch with it. BTW the worst single sentence summaries are the Hollywood summaries: this is Airbnb for Ubuntu distributions. That sort of summary says that you haven't really thought it out. It's a trope and their eyes just glaze over immediately.

pilsetnieks 10y ago
Because "this is X for Y" is technically one sentence but it needs a lot of work to decode. If you can deliver just a sentence, it should also be just a sentence of thought to parse. Instead we need to think about what is X, what is Y, substitute the variables, and now we're juggling a paragraph of incoherent thought. Whereas a "Do this, and that happens" doesn't need any of that.
gnicholas 10y ago
For better or worse, some people really want to hear your "We're the X for Y". My startup [1] isn't the X for any Y (the closest thing I've found is "we're the Dolby for reading" — but this is not a close fit and makes people think too hard), but I've heard from many mentors/investors that I should try hard to come up with an "X for Y" comparison because they and their colleagues like to hear them. I agree with you that these summaries are sometimes quite awful, but in some cases they are quite apt. The conclusion I've come to is that if a very good analogy exists, you should use it. But the bar for "very good" should be quite high, since a bad "X for Y" will do more harm than good. You end up in meta-conversations about the analogy itself, which isn't helpful. 1: http://www.BeeLineReader.com http://www.BeeLineReader.com
- CalChris 10y ago
  With a summary, you're trying to get a value proposition across succinctly. And I (as in this is my opinion) don't think you can do that with X for Y. You push a button and in five minutes a Mercedes picks you up and takes you where you want to go. I know exactly what that means. I immediately see the value in it. As you say but this is not a close fit and makes people think too hard. That means they can't immediately see the value in it. That means you have to keep working on it. Bailey didn't say this was gonna be easy. BTW, the Kalanick summary personalizes brilliantly and name checking Mercedes sure doesn't hurt. The later Uber summary (“Tap a button, get a ride.”) does nothing for me. I only vaguely know what it even means because I already know it's about Uber. It could be talking about an FPS for all I know. Still, it is better than an iPhone app for taxis. But the bar for "very good" should be quite high. That's an awesome line.

mozumder 10y ago

There's a Facebook group that's dedicated to One Sentence Startup Pitches: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1500321840185061/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/1500321840185061/ "A dating site for vegans: NeverMetHerbivore" "A combined BBQ restaurant + strip club: Ribs for Your Pleasure" "Autocorrect for tattoos"

natvod 10y ago

Writing effective one sentence product descriptions can be boiled down to: Describe in simple terms a major product feature that either or both: a) solves the biggest pain point for your customer b) makes you the most different from your closest competitor Examples: https://heapanalytics.com https://heapanalytics.com: Automatically track all website and app user actions - no coding required https://mailchimp.com/ https://mailchimp.com/: Easiest to use email marketing platform https://www.pipedrive.com/ https://www.pipedrive.com/: Drag and drop interface CRM - view all deals by type at a glance https://www.getrevue.co https://www.getrevue.co - Effortlessly send a weekly newsletter to engage your audience http://www.artofemails.com/ http://www.artofemails.com/ - Proven prewritten sales email templates

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
hammock 10y ago
You took one point from OP ("lead features") and missed the others. For example, the "input output" part. Without that you are probably missing some representation of the user/customer in your description. Ab rollers would never sell if they said "gives you rock hard abs" without the "just 20 minutes a week!" part.

todd8 10y ago

I marvel at how movie plots can be summed up in one sentence. On-line movie services (ATT UVerse, etc.) give such concise descriptions in so little space.

JohnJamesRambo 10y ago

"Something where you can type someone’s name and find out a bunch of information about them." Well Mark Zuckerberg nailed that one describing his Facebook.

ak39 10y ago

The inability to formulate a one-sentence product description is a symptom of an imprecise product strategy. It's not a case of "in spite of it". A mature & reliable product strategy (who you're targeting, what differentiated value you're adding to your targets etc) will automatically yield that one-sentence. No art about wordsmithing. All about a valuable product.

mconnolly 10y ago
Sort of, but for highly complex systems (take something like real estate for example) describing it in this way is difficult not because of lack of product and targeting knowledge, but because the customer is so far behind in their knowledge of how the process works.

davemel37 10y ago

one of the top branding experts in the world,Al Ries, says the purpose of a slogan is to give your users the tool for explaining why someone should use your product when discussing it with a friend. https://youtu.be/EAXCu1zeaaI https://youtu.be/EAXCu1zeaaI

jbreckmckye 10y ago

I prefer product haikus: --- This smart microwave, Explodes when our servers fail, Sorry about that.

sirgg0119 10y ago

what gets lost is the pitch changes depending on the audience... there is no one universal sale. Now I think the concept's valid, but focus differs