Ok I think we're talking past each other. I was busy earlier so I didn't get a chance to fully respond. The point I was trying to make about the iPhone and mark

Ok I think we're talking past each other. I was busy earlier so I didn't get a chance to fully respond. The point I was trying to make about the iPhone and marketing was the bulk of money and time invested was in the product itself. You said Apple spent 2 billion in R&D. Now how does that cost compare to the marketing campaign that followed? I found this article talking about advertising for the iPhone 6: http://www.campaignlive.com/article/apple-ad-spend-rises-50-record-18-billion/1370742 http://www.campaignlive.com/article/apple-ad-spend-rises-50-... "The company reported record profits of $53.4 billion on turnover of $233.7 billion, thanks to the iPhone6 and iPhone6s sales. Advertising still represents less than 1% of turnover." Do they spend a crapton on marketing? Well compared to how much me and you make, yes. But compared to what Apple makes off iPhones, it isn't. The point I was trying to make was the iPhone successful because of a slick marketing campaign or was it the quality of the product itself? I would say it's the product in this case. Look at high-traffic sites like reddit and imgur that barely market themselves but are still wildly popular. Why? People like it and want to use it because they're good sites. That was the point I was trying to make. A good product or service is worth it's weight in marketing gold. In my opinion you should be spending the bulk of your resources on R&D improving your product than growth hacking. Your chances of success are much higher with a solid product/service. The tech industry has an abysmal failure rate compared to literally any other industry and I feel this trend of rushing through a MVP and marketing the hell out of what's essentially an unfinished product is the cause. How do you even know if the market for your product or service is even there to begin with if your MVP isn't fully functional yet. Concentrate on the product/service and beta test. Get feedback and listen to what people are telling you. Grow organically. Maybe people likes how your product does X but but starts asking if it could do Y also. The addition of that feature could be what pushes your product over the top. That's all I was saying.