4 ms·

The question is though, is getting featured in such a list a good thing. Does it lead to good things? Perhaps I'm just a bitter "old" person (over 30), but I'm

by axod 16y ago

The question is though, is getting featured in such a list a good thing. Does it lead to good things? Perhaps I'm just a bitter "old" person (over 30), but I'm not convinced it matters that much. IMHO The Visual Website Optimizer guy should concentrate on providing value and cool stuff for customers rather than pandering to journalists fashion tastes. If he's providing real value, it's fairly simple to start paying for advertising and driving new customers to sign up etc.

maxklein 16y ago
You're absolutely right. Such lists mean nothing to your core business, and the effect is minor in the long run. Imagine you want to create a great airline. What do newspaper articles have to do with that? If your airline is great, people will hear about you. That's how it should be. My original point was just about why it seems that it's always the same people being featured. It's because those people just have more human interest in their concepts than other people, and the fundamentals of their businesses have little to do with their being featured.
- evansolomon 16y ago
  You are likely correct that it's unlikely any of these companies' futures will change appreciably because of this coverage. However, PR can definitely make a real difference in a business--see Aaron Patzer's thoughts on this (no particular source, but he talks about it a lot). To take your airline example, Virgin America invested a ton in PR when they launched. Also, I think writing off successful PR (even in this particular article) as being a company with or without a human interest angle is wrong. I don't think there's anything particularly human interest-y about Posterous, or syncing cell phone data to computers. Certainly the fundamentals of the businesses are not the high order bit either, but that doesn't seem any more like any inherently good decision basis than many other things.
  - axod 16y ago
    >> "I don't think there's anything particularly human interest-y about Posterous, or syncing cell phone data to computers." The human interest bit is that "These are all 'young' people (under 30 or something)". If it was just a list of "hot new startups" it wouldn't have that same angle.
    - evansolomon 16y ago
      That doesn't make sense in the context of maxklein's comment. He said that the same people get covered over and over because they have a better human interest angle. If the human interest piece were being <30 years old, that would only work once/year when Inc does this feature.
galois 16y ago
Is getting featured on such a list a bad thing? Why do you think these people had to pander to journalists to make this list? They were just doing their own thing. There's so much thinly-veiled jealously in this thread, which, sadly, is exactly what I expected.
- axod 16y ago
  It's not jealousy, I think it's great the companies were featured. It's always cool to get your photo/product mentioned somewhere :) Interesting to note that 1/3rd of the people featured were Women. Higher than I'd imagined. I think it could be a bad thing if you make decisions in order to get on such a list, if you're spending time trying to get on such lists rather than doing what you think is best for the business. Getting featured on Techcrunch/Inc/etc won't make or break your business. My comment about pandering to journalists was a more general point. As was stated by TechCrunch, they ignored "Visual Website Optimizer" basically because they thought the name was unfashionable. I'd be very doubtful that any customers or potential customers would care. Journalists write about what people want to read about - extremes/freaks/car crashes/drama/soHotRightNow/epicFails etc. Which may well not be your business or your product. But that doesn't mean you have a bad business/product...
  - lkozma 16y ago
    Another excuse they gave was that the founder wrote them emails on Sunday. As if emails could not be read anytime later.
    - axod 16y ago
      Perhaps they get their email split into 140 character chunks and tweeted to them ;)
evansolomon 16y ago
"If he's providing real value, it's fairly simple to start paying for advertising and driving new customers to sign up etc." This is definitely not fairly simple. Getting the attention of potential users is a huge problem and a difficult, valuable one to solve. This is to say nothing of what the founder of VWO should be doing, but whatever the answer is it shouldn't be because getting customers is fairly simple. It's super hard.
paraschopra 16y ago
I think press does something that advertising can never do: providing social proof. Advertising gets you eyeballs; press gets you eyeball + proof (that a startup is worth knowing more about). But, yes I agree that pandering to a journalist's taste isn't a great idea. But that's not because I think it is against my philosophies (or such), rather it takes so much time to figure out what works for him/her. As I commented above, I still haven't found my hook. And I'm vaguely aware that the hook will vary from journalist to journalist.
- axod 16y ago
  Surely the proof is "This advertising provided a positive ROI"? :/ Or are we talking companies without business models here?...
  - chc 16y ago
    Users don't care — and in fact don't know — if your advertising has good ROI. But they will take notice if someone they trust says you're doing something amazing. This is advertising.
matthewer 16y ago
Press is just part of the bigger picture of success, but you certainly can't ignore it. And it DEFINITELY makes things easier to move forward.

by axod 16y ago

maxklein 16y ago

You're absolutely right. Such lists mean nothing to your core business, and the effect is minor in the long run. Imagine you want to create a great airline. What do newspaper articles have to do with that? If your airline is great, people will hear about you. That's how it should be. My original point was just about why it seems that it's always the same people being featured. It's because those people just have more human interest in their concepts than other people, and the fundamentals of their businesses have little to do with their being featured.

evansolomon 16y ago
You are likely correct that it's unlikely any of these companies' futures will change appreciably because of this coverage. However, PR can definitely make a real difference in a business--see Aaron Patzer's thoughts on this (no particular source, but he talks about it a lot). To take your airline example, Virgin America invested a ton in PR when they launched. Also, I think writing off successful PR (even in this particular article) as being a company with or without a human interest angle is wrong. I don't think there's anything particularly human interest-y about Posterous, or syncing cell phone data to computers. Certainly the fundamentals of the businesses are not the high order bit either, but that doesn't seem any more like any inherently good decision basis than many other things.
- axod 16y ago
  >> "I don't think there's anything particularly human interest-y about Posterous, or syncing cell phone data to computers." The human interest bit is that "These are all 'young' people (under 30 or something)". If it was just a list of "hot new startups" it wouldn't have that same angle.
  - evansolomon 16y ago
    That doesn't make sense in the context of maxklein's comment. He said that the same people get covered over and over because they have a better human interest angle. If the human interest piece were being <30 years old, that would only work once/year when Inc does this feature.

galois 16y ago

Is getting featured on such a list a bad thing? Why do you think these people had to pander to journalists to make this list? They were just doing their own thing. There's so much thinly-veiled jealously in this thread, which, sadly, is exactly what I expected.

axod 16y ago
It's not jealousy, I think it's great the companies were featured. It's always cool to get your photo/product mentioned somewhere :) Interesting to note that 1/3rd of the people featured were Women. Higher than I'd imagined. I think it could be a bad thing if you make decisions in order to get on such a list, if you're spending time trying to get on such lists rather than doing what you think is best for the business. Getting featured on Techcrunch/Inc/etc won't make or break your business. My comment about pandering to journalists was a more general point. As was stated by TechCrunch, they ignored "Visual Website Optimizer" basically because they thought the name was unfashionable. I'd be very doubtful that any customers or potential customers would care. Journalists write about what people want to read about - extremes/freaks/car crashes/drama/soHotRightNow/epicFails etc. Which may well not be your business or your product. But that doesn't mean you have a bad business/product...
- lkozma 16y ago
  Another excuse they gave was that the founder wrote them emails on Sunday. As if emails could not be read anytime later.
  - axod 16y ago
    Perhaps they get their email split into 140 character chunks and tweeted to them ;)

evansolomon 16y ago

"If he's providing real value, it's fairly simple to start paying for advertising and driving new customers to sign up etc." This is definitely not fairly simple. Getting the attention of potential users is a huge problem and a difficult, valuable one to solve. This is to say nothing of what the founder of VWO should be doing, but whatever the answer is it shouldn't be because getting customers is fairly simple. It's super hard.

paraschopra 16y ago

I think press does something that advertising can never do: providing social proof. Advertising gets you eyeballs; press gets you eyeball + proof (that a startup is worth knowing more about). But, yes I agree that pandering to a journalist's taste isn't a great idea. But that's not because I think it is against my philosophies (or such), rather it takes so much time to figure out what works for him/her. As I commented above, I still haven't found my hook. And I'm vaguely aware that the hook will vary from journalist to journalist.

axod 16y ago
Surely the proof is "This advertising provided a positive ROI"? :/ Or are we talking companies without business models here?...
- chc 16y ago
  Users don't care — and in fact don't know — if your advertising has good ROI. But they will take notice if someone they trust says you're doing something amazing. This is advertising.

matthewer 16y ago

Press is just part of the bigger picture of success, but you certainly can't ignore it. And it DEFINITELY makes things easier to move forward.