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The war to sell you a mattress
- joelrunyon 9y agoThis was fascinating.
- PhilWright 9y agoAmazing to see people stumbling upon millions. Most techies are trying to come up with clever technical solutions to try and build an online business. Whilst elsewhere there are people making millions from reviewing mattresses. Or whatever the next accidental hot market will be.
- justboxing 9y ago> Whilst elsewhere there are people making millions from reviewing mattresses True, but from what I read, this guy had SEO experience and ranked #1 for "Casper Mattress Review" for many years. In other words he was clever at marketing his site which was stuffed with affiliate links along with 1 on 1 agreements with some mattress companies. Most techies who are coming up with "clever technical solutions" either don't validate a need for their offering, or really suck (add me to this list) at marketing their solutions / online businesses.
- davidpelayo 9y agoI couldn't agree more.
- TeMPOraL 9y agoGiven how much malicious behaviour is often involved in SEO and strong marketing, I'd say a lot of techies try to come up with "clever technical solutions" in order to try and avoid unethical business practices.
- Untit1ed 9y agoTrue, but there's a survivor bias there - for every guy who stumbles into millions there's 100 writing content that gets ignored and making nothing.
- noitsnot 9y agoId say it's huge. More like a tens or hundred of thousands at one point. Everyone and there mother was blogging. Now it's just sexy insta pics holding brand name merchandise with hash tags mixed into 20 others as the advertising notice.
- kodablah 9y agoI don't find it that amazing having worked at large companies and watched middle to upper management do the same. I try not to play the envy game lest I just self loathe. Luck has always existed. Also, tales like these help keep me humble and I just assume there is a cognitive dissonance and their talents are valuable even if I can't see how.
- paulgb 9y ago> I just assume there is a cognitive dissonance and their talents are valuable even if I can't see how. I think that's the right attitude. Even if you look down upon SEO, there's no denying that the guy learned a skill that took time and effort, plus took some risks that it wouldn't work out.
- cyberferret 9y agoReview sites in any niche industry can be extremely popular. I am a guitarist, and there are a LOT of blogs and Youtube channel reviewing guitars, amps and pedals. Most are pretty boring, technical reviews which aren't all bad, but get a handful of views. Then there are the channels that thrive on drama and conflict. One particular guitar reviewer is an older chap, with questionable playing skills and knowledge, but he excels in riling up companies, which in turn leads to more publicity and views for him. He is well known for taking expensive electronic gear apart and saying things like "I can't believe they charge $2000 for this guitar effects processor when I know the motherboard and DSP chips on here only cost $200... etc.". When the company refutes these claims or tried to explain, he shuts them down with demands for payment to remove his negative reviews etc. We cannot expect much more though - a whole generation of audience has been trained to seek out such drama and negative energy and latch on to it like a remora to a shark.
- Ascetik 9y agoYeah basically he is committing extortion and blackmail, pretty sad.
- whamlastxmas 9y agoMore accurately, he's accepting bribes to silence his freedom of speech. He's entirely in his right to have negative reviews as long as they're truthful.
- graeme 9y agoThat’s blackmail. Making a legal threat and making a legal money request combine into an illegal act.
- saimiam 9y agoWhat law says I can’t give you an incentive to stop badmouthing me? According to this link, defamation - written (libelous) or verbal (derogatory) - is a civil matter and not a crime. https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/defamation-law-made-simple-29718.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/defamation-law-made-...
- inanutshellus 9y agoA friend of mine made a fair bit of money off of a website that listed "free stuff" promotions around the web. But it was manually-maintained and so quickly died. ... BUT... He really only started making ad revenue on the site once he stopped maintaining it! People would find his site, then would realize the content was old, but would click on an up-to-date ad instead. Accidental genius. :)
- noitsnot 9y agoSounds like seo took hold on its own over time. It accumulated links and ranking naturally.
- schnevets 9y agoI'd say affiliate marketing is more of a modern "lemonade stand" business, just like youtube/twitch videos, game programming, and app development. There's an extremely low barrier to entry and it gives you an ideal place to hone business skills, but odds are you won't make enough to cover the cost of hosting a website.
- ghaff 9y agoMy impression is that, if you find a niche, stick with it, and do at least nominal marketing, you'll make a few bucks. But emphasis on few. For most people, it's more akin to a nice hobby than a real business.
- justboxing 9y ago> Much of this traffic went to Amazon (when Derek lacked a direct affiliate relationship, he sent traffic to a brand’s page on Amazon, with whom he did). Something is not not right here. Was Derek banned from the Amazon affiliates program? How else does he "lack a direct affiliate relationship" ? I made a viral cat videos site for kicks and was approved by amazon affiliates to link to cat product reviews... so why wouldn't someone like this guy be able to get a direct amazon.com affiliate account?
- kulta 9y agoGreat read, thanks for sharing!
- dzink 9y agoWhat does YC think of companies that make affiliate revenue? Is it a positive or a negative in the VC world?
- ntzm 9y agoI think it's a perfectly legitimate way of making money, so long as users aren't deliberately deceived into getting a worse deal to get a better deal for the company
- hkmurakami 9y agoHas Pinterest moved off of affiliate revenue making?
- michaelbrooks 9y agoPersonally, I think it's not a terrible way in making some sort of revenue. As long as it's honest and doesn't try to manipulate their potential customers. I'm trying to make some revenue from Udemy affiliation using my Twitter account as it relates to my profile and I don't see why others shouldn't be doing it as well.
- liaukovv 9y agoI don't think it's possible to implement an affiliate program in a completely ethical way. Even if you try to make your reviews fair and honest you will still have a subconscious bias to give every product as high score as possible, because high scores generate affiliate purchases.
- deepsun 9y agoArticle sounds like infotainment to me, made to advertise mattress advertising websites. After reading that article you certainly going to remember their name. Everything in the article is probably true, however.
- gbbr 9y agoThis article is way too long.
- ak39 9y agoAgreed. I gave up when I felt I reached “risk of prolapse” time. Will finish it in another “sitting”.
- mckoss 9y agoFelt about right for the complexity of the story and the thoroughness of the research. I think we should be encouraging long form journalism, not falling back to click-bait news.
- Animats 9y agoThe whole mattress industry is a scam. Actual manufacturing cost is $75-$300. Mattresses are even cheaper on Alibaba. Vacuum-packing memory foam shrinks mattresses for shipping, and now they can be imported easily. If you really want to annoy the US mattress industry, set up a review site and review sub-$100 mattresses off Alibaba. (Personally, I have an air bed which cost about $200.)
- hendzen 9y agoThere is a brand on Amazon (Zinus) that sells reasonable quality foam mattresses with low markups. I bought their Queen [0] for $289, and have been happy with it. I'm assuming that Amazon will also eventually introduce an Amazon Basics version and suck up all the profit... [0] - https://www.amazon.com/Zinus-Memory-Green-Mattress-Queen/dp/B00Q7EPSHI https://www.amazon.com/Zinus-Memory-Green-Mattress-Queen/dp/...
- coldcode 9y agoBought one of those recently, most comfortable mattress I've ever had, and the cost was amazing. No idea why one would pay $3000 for a Temper-Pedic. Even if this mattress only lasted a few years I could buy 10 of them and still come out ahead.
- hugecynic 9y agonot joking: i bought 2, and use one as the 'box spring'. it's pretty amazing sleeping on 24" of queen memory foam for less than half the cost of a single shitty mattress 10 years ago.
- sliverstorm 9y agoI believe the point of the box spring is: 1) Providing rigidity for use on a sparse frame 2) Providing airflow so the underside of the mattress does not stay damp (from sweat etc) Don't know how much of an issue this still is, but as far as I know it's not just a spacer.
- Overtonwindow 9y agoFascinating read. Who would've thought to roll a massage and ship it? I grew up and still sleep on spring mattresses. No rolling here.
- R_haterade 9y agoNo, they can do it with inner springs now too. That tech is relatively new.
- Overtonwindow 9y agoOh wow thank you, I had no idea.
- stuaxo 9y agoI have an Ikea sprung mattress that arrived rolled.
- z3t4 9y agoIf you want to make a lot of money - place yourself between the consumers and the producers.
- b3lvedere 9y agoWhy isn't everybody doing this then?
- hutzlibu 9y agoBecause it is hard .. and in the way they are doing it, unethical.
- z3t4 9y agoI did not say it would be easy ... Only that it's easier then producing and selling the products/services/needs yourself. It will take much less work if you figure out a clever way to stand in-between.
- b3lvedere 9y agoAh. Sorta like consultancy.
- 9y ago
- gadders 9y agoThis article kind of makes Casper sound like the Uber of mattress companies.
- commenter1 9y agoThis just proves it: the worst thing a company can do is to underestimate the stupidity of its customers.
- hutzlibu 9y agoNow this made me thinking of other online review sites. Are they all like that? I couldn't give an honest review, if I get more money from B than A. So if they state otherwise, I call it fraud And I know that's what people call marketing in general and there might be some truth in it - but that's why you go to these review site to get a neutral view. So normally the customer should pay the reviewer, he is doing work for him, because when the company pays the reviewer ...
- kakarot 9y agoThere are very few review sites for any given product / service that aren't in the pocket of businesses through things like referral systems and sponsorships. It's an industry.
- danpalmer 9y agoThis is the reason why I’m traditional journalism there is a very strict divide between the content and business sides of the company. The journalists don’t know about the deals, and the business side don’t get to provide input on the content side. Unfortunately in these smaller, newer forms of content business, those concerns are just ignored.
- hutzlibu 9y agoErm, the traditional journalism buisness knows ads as well. And there are countless examples of articles being stopped investigating/published, because the main add customer objected and threatened to leave Or when it so happens, that the boss of the media concern is a golfclub buddy of the senator who is accused of something. etc. etc.
- danpalmer 9y agoIt does happen, but most of the industry has a really strong negative reaction to the journalists and business side mixing in particular ways. It's a cultural divide that was established a long time ago and is still very important now.
- 9y ago
- cyberferret 9y agoThe whole online mattress industry has a bit of a stink to it. Here in Australia, I have been stalked for months by a particular brand of online mattress, Koala(?), on my Facebook feed, which I ignored, but on the past few weeks, I see the SAME ads on FB with the SAME girl in them etc., sold as a completely new brand. I assume the original company either went bankrupt or received a C&D from somewhere and had to change their name. But this does nothing at all to increase my confidence in these online sellers. Welcome to the Cialis of 2017...
- robbiep 9y agoKoala is still about. But seems like lots of similar ones popping up as well. Apparently all made in same factory? No idea if that is true or not
- JoshuaEddy 9y agoThere is similar situation in the diamond engagement ring market, of all places! NiceIce, Beyond4Cs, Yourdiamondteacher, ProsumerDiamonds -- all affiliate marketing blogs that drive a lot of sales. No lawsuit yet to reveal the inner workings, but undoubtedly there is the same shadiness.
- rypskar 9y agoThe whole jewelry diamond market is shady and should be boycotted. It is a shame that many still fall for the marketing and think diamonds are rare
- ocfnash 9y agoPossibly a good time to plug moissanite again: http://diamondssuck.com http://diamondssuck.com
- IgorPartola 9y agoOdd. The arguments all make sense, but the prices I am seeing are nowhere near the quoted ones. Have the prices on moissanite jewelry been jacked up since this site was created or something?
- reverend_gonzo 9y agoThere's a wide range of prices. More often than not, you'll end up buying one that is custom made in an American lab, so it might not be exactly cheap, though it is cheaper than an equivalent diamond. We bought moissanite because I absolutely refuse to support the diamond industry in any way. For what its worth, friends of our who are obsessed with image can't tell the difference.
- pbhjpbhj 9y agoIs the sting in the tale (sic) that DeBeers (or its major shareholders) owns the moissanite company/production/patents and created the competition to secure both sides of the market?
- mwexler 9y agoThe business models for pricing aggregators and reviews sites are completely absent. Even Consumer Reports struggles to meet the costs of testing and staffing. The BBB is a mess. The "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval" hasn't meant anything for decades. It's a sad state of affairs: We all want unbiased reviews, but we won't pay for them. We all want to know the spread of prices so we can balance service/trust with cheap, but price aggregators are all either blocked out of existence or become affiliate listings. While so many things have come true, there are still a few internet dreams like free-flow price summaries and wisdom-of-the-honest-crowd which are sadly still just beyond our grasp.
- ghostbrainalpha 9y agoThe problem goes deep. I recently decided to get a Consumer Reports subscription after not having one for 10 years. I used it to find the absolute BEST dishwasher. But because their rating system is a little strange, and they don't exactly tell you BUY THIS, DONT BUY THAT, I ended up with a Dishwasher I hate. It was the most expensive, and best according to CR, but I cannot express how miserable this piece of junk makes me. Then I look at the FREE reviews on Amazon, where I see many people who have the exact same issues as me. Why did I pay for Consumer Reports? According to their "tests" this dishwasher might last 20 years or something amazing like that, but for what I care about it sucks, its hard to use, and it doesn't dry dishes AT ALL. I want to fund unbiased reviews, but I also need Consumer Reports or others to step up their game on providing information that is actually useful and changes my experience as a buyer.
- skewart 9y ago> they don't exactly tell you BUY THIS, DONT BUY THAT > but for what I care about it sucks, its hard to use, and it doesn't dry dishes AT ALL. I'm confused, it sounds like you wish CR had just told you which dishwasher to buy without going into more detail, but you also wish they had gone into more detail about specific strengths and weaknesses so you could make a decision based on what's most important to you. Did CR just not talk about the things you hate about your dishwasher, or did they talk about it, but only as part of a complicated, confusing review? I've generally found CR to be a million times more informative than any of the crappy, sleazy affiliate marketing sites peddling "reviews" that clog up the first few pages of Google search results. That said, I haven't really looked at them for a few years, so maybe they've gone downhill. Their business model does seem harder to sustain in the internet-era.
- greedo 9y agoMany podcasters are in the same boat, though they try to mask it. I only listen to probably 3 podcasts, but I hear the same sponsor reads on a daily basis. Casper, Fracture, Betterment, Warby-Parker, etc. The reads given by these sponsors are only guidelines, the better podcasters personalize them to make them sound like real endorsements not just ad reads.
- mrhappyunhappy 9y agoSadly some people can’t tell the difference between a sponsored read and an endorsement precisely because they make it sound like an endorsement.
- greedo 9y agoEven when you can tell the difference, it's hard to ignore the effect of someone you enjoy listening to do the read. With my favorite podcasts, I enjoy the "company" of the hosts, and have an implicit bias towards what they say. So an ad read by them is extremely effective. If it was a canned commercial like on TV, I'd be able to tune it out much more effectively.
- mrhappyunhappy 9y agoGood point!
- colmvp 9y agoI can't help but laugh when the guys at Pod Save America plug Square Cash and other companies
- rsynnott 9y agoThey advertise one of the non-Casper mattress brands, though. Internet mattress hipsters! Also, two brands of internet razor. Podcasts seem to specialize in advertising things that I definitely would want to buy in an actual shop and not the internet.
- 9y ago
- mrfusion 9y agoHow do you make the switch to foam mattresses? They just feel so strange and different compared to regular mattresses?
- Distant_horizon 9y agoI lasted a month on $600 foam. I woke up several mornings with sore hips. Finally, I called the local rescue mission to donate it. When I explained that I felt bad passing it on to someone else, they said they are picking up a couple of these mattresses each week! It seems like it's a hard adjustment for many... zing.
- milesokeefe 9y agoMind sharing what the company/bed was?
- Distant_horizon 9y agoMine was Tuft and Needle.
- makeset 9y agoFWIW, I've been very satisfied with mine for three years now. It's a much firmer foam than memory foam, and gives me just the right amount of support for side sleeping.
- milesokeefe 9y agoI suspected so, I just got a queen mattress from them two days ago, I've really enjoyed it so far.
- mrhappyunhappy 9y agoWhat was your sleeping position and what firmness of the mattress?
- 9y ago
- CoryMO 9y agoI'm shocked that no one has posted https://www.themattressunderground.com/ https://www.themattressunderground.com/ yet. It is totally worth a look. The amount of technical detail is right up HN's alley. Full disclosure: I paid nothing to the site, but used it to find a local mattress shop (and manufacturer) and purchased a mid-range queen mattress at a good price. Apparently the shop owner had received quite a few referrals from them, but he never paid them or received any payment from them.
- whitepoplar 9y agoThe mattress industry is a total scam. Nest Bedding's CEO, the one that was quoted in the article, even goes so far as to threaten people who post negative reviews on Yelp. I left a one-star review on their website, but it doesn't even appear in their product ratings. The ratings distribution on Nest's website is statistically impossible! Other companies aren't any better. Casper cheapened the materials used in their mattress, but is still riding on positive reviews for the original model which used latex (more expensive) as a top layer.
- vijayr 9y agoWhy is everything a "war" in the American media? war on obesity, war on diabetes, war on this, war on that...? It is just businesses competing to sell products - maybe a little too interested in suing, but business nevertheless.
- sjbase 9y agoIt's really unfortunate. There's a great book called Metaphors We Live By [1] that digs into this same observation, using "arguments" as an example: you "attack" another person's argument, you "defend your point." You either win or lose. We could have just as easily chosen arguments to be a dance instead of a war. A lot of narrative here in America eventually turns into good vs. evil, and War on X is an example of that. I've heard people attribute this to anything from religion, to the revolutionary origin of the country, to military-industrial conspiracy. [1]: http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo3637992.html http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo3637992...
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago>We could have just as easily chosen arguments to be a dance instead of a war.// I don't see how that works - partners dancing together are cooperating to improve the outcome. Those competing in business are (unfortunately, in capitalist systems) almost always trying to profit and destroy their competitors. It's perhaps a bit like moshing? War fits as a better metaphor for companies under capitalism. If the companies were helping each other and targeting better products with less profit, that would be more like dance partners.
- icebraining 9y agoCompanies help each other all the time; it's called "collusion," and it's usually frowned upon.
- GuB-42 9y agoYou mean, like a dance battle, oh wait... I think the idea is backwards. We don't use military metaphors for anything competitive, we use words related to competition for describing war, because war is competitive by nature. It goes back and forth from there.
- mi100hael 9y agoI've found Ikea to be a great place to buy a mattress. No shady sales tactics or aggressive salesmen, several models you can physically try out in the store, and good quality/value.
- Fezzik 9y agoSeconded. Their latex mattresses are amazing if you are looking for a firm mattress, and priced significantly cheaper than anything else on the market. I have owned two over the last 14 years and both have been amazing: assisted in easing back pain and making my sleep more restful.
- sliverstorm 9y agoIs there a lot of nuance to latex? Or are they pretty similar/competitive with other latex mattresses?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Fezzik 9y agoI can't say I did a lot of research beyond price (Ikea was cheapest) and comfort (they all felt the same to me). This seems like a pretty good article about latex mattresses though (the photo part-way down of tapped rubber trees bummed me out): https://hubpages.com/living/Warnings-Wisdom-on-Buying-a-Latex-Mattress-by-a-Mattress-Sales-Expert https://hubpages.com/living/Warnings-Wisdom-on-Buying-a-Late...
- amelius 9y agoExcept for tall people.
- woolvalley 9y agoDoesn't Ikea sell the standard mattress sizes? Do you mean a lack double & single tall mattress sizes?
- mrhappyunhappy 9y agoSad thing is even with full disclosures there are vast numbers of people who will not read the disclosure. Some sites do a bang up job of making the disclosures so unnoticeable that they never lose a referral.
- sixdimensional 9y agoThe irony here being, after I read this article, I'm now seeing ads for mattresses all over the web due to the embedded ads in the article. Marketing and advertising feels more like a virus than anything these days.
- cag_ii 9y agoSpot on, That's a great analogy!
- fierro 9y agoViral videos are a thing of past. Check out this new viral ad!
- Sohcahtoa82 9y agoYou don't use an ad blocker?
- sixdimensional 9y agoIronically, at work untrusted extensions are blocked so can't install ad blockers.
- alecco 9y agoThe only way is to blur your analytics. Move out of Google/Facebook. Install Ad Nauseam extension to not just block tracking but click on everything in the background. This will ruin the information they gather about you with noise. https://adnauseam.io/ https://adnauseam.io/
- manigandham 9y agoNot really, just use a real adblocker and move on with your life. Adtech has plenty of problems but this kind of silly abuse is easily caught and filtered out with no effort. You might even cause yourself more annoyance with fraud and spam prevention tools used with common services.
- marinman 9y agoReally interesting article but he really zoomed past the "I got a free mattress" part
- markbnj 9y agoI really knew very little about the whole affiliate marketing economy before reading this. My primary reaction after reading it is just to SMH at the fundamentally greedy acquisitive dishonesty of the whole mess. I realize it's nothing new, but still.
- chaoticmass 9y agoI got a $5000 queen sized latex mattress for $300 because I bought from the clearance section at [popular mattress store chain].
- CM30 9y agoThis reminds me a lot of the web hosting industry, which also has a huge issue with questionable review sites set up for affiliate payments and hosting companies owning supposedly neutral sites about the industry. There are at least a few active forums you can ask about good hosting companies on (which is something the mattress buying process seems to lack), but then you have to deal with astroturfing and companies 'hinting' that you should use their service in every post. Either way, I think these industries (and many others) are in this situation because the internet has just made good, high quality journalism unprofitable. Along with clickbait and actual lies, it seems affiliate commissions are where the money is in writing nowadays, meaning there's a huge incentive to write pandering crap and an equally large disincentive to care about being a truly helpful source for this information.