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I think OP is missing the point here. As he being the sales rep, the only valid answer would have been "Yes, it's on the edge.". It is a question dedicated to

I think OP is missing the point here. As he being the sales rep, the only valid answer would have been "Yes, it's on the edge.". It is a question dedicated to find out if you yourself think the product is good enough or how well you think it positions itself with the competition. Maybe it's just me being stupid here, but I find it funny how the whole discussion here has turned into a technical debate, which the original customer's point IMHO clearly wasn't. There is no edge. You define the edge by what you believe in.

erikb 8y ago
Replace "edge" with any other hot term and that's your IT market. Even without demand and even without innovation a lot of stuff is changed all the time. Current systems are centralized? Well let's decentralized everything. Current systems are decentralized? Centralize. Every. Thing. Watching it as engineer can be especially painful, because you already know that the other thing is not that much better. And more often this b.s. starts with the optimal trade-offs and turns into exactly what was carefully avoided with good architecture and decision making. Sometimes I really think some of the managers are sitting there thinking "Yes, I know that you are smarter than me. But that is your disadvantage. Just to get some leverage I will now push for the stuff you told me to avoid again and again over the last 3 years, and you can't beat me in that approach because everything in you is fighting against this."
ownagefool 8y ago
I think the author was missing the point, but not in the way where he should lie. Edge in the context asked, with the explanation given, likely was refering to "bleeding edge", "cutting edge", or "leading edge". As in the customer wants to buy modern technology that makes their company look hip, their developers happy, and gives them an advantage against the competition. Some rant about CDNs, or where the edge of the network is, seems inappopriate here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_edge_technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_edge_technology
wolframhempel 8y ago
Author here: When talking to an investor you are only a "sales rep" to some degree. You are the owner of a company looking to raise funding by selling a certain percentage of shares, so much is true - but the mindset is more one of finding the right partner. Given a promising enough vision and execution there's no shortage of interested VCs and the challenge is in picking the right one for the long term. All VCs offer money, but many offer value beyond that. As the VC(s) you'll choose will hold a significant stake including board seats and voting rights you'll want someone with a deep enough understanding of your industry, technology, market, sales or operational model. Even if we were talking about selling to a customer here I would argue that one's better off providing long-term value (and forfeiting a deal if one can't) than just catering for any buzzword-driven expectation and watch the whole edifice crumble a few months down the line
- taikahessu 8y ago
  I totally agree with your points here. But just as few others have pointed out, it looks more like a "shiny object syndrome" or it could also be a bit of that the customer is not an expert of the software field and feels like he/she's gotta bring something to the table to sound credible. Your blog post sent me far into memory lane. I still remember a case where I was a starting entrepreneur and I was selling a website remake. The customer asked me if our CMS's database was relational. He clearly did not even have a clue what that actually meant, but neither did I :) I knew it was "most probably totally irrelevant" to the whole case (just as you seemed to ponder), but my uncertainty showed. I was maybe under my 20s then, though I was very confident I could deliver. But I was no salesman, more of an enthusiast geek with a vision. What he was basically asking me was "why should I pick your product instead of all the others? Is this person credible?". It caught me so off-guard, that I kind of froze back then and wasn't able to bring the conversation to a level where our product would be compared to the competitors. Focus on the good things etc. Maybe he did it just check, if I was actually aware of any competition! I didn't get that contract. I still remember it as a lesson learned in many levels and your blog post somehow reminded me of that moment. Can't really say if they are comparable, but there you have it :) ps. My first thought today could be more like "what is this person scared of the most in this situation, where does this kind of question stem from?". A great sales rep might ask that question directly back. Cheers!

erikb 8y ago

Replace "edge" with any other hot term and that's your IT market. Even without demand and even without innovation a lot of stuff is changed all the time. Current systems are centralized? Well let's decentralized everything. Current systems are decentralized? Centralize. Every. Thing. Watching it as engineer can be especially painful, because you already know that the other thing is not that much better. And more often this b.s. starts with the optimal trade-offs and turns into exactly what was carefully avoided with good architecture and decision making. Sometimes I really think some of the managers are sitting there thinking "Yes, I know that you are smarter than me. But that is your disadvantage. Just to get some leverage I will now push for the stuff you told me to avoid again and again over the last 3 years, and you can't beat me in that approach because everything in you is fighting against this."

ownagefool 8y ago

I think the author was missing the point, but not in the way where he should lie. Edge in the context asked, with the explanation given, likely was refering to "bleeding edge", "cutting edge", or "leading edge". As in the customer wants to buy modern technology that makes their company look hip, their developers happy, and gives them an advantage against the competition. Some rant about CDNs, or where the edge of the network is, seems inappopriate here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_edge_technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_edge_technology

wolframhempel 8y ago

Author here: When talking to an investor you are only a "sales rep" to some degree. You are the owner of a company looking to raise funding by selling a certain percentage of shares, so much is true - but the mindset is more one of finding the right partner. Given a promising enough vision and execution there's no shortage of interested VCs and the challenge is in picking the right one for the long term. All VCs offer money, but many offer value beyond that. As the VC(s) you'll choose will hold a significant stake including board seats and voting rights you'll want someone with a deep enough understanding of your industry, technology, market, sales or operational model. Even if we were talking about selling to a customer here I would argue that one's better off providing long-term value (and forfeiting a deal if one can't) than just catering for any buzzword-driven expectation and watch the whole edifice crumble a few months down the line

taikahessu 8y ago
I totally agree with your points here. But just as few others have pointed out, it looks more like a "shiny object syndrome" or it could also be a bit of that the customer is not an expert of the software field and feels like he/she's gotta bring something to the table to sound credible. Your blog post sent me far into memory lane. I still remember a case where I was a starting entrepreneur and I was selling a website remake. The customer asked me if our CMS's database was relational. He clearly did not even have a clue what that actually meant, but neither did I :) I knew it was "most probably totally irrelevant" to the whole case (just as you seemed to ponder), but my uncertainty showed. I was maybe under my 20s then, though I was very confident I could deliver. But I was no salesman, more of an enthusiast geek with a vision. What he was basically asking me was "why should I pick your product instead of all the others? Is this person credible?". It caught me so off-guard, that I kind of froze back then and wasn't able to bring the conversation to a level where our product would be compared to the competitors. Focus on the good things etc. Maybe he did it just check, if I was actually aware of any competition! I didn't get that contract. I still remember it as a lesson learned in many levels and your blog post somehow reminded me of that moment. Can't really say if they are comparable, but there you have it :) ps. My first thought today could be more like "what is this person scared of the most in this situation, where does this kind of question stem from?". A great sales rep might ask that question directly back. Cheers!