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> The report I got about the demo was that the real estate people loved it, it was just what they wanted. > “But,” they said, “how do we collect the referral f
by seanwilson 7y ago
> The report I got about the demo was that the real estate people loved it, it was just what they wanted.
> “But,” they said, “how do we collect the referral fees?”
This is why you need to understand what problem a client wants solved and not just build what their suggested solution is. Even if you build their suggested solution perfectly, they're not going to be happy at the end if their original problem isn't solved. Their suggested solution should only be used as a starting point to understanding their requirements.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoThat's a confusion about who the client is. This was a web page, to be used by a public consumer. The real estate people were, in my view, obstructionist old-guard trying to preserve their paper empire. Not the client. They torpedoed an early example of the web removing the middleman and streamlining an industry. Prudential's agents weren't ready for the revolution.
- seanwilson 7y agoIsn't that a lesson then that you should make sure you're talking to and getting buy-in from decision makers higher up the chain instead of people whose decisions are more likely to be overturned?
- jimmydddd 7y agoHypothetically yes. But in some cases, you are hired by a department in a large division of a huge corp., with many layers of management above the department that hired you. And the end product is for a department in a totally different division of the corp. In such a case, you don't have access to the actual end customer.
- seanwilson 7y agoWhy wouldn't you be able to get access to the end customer to validate what you're building?
- oblio 7y agoBecause he's not the one paying you.
- wool_gather 7y agoThe right move at the point where it got presented to and rejected by the other division was probably to say "Well, I built what we agreed on. I'm happy to revise the product based on this external feedback, but that's not included in the original fee". But the article did say that this was at a point in his career where he might not have been experienced enough to make that call.
- seem_2211 7y agoI think the wider point here is made where the author mentions that the large company was really a collection of medium sized businesses.
- mattmanser 7y agoActually, you're very wrong, as I've worked in that trade. That industry relies very heavily on referral fees to this day. Part of that is matching consumer with broker, and part is brand. Today it's places like comparethemarket, back then it was Prudential. So nothing's changed, the web hasn't made any efficiency gains. The better solution than what they came up with is to have put in a unique forwarding phone number per affiliate, and charge the affiliates a referral fee per call (or perhaps per unique telephone number). Whether that tech existed in the late 90s I don't know, but it's been available for over a decade now, and was probably available back then in a more analog form. What's nice is that now you get a webhook telling you about each call, so all the billing is automated. As for when you put your email address into a form on some comparison site? Mortgage brokers bid on those leads. It used to be in the region of £20-50 per lead, pre-2008, and I know someone charging a comparable rate now, plus a cut of commission for subsequent remortgages.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoHa! That just shows that web companies have figured out how to put themselves back in as middlemen. So sad.
- NewsAware 7y agoI would rather interpret it such that the original department ordering the web page did not understand the business model of their overall company (with the GP having no chance to learn the real business mechanics from them) and that the real estate people actually saved the project in the end. Wouldn't want to work there myself though ofc.
- SamuelAdams 7y agoAgreed. I can't remember the exact issue, but I found a great answer on Ubuntu Exchange one day about some firewall rules. The OP wanted to do something really arcane that may introduce some security vulnerabilities. The "accepted answer" was someone asking "why"? He asked it five times. His best advice was to always ask "why" at least five times - that almost inevitably gets you to the real meat of the problem.
- std_throwaway 7y agoIt's clients all the way down. Primarily you satisfy the one who gives you money today. Everything else is primarily their problem.