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Not speaking negatively of Trennd or Josh - this illustrates the point that marketing skills are critical to success in these kinds of ventures, much moreso tha
by blunte 7y ago
Not speaking negatively of Trennd or Josh - this illustrates the point that marketing skills are critical to success in these kinds of ventures, much moreso than development skills.
Tenacity and willingness to expose oneself (at obvious risk of being told negative things) is requisite to achieving success like this so quickly (and probably also when done slowly).
- j_kao 7y agoThis 100%. Think of all the "bad" or "clunky" products out there (not to say that this is a bad product, it's a great idea) that we use every day at work - this is why there's the saying "Sales cures all."
- citilife 7y agoI think a large part of it has to do with design... I have a similar product offering: https://hnprofile.com/compare?search=AWS,GCP%20|%20Google%20Cloud,Azure https://hnprofile.com/compare?search=AWS,GCP%20|%20Google%20... We offer to businesses, have a few pilots, but the slickness of Trennd is probably something we'll copy. It was clearly easy to see how the UI helped here - congratz on the sale too (if you're reading this).
- micael_dias 7y agoIt would be nice to let me leave the website using the back button (chrome android)
- wolco 7y agoThanks for providing a link. Just comparing the two.. the backend might be the same but the slowness and non-obvious graphs makes you feel awful but the card based layout was fresh. Both could be more engaging.
- workthrowaway 7y agocurious, have you tried product hunt or similar? it is looking to me that playing the online popularity game has become a key factor for succeeding. if something is popular on product hunt, it is more likely to succeed.
- citilife 7y agoWe haven't done that directly, we did push out our chat bot: https://www.producthunt.com/posts/insideropinion https://www.producthunt.com/posts/insideropinion
- cfitz 7y agoTo your defense, you're sharing a truth that is often difficult for many technical founders to hear/read. Many either over-estimate their non-technical skills or don't care to think about them at all, as "the better product always wins" myth remains present to this day. I am not personally exempt from this thinking, especially at the start of my entrepreneurial journey, where I wasted many months bringing products to market, to no avail. I am also certainly not the first person to make this observation. If you aren't willing to hop on a demo of your product via video chat with a potential customer, per their request, you're directly lessening the chances of that product's success. With that said, once you realize that without marketing or sales, nobody will see your beautiful creation(s), you quickly realize the need for such. Personally, this lead to a desire to learn, practice, and master these skills. However, you can easily find others with a seemingly natural affinity for these skills and delegate these efforts to these individuals (whether partners or employees), enticing them with stock and/or salary should you have sufficient revenue and/or funding. EDIT: I want to make it clear that I am not suggesting solo ventures succeed less often than those with more than one founder. There is research (see that from NYU and Wharton) pointing to exactly the opposite.
- alexyz12 7y agoDo you know any good ways to improve your non-technical skills as a founder? I am at the point where I've built the mvp, but growth is very slow. I use the mvp personally so I know its useful, but I really think Im not good at getting it out there to get enough feedback to iterate. Any suggestions on getting better at this side of entrepreneurship?
- keenmaster 7y agoConfidence is key. It is a magical trait that energizes you, enhances your executive presence, and supercharges sales. I have no idea what your product does. However, if you truly believe that it could provide value, then that should give you the confidence you need to sell it. There is no better way to sell than with the sincere belief that a potential customer will be better off if they buy your product. It seems like you have that part down, since you personally use your product and it solves at least one person's problems. Practice pitching your product concisely in front of the mirror. Refine your pitch until you don't bore yourself anymore, then go talk to prospective customers knowing that a majority of the time you will fall flat on your face. Use those interactions to refine your pitch, tweak or pivot your product, and find out what really resonates with people.