6 ms·

Ask PG: How to do marketing

5 points by adamzerner 13y ago

What is your take on marketing? I know you say that it's crucial to spend as much time on the product as possible. How much time should someone launching a website spend on marketing? Are there any tactics you recommend, or should you just depend on it spreading virally?

ig1 13y ago
Depending on viral growth is a death sentence. There's a tiny tiny fraction of startups who have a viral coefficient > 1 which means that they can rely on it. And of those who could, most of them use it alongside other forms of marketing.
lifeisstillgood 13y ago
Hope you dont mind me butting in, but this does not feel like a question that will get many answers - which is a shame. Sadly you get mine. Don't think of marketing as something you do to a product after it is finished. You are after the perfect product/market fit. Which means changing your product to be "something people want". But it also means it must have your stamp, your personality or ethos shining through. Otherwise all you are doing is pivoting soullessly till someone pays. So if there is any advice here it's - build something people want and make sure it is easily discoverable by thos people. So you seem to be building a "website about college and colleges". So lets guess its about the "hidden" parts of each college - best burger bars in walking distance, why the electrical engineering department is off campus those things. It sounds like its a publishing issue not a technical issue - are you providing cool Medium-style blogging (not on Facebook) for Freshers on campuses nationwide, then getting the best to bubble up? If so almost all your marketing is defined in that paragraph But I am wondering off course - please this sounds a bit more like reaching out for "help bit lost business plan - wise". For which is a common complaint and carries no shame. So tell us more - if we pass back maybe a comment or two will inspire something
- adamzerner 13y ago
  Here's a link to my website. It should clear things up http://fast-reaches-9399.herokuapp.com/ http://fast-reaches-9399.herokuapp.com/. I've still got some work to do before I launch. I'm completely on board with "make things people want" rather than "make people want things". What I'm really getting at is the question of once you make something people want, how to promote it and spread the word. For my website, the two questions are 1) How do I get people to answer questions? 2) Once there are a bunch of answers, how do I spread the word? And please fell very free to but in! Any help I can get is much appreciated! I made it an Ask PG question because I read a lot of his essays and I don't remember him really addressing the issue of how to promote products other than by saying to start off by making something people want. note: I do have a bunch of ideas on how to answer these questions. Just looking for other ones. My biggest idea is to get "interns/representatives" at each school. The intern would be responsible for spreading the word at his college and getting people to answer questions, and then later on for spreading the word to high school students. I can't offer any money or equity, but I think it's a great opportunity for students to apply their skills to a real world company. That's hard to find. Most internships don't provide that sort of autonomy and freedom. So for this reason, I think there's sufficient demand to fill that internship position. Regarding effectiveness, a motivated college student shouldn't have too much trouble getting his friends and fellow students to answer questions.
  - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
    Well there's a lot to cover here, but it turns out pg did answer the question - http://paulgraham.com/ds.html http://paulgraham.com/ds.html In the end these are the answers you have - but I would strongly urge you to consider putting your time into another industry.
    - adamzerner 13y ago
      Why do you say I should consider putting my time into another industry?
      - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
        Sorry - I meant that to be part of a longer post. Basically colleges have a defined rapid turnover - so you could spend time developing relationships only to have them vanish instantly. Add to this there is not a lot of money amount students, and post-Facebook there is a lot of interest in bootstrapping through colleges. I would look to find a small niche in a B2B world - but then I am a middle aged man - and probably one of the most important things you can learn here is make your own mistakes. You seem like you will fight to build a business - so fight in something you believe in yourself. No-one has a crystal ball - just statistics
        adamzerner 13y ago
        I'm not sure if you're understanding what my websites business model is. College applicants want information about schools to help them choose where to go. Student reviews is one of the best ways to provide this information. Right now student reviews leave out a lot of information because the questions being asked of them are too general. I think that my questions will prompt students to talk about things and provide information that you can't find elsewhere. That, coupled with the fact that I think my site is more well designed and more comprehensive than the competition, is why I think it'll be successful. Regarding how much money is in this market, I see companies like Princeton Review, Unigo, College Prowler etc. seem to be rather large companies, so there must be some money in this business. Enough money where I'd be rich if I displaced the big players (or at least became a big player).
adamzerner 13y ago
I just read up some more and it seems that 'inbound marketing' is big, and writing good essays/blog posts to attract traffic is a great strategy.
- adamzerner 13y ago
  Seth Godin's stuff is great! http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/ http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/
adamzerner 13y ago
http://paulgraham.com/ds.html http://paulgraham.com/ds.html is actually sort of what I was looking for.
Sealy 13y ago
One of Paul's posts says he used these guys: http://www.schwartzmsl.com/client_coverage.php http://www.schwartzmsl.com/client_coverage.php I can't remember where it is, one second let me search... tadaa here we go: http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html I find this quote incredible: "we were paying a PR firm $16,000 a month. And they were worth it"
- Sealy 13y ago
  tl;dr there is also this quote: In 1997 I got a call from another startup founder considering hiring them to promote his company. I told him they were PR gods, worth every penny of their outrageous fees. But I remember thinking his company's name was odd. Why call an auction site "eBay"?
- adamzerner 13y ago
  Thank you very much for that! That really addresses my question, and it's useful because I haven't really thought about getting a PR firm.

5 points by adamzerner 13y ago

ig1 13y ago

Depending on viral growth is a death sentence. There's a tiny tiny fraction of startups who have a viral coefficient > 1 which means that they can rely on it. And of those who could, most of them use it alongside other forms of marketing.

lifeisstillgood 13y ago

Hope you dont mind me butting in, but this does not feel like a question that will get many answers - which is a shame. Sadly you get mine. Don't think of marketing as something you do to a product after it is finished. You are after the perfect product/market fit. Which means changing your product to be "something people want". But it also means it must have your stamp, your personality or ethos shining through. Otherwise all you are doing is pivoting soullessly till someone pays. So if there is any advice here it's - build something people want and make sure it is easily discoverable by thos people. So you seem to be building a "website about college and colleges". So lets guess its about the "hidden" parts of each college - best burger bars in walking distance, why the electrical engineering department is off campus those things. It sounds like its a publishing issue not a technical issue - are you providing cool Medium-style blogging (not on Facebook) for Freshers on campuses nationwide, then getting the best to bubble up? If so almost all your marketing is defined in that paragraph But I am wondering off course - please this sounds a bit more like reaching out for "help bit lost business plan - wise". For which is a common complaint and carries no shame. So tell us more - if we pass back maybe a comment or two will inspire something

adamzerner 13y ago
Here's a link to my website. It should clear things up http://fast-reaches-9399.herokuapp.com/ http://fast-reaches-9399.herokuapp.com/. I've still got some work to do before I launch. I'm completely on board with "make things people want" rather than "make people want things". What I'm really getting at is the question of once you make something people want, how to promote it and spread the word. For my website, the two questions are 1) How do I get people to answer questions? 2) Once there are a bunch of answers, how do I spread the word? And please fell very free to but in! Any help I can get is much appreciated! I made it an Ask PG question because I read a lot of his essays and I don't remember him really addressing the issue of how to promote products other than by saying to start off by making something people want. note: I do have a bunch of ideas on how to answer these questions. Just looking for other ones. My biggest idea is to get "interns/representatives" at each school. The intern would be responsible for spreading the word at his college and getting people to answer questions, and then later on for spreading the word to high school students. I can't offer any money or equity, but I think it's a great opportunity for students to apply their skills to a real world company. That's hard to find. Most internships don't provide that sort of autonomy and freedom. So for this reason, I think there's sufficient demand to fill that internship position. Regarding effectiveness, a motivated college student shouldn't have too much trouble getting his friends and fellow students to answer questions.
- lifeisstillgood 13y ago
  Well there's a lot to cover here, but it turns out pg did answer the question - http://paulgraham.com/ds.html http://paulgraham.com/ds.html In the end these are the answers you have - but I would strongly urge you to consider putting your time into another industry.
  - adamzerner 13y ago
    Why do you say I should consider putting my time into another industry?
    - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
      Sorry - I meant that to be part of a longer post. Basically colleges have a defined rapid turnover - so you could spend time developing relationships only to have them vanish instantly. Add to this there is not a lot of money amount students, and post-Facebook there is a lot of interest in bootstrapping through colleges. I would look to find a small niche in a B2B world - but then I am a middle aged man - and probably one of the most important things you can learn here is make your own mistakes. You seem like you will fight to build a business - so fight in something you believe in yourself. No-one has a crystal ball - just statistics
      - adamzerner 13y ago
        I'm not sure if you're understanding what my websites business model is. College applicants want information about schools to help them choose where to go. Student reviews is one of the best ways to provide this information. Right now student reviews leave out a lot of information because the questions being asked of them are too general. I think that my questions will prompt students to talk about things and provide information that you can't find elsewhere. That, coupled with the fact that I think my site is more well designed and more comprehensive than the competition, is why I think it'll be successful. Regarding how much money is in this market, I see companies like Princeton Review, Unigo, College Prowler etc. seem to be rather large companies, so there must be some money in this business. Enough money where I'd be rich if I displaced the big players (or at least became a big player).

adamzerner 13y ago

I just read up some more and it seems that 'inbound marketing' is big, and writing good essays/blog posts to attract traffic is a great strategy.

adamzerner 13y ago
Seth Godin's stuff is great! http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/ http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/

adamzerner 13y ago

http://paulgraham.com/ds.html http://paulgraham.com/ds.html is actually sort of what I was looking for.

Sealy 13y ago

One of Paul's posts says he used these guys: http://www.schwartzmsl.com/client_coverage.php http://www.schwartzmsl.com/client_coverage.php I can't remember where it is, one second let me search... tadaa here we go: http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html I find this quote incredible: "we were paying a PR firm $16,000 a month. And they were worth it"

Sealy 13y ago
tl;dr there is also this quote: In 1997 I got a call from another startup founder considering hiring them to promote his company. I told him they were PR gods, worth every penny of their outrageous fees. But I remember thinking his company's name was odd. Why call an auction site "eBay"?
adamzerner 13y ago
Thank you very much for that! That really addresses my question, and it's useful because I haven't really thought about getting a PR firm.