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In theory, picking a marketing person is easy, since the person who's best at marketing is the one who convinces you. But as a marketing guy, I have to point o
by byrneseyeview 17y ago
In theory, picking a marketing person is easy, since the person who's best at marketing is the one who convinces you.
But as a marketing guy, I have to point out that the big mistake many people make in marketing their products is to go too big, too early -- if you have something great, being one genuine person instead of a bigger, less genuine company is going to get you a higher return on investment.
A few ideas, though:
* Pick someone who cares about your startup and offers suggestions;
* Make sure this person can relate to your users (but not too well to sell to them -- you want an honest lawyer, not an impartial juror);
* Figure out where you could be getting customers, but aren't (if bouldr.net is the product, you'll want endorsements from bloggers who love climbing -- few people will know to search Google for what your app does);
* Start small, start freelance. Since marketing and hiring are both so error-prone, your top priority should be to make your mistakes cheaply.
- MrMatt 17y agoAwesome - thanks for this! I'll definitly be looking to go through the freelance route rather than hiring someone full time straight away.
- Alex3917 17y ago"In theory, picking a marketing person is easy, since the person who's best at marketing is the one who convinces you." I dunno, I couldn't sell my way out of a paper bag and I still hosted that conference, which is well on it's way to being a valuable asset. Most of the people who showed up thought it would suck, but then they came anyway and liked it and now they'd come again. This was my strategy though and it worked, but clearly I'd never get hired for anything given your theory, which makes me suspect it may be more complicated than that.
- byrneseyeview 17y agoSwagapalooza is one of those edge cases. You're more a catalyst than a sales guy, since the whole thing had to come together -- it couldn't be built. And you clearly can sell. Selling your way into Godin's program is not trivial.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- imp 17y agoI think he was referring to this: http://xkcd.com/125/ http://xkcd.com/125/
- MrMatt 17y agoCongratulations - you win! I was thinking about this cartoon as I wrote the question.