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If increasing your growth rate is your objective, this looks like a very nice first step, Joel. You disguise a PR piece as an objective "how to" in a national
by edw519 17y ago
If increasing your growth rate is your objective, this looks like a very nice first step, Joel. You disguise a PR piece as an objective "how to" in a national business publication, coming across as an authority, the underdog, and an all around nice guy who really cares about his customers.
You're an engineer who claims to be "weak" in the sales department, but all evidence to the contrary: nice "sales hack". Any reasonable person who takes your advice would be a fool if he bought from your competitor. Not bad for a couple hours work. Kudos.
- spolsky 17y agoJeez, everything is a conspiracy on Hacker News. How about I wrote it because I'm a columnist at Inc and I have to turn in one article a month? And how about, they hired me because they like columnists who are actively running businesses to write about the issues they face? (c.f. Norm Brodsky, the other columnist, who has some kind of a box storage business). None of the plumbers and dog shampoo-vendors who read Inc. do software project management. The number of leads I get from Inc readers is laughable. Also, you're confusing sales and marketing. They're different things. We're pretty good at marketing for a company our size. We're absolutely bad at sales.
- tptacek 17y agoI don't think edw519's being sarcastic. I got the same vibe he did off that article, and I admired the article all the more for it.
- vlb 17y agoHe doesn't need to be sarcastic. It's just the same effect if he's sincere. Even if edw519 is sincerely complimenting Joel on 'disguising a PR piece as an objective "how to"', that's not going to be a welcome comment if Joel didn't feel he was writing a PR piece, let alone disguising it. A sincere compliment for doing something you wouldn't do intentionally doesn't make the recipient feel good.
- edw519 17y agoYikes, lighten up, Joel. I really meant what I said. I have no idea how many leads you get from inc, but I bet you get a few more with that piece. What I didn't say in my original post was that this was an excellent example of generating interest in your business while contributing to the community at large, and that quite a few of us here can learn from it. But now, I'm afraid to give you another compliment because you may misinterpret it. (Oops, too late.) There have been many times when my post was misunderstood because I accidently omitted the <sarcasm> tags. But this is the first time the inverse ever happened. Live and learn. </nosarcasm>
- jister 17y agoActually, I also find your first post sarcastic.
- gruseom 17y agoI don't think you're technically allowed to find it sarcastic after the speaker explains that he meant what he said. Unless, of course, he's lying. But he isn't. Anyone who reads edw519 regularly (i.e. anyone who reads HN regularly) knows that's just how he is :) p.s. edw, given your closing nosarcasm tag without an opening one, must we now assume that everything you've ever said was non-sarcastic?
- jshen 17y agoI think it's perfectly reasonable to believe that the words a person used did not clearly reflect the thoughts in their head. In fact, I'd say it's fairly common. Given that, one could be "technically allowed" to find it x even though the writer insists it's y. It surely didn't sound like a compliment to me when I read it.
- gruseom 17y agoit's perfectly reasonable to believe that the words a person used did not clearly reflect the thoughts in their head Sure, but that's by definition not sarcasm.
- oldgregg 17y agoI for one think your writing is well suited for Inc.