Are you listening? If you are then this is what I have to say to you.
I will give you my money, time, attention or love (one or all of these) — IF YOU WILL;
- Create great products
- Show me that there is value in your products
- Before selling me on anything, make an attempt to help and connect
- Make world a better place
- Give me what I want (and not necessarily need)
- Bring a smile to my face — movies, good food
- Help me show that I have spent a lot of money — with luxury items — like cars, phones, watches
- Help me belong — by creating a cult brand – like Harley
- Help me lessen my info load — with news aggregators, better spam filters, productivity apps
- Help me learn — with blogs, wikis, websites, books, Open Course Ware
- Let me connect with other people — through email, social networks
- Let me peep into the lives of my friends and their friends — like social networks (facebook)
- Help me connect with the world — like twitter
- Help me connect with my inner self — something to do with spirituality, yoga
- Remember my choices — like Amazon.com, my local salon
- Help me build my brand or get a better job — like LinkedIn, YouTube
- Help me manage my finances — like Mint.com
- Bring my documents and processes online — with SaaS solutions (like Zoho and 37Signals)
- Try to build something better than a bank? — like BankSimple
- Build something simple, easy to use, and making me connect and look cool – like Tumblr
- Help me get better deals — like AppSumo
- Help me lead a simple life — like ZenHabits
- Make me feel special — by sending me a birthday message or come up with a pleasant surprise
- Be somebody whom I love already because of my earlier experience with your product
I may be demanding but I am a 21st century consumer and my time (for sure) and money — like you – is limited and there are many things in your product category waiting for my attention.
So what are you building? Is it something special, unique, immensely valuable, and stylish? If not give some more thought; because this is not only my demand — this is the voice of the world (or at least a generation). Young people like me — exposed to variety to media, products and experiences want better things.
Wishing you success.
Difficult…! Once again you made it difficult…..is it like I start upper’s(like u termed) need to think just on the dot com lines….. i have so many thoughts pouring!
Dot-com or not – the premise to build a startup and make it a success is same. Solve a problem, solve it in a better way that the existing solutions, share it with audience, let them see value in it, ask for the sale and correct on the fly. How you sell/promote should be in sync with your temperament and resources.
What one terms as success varies – for one it can be making money providing a me-too service/product. For another person, it is important to be sure of the quality of the offering and impact it creates.
1st one can easily earn a living but if you want to create something significant then it is important to think about the impact your product or service will make.
On what line are you thinking?