TechCrunch is a terrible place for consumer startups to try to find customers. It's a great place to gain credibility with the tech/entrepreneur/investor community and it also typically results in other publications writing about you. YC companies launching publicly 2 weeks before Demo Day (probably) need both of those things more than they need a few hundred more users. Just about anybody reading TechCrunch who is of great importance to the next two weeks of this company's lifecycle knows what Hipmunk is. Those same people also know that an article in TechCrunch doesn't get most companies very many users.
> It's a great place to gain credibility with the
tech/entrepreneur/investor community and it also typically results in
other publications writing about you. YC companies launching publicly 2
weeks before Demo Day (probably) need both of those things more than
they need a few hundred more users.
True. Very true. Two weeks before Demo Day must be an insane time.
I see the only difference between you and I is, you are thinking shorter
term with _OR_ logic, while I am thinking longer term with _AND_ logic.
To be more clear, I want to craft the message to gain credibility with
the tech/entrepreneur/investor community, gain additional press, _AND_
acquire new customers. It can be done. You might be living with your
initial one-liner a lot longer than you ever expected; choose carefully.
On the other hand, you've lived through this particular insanity, so you
understand the pressure cooker the current batch of founders are in at
the moment. Expecting the founders, under pressure, to come up with a
one-liner that their mother could love might be unrealistic, but it is
advantageous.
> TechCrunch is a terrible place for consumer startups to try to find
customers.
Our opinions differ a bit on this, and considering who you are, it's
probably not the most wise decision on my part. ;)
It's the early adopters -- the enthusiasts -- found on the likes of
techcrunch, HN and similar that start the snowball, even on consumer
orientated startups. When you craft a message specifically for the tech
savvy early adopters, they understand it, but they can't use your
message to sell it to others.
It comes down to the, "All things bought are sold," idea, where when you
buy something, you sell others on it in some way. You might convince
them it's useful, cool, exclusive, smart, worthwhile, or whatever, but
you really do sell your purchase to others. A well crafted message makes
it easy for your customers to sell for you, particularly your early
adopters. Oddly enough, it works on investors and journalists as well
since they both have the need to sell their investment/article and
hence, sell for you. The need to sell a purchase is the reason why
one-liners exist.
In general terms, we agree, but my expectations are very high, and
admittedly, they may be unrealistic under the circumstances (launching
two weeks before fundpocalypse). None the less, keeping this stuff in
mind might be helpful to founders in the long run. I hope it is.
