

Ask HN: Getting Eyeballs - kyro

Seems like Arrington's post has sparked some conversation about the community and founders' desperation for exposure. What's the problem? Are people not clever enough to come up with unique marketing plans? Or do most of them fail?<p>Coming from someone who hasn't been involved in a startup (yet!), I've never really understood this inability among founders to develop clever marketing campaigns. Everyone seems to think they need to score a blog post. And even if that's what it takes, there's huge frustration and difficulty with doing so.<p>During Startup School '08, Arrington said the best way to get on TC was to create a story. That seems pretty straightforward to me. So create one. That doesn't mean email him asking him to demo your product. It means to stir up some drama. Leak a screenshot, 'accidentally' post something on twitter, etc. I'm pretty sure that's the type of story he's talking about. In being creative with creating features, you also need to be master storytellers.<p>Instead of blog posts, there are myriad of things you could do for promotion and eyeballs. Make a bogus/cute little app that might not relate to your site like that 'Is Hillary Swank Hot?' app that was here a week ago. Make it a gag site and promote there. Here's an idea: Make weekly videos of a puppet version of your logo gruesomely killing the logos of your competitors or just popular sites in general. Be a sensationalist.<p>It really shouldn't be all that hard, guys, honestly. People these days will watch anything, and there are celebrities and fads in every corner of the internet waiting to find an audience. Making them stick to your service is another problem, but getting exposure shouldn't be difficult.
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amichail
_Coming from someone who hasn't been involved in a startup (yet!), I've never
really understood this inability among founders to develop clever marketing
campaigns._

Why don't you try it and see whether it's that easy?

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volida
he's got the positive mindset, and that's more important.

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vaksel
there is a difference between being positive and ignorance.

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volida
I link being positive with persistence.

Ignorance is a deliberate state and has nothing to do with it.

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jwesley
Please don't use the term "eyeballs". It makes you sound like an aging
marketing exec.

The thinking behind "getting eyeballs" is the same as "Techcrunch is our
marketing plan". It's not about how many people see your product, its about
the right people seeing your product at the right time.

Pulling stunts might get you coverage in the tech blogs, but unless those
people are your ideal users, it won't be much help.

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apgwoz
> its about the right people seeing your product at the right time.

 _Or_ people remembering your product enough to think, "Hey, I think I
remember the guys who did that Is Swank Hot? had something like that," when
someone asks #lazyweb on twitter/identi.ca. You can't forget that
"crowdsourcing" is in.

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jamesbritt
"Make a bogus/cute little app that might not relate to your site like that 'Is
Hillary Swank Hot?' app that was here a week ago."

Except that gave me a poor impression of the people behind it, since the
notion of it being an "app" struck me as disingenuous.

It's easy to get attention, less easy to get _good_ attention (begin debate
over "there's only one thing worse than being talked about ...")

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mixmax
I actually quite like your puppet idea.

