

No one wants to buy my sneakers - mijustin
http://justinjackson.ca/sneakers/

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paulgb
Sorry to use this channel for something off-topic, but I can't find an email
address on your site.

Your bold fonts would look a lot sharper if you included the bold version of
the webfont. It's a one-line change, from:

    
    
      <link rel='stylesheet' id='font-bitter-css'  href='http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Bitter&#038;ver=1' type='text/css' media='screen' />
    

to

    
    
      <link rel='stylesheet' id='font-bitter-css'  href='http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Bitter:400,700&#038;ver=1' type='text/css' media='screen' />

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ardit33
Maybe your problem is finding other people that would like that type of
sneakers.

If the product was good, and priced well, perhaps it was a marketing problem.
You were marketing it to high-school kids, while this type of shoe seems to be
fit for the SF Mission/hipster kids.

~~~
mijustin
Yes, this is sometimes the case. I've done some thinking on this in this older
post: [http://justinjackson.ca/this-tree-guy-has-good-business-
advi...](http://justinjackson.ca/this-tree-guy-has-good-business-advice/)

Sometimes, moving to a new market can help. However, there's still the
possibility that there is no profitable market for your product.

This is why I want to get to the customer as quickly as possible (with the
idea, or a prototype) so that I can get feedback. If one market doesn't
respond, I can bring the prototype to another market.

The danger is building the product solely on your own passion, without doing
that research first.

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mijustin
One real life example that could counter my argument here is 37signals.
They've often said they build products for themselves. Do you think they're
just lucky?

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taligent
This is the WORST advice for startups who statistically are more likely to
fail before even getting to market. It's even terrible advice for large
companies as well.

Build what you want to build. Build something that you are proud of and that
motivates you to get out of bed and keep working on. Build something that
excites you and that you can see a roadmap for.

At least then you won't spend your life with regrets.

~~~
mijustin
Don't you think that building something _solely because it excites you_ is
what causes startups to fail?

I'm not sure customers really care about our motivation. That's the ultimate
test: do enough customers buy the product to make it profitable?

I was trying to think of a few product flops that might relate to this:
Consumer example: New Coke Small app example: Backpack (by 37signals) Venture
funded example: Color Big app example: Google Wave

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JoeAltmaier
Sometimes, asking the customer what they want is futile. Especially with an
existing product, asking for futures. E.g. ask a farmer in 1901 what he
wanted- he'd say "a horse that can pull harder and eats less hay". Never, ever
would you have heard 'a tractor'.

Build that tractor. Or rocket ship, or twitter/blog/flash mob mashup. Then
lead people to it. Then, get feedback from early adopters, hone your pitch,
figure out how to draw them in.

~~~
mijustin
Yes, asking customers what they want isn't usually that helpful.

However, listening to customers is very helpful. It's not easy, but by
listening to customers we can identify trends that help us answer: "What
should I build?".

Then, instead of building the whole tractor (or rocket ship) we can show them
a model (or prototype) and gauge their reaction.

In my case, with the sneakers, I could have purchased my own pair online
($90), and shown customers and friends to see if there was any local demand.
That would have saved me a lot of money! (I ended up having to sell most of
the shoes at a loss)

