

Your web app needs to be ten times better than the competition - eoghan
http://www.contrast.ie/blog/ten-times-better/

======
samd
This article is pretty vacuous, read Joel's _Strategy Letter 3_ for an actual
article on barriers to entry.

<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000052.html>

------
cloudkj
Why not 5x, or 15x? How do you quantify how much "better" one app is than the
other? That, to me, is the hard part. Instead of aiming for 10x, continuously
and incrementally improving your product until it reaches the threshold will
suffice, especially since that threshold will vary widely depending on what
kind of product you have.

~~~
winterlightning
I totally agree, without an actual means of measurement of "how much better"
these multipliers seem to be useless. Also, often it is one or two key
features that distinguishes one product from another. For me, Gmail's "how
much better" was the better storage and the fact that conversations are
organized better.

------
pedalpete
Was gmail really 10x better for the average user? I still use my hotmail
address (though I use gmail provided through google apps).

I thought the success of Gmail was due mostly to the hype and the perceived
rarity of having the address at the time.

People don't seem too averse to changing emails. I suspect the growth of .mac
emails has increased about on par with the growth of Apple market share over
the last few years.

~~~
alayne
How is hotmail's current spam filtering? From my experience with other web
email, gmail's filtering is second to none.

~~~
pedalpete
I haven't noticed a difference between spam from either my hotmail or gmail
addresses, so I'd say they probably have it pretty good.

------
techiferous
Don't settle for being better than your competition. 10x better may not even
be enough to oust a strong leader. Instead, invent a new category for your
product to be the best in.

For example, you can make an operating system 10x better than Windows, but
Windows can still have the lion's share of the market. Instead, make a new
category of operating systems: operating systems for a new type of computer
(iPad) or turn the browser into an operating system (Google Chrome).

In other words, if your competition is playing a winning game, _don't play
their game_. They've already proven they are winners at it. Invent your own
game.

------
wushupork
I don't agree with this statement at all. Look at how many photosharing sites
there are. Are you saying on Flickr or Photobucket can have viable businesses
and the rest should just keep over and die. There are tons of nice little
"Italian restaurants" of photosharing on the net that can have perfectly
viable businesses. Look at SmugMug.

Another example is video sharing sites. By your statement, if you are not
Youtube or looking to be 10x better than YT, you should just call it quits and
forget it, but look at all the other video sites - CollegeHumor, Justin.tv,
Vimeo, etc.

------
iamclovin
Great points as we're looking to launch our first product in the next two
months.

Helps us to aspire to a higher standard.

------
bandhunt
broad generalization - cost of switching varies GREATLY depending the type of
service.

------
TotlolRon
Your blog title needs to be 11.785 times stronger than the competition. Or
maybe 12.785.

