
Don’t compete on features - revorad
http://andrewchenblog.com/2011/07/11/dont-compete-on-features/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AndrewChensBlog+%28Andrew+Chen+%28%40andrewchen%29%29
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eps
BMW is not a good example. It might be an illutrative marketing and
positioning example, but as an owner of one these ultimate driving machines I
can certainly say - never again. They set the plank very high and failed to
deliver. From firmware that was antiquated on a delivery to spending few days
in service every few weeks - that's just not one typically expects from a
brand new 100K car.

In other words - if you are not competing on features, make sure you deliver
on those ambiguous marketing messages you use instead. Because the less
precise you are the more your customers will assume and the greater their
disappointent will be.

~~~
lsc
Did you really expect a $100K plus car to be as reliable as a honda? I mean,
my expectation of any highly complex low-volume product is that I'm going to
hit a lot more bugs than with a similar high volume product, no matter how
much care was put in by the manufacturer.

But actually, I think BMW is an illustrative example. They spend dramatically
more on advertising per-unit sold than Honda does, they have a dramatically
worse reputation for reliability than Honda, and yet I believe they maintain a
higher profit margin on a much lower volume vs. Honda.

Honda, here, has the "feature" of reliability; this is a big thing for nearly
everyone, and it takes a /lot/ of marketing dollars to make people choose to
pay more for a product that lacks that particular feature.

So yeah, if you can get rich people to pay extra for nothing more than good
marketing, hey, more power to you. But, without continual and consistent
marketing outlays, someone else will come along with a better, cheaper
product, and unless you can outspend them, Honda will eat your lunch.

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breckinloggins
...unless features are what you're competing on.

Usually this is the correct advice, but there are markets out there of people
who need to take the next step up from a basic product and features are
exactly what they're looking for.

Take Basecamp for example. There was recently an article on HN from someone
who clearly outgrew the product. The consensus on HN was "this guy isn't in
Basecamp's target market", and that's absolutely true.

But that also means he IS in a market of people looking for something like
Basecamp but with more features. Something in between Basecamp and, say, MS
Project. For these markets, competing on features may work.

Just don't go overboard, or you'll end up remaking MS Project :)

~~~
andrew_null
(I am the original author of the blog post)

Disagree. What does it meant to have Basecamp with "more features"? Features
aren't in themselves good things.

Instead, you end up needing to focus the new features around a particular
theme or value proposition- be it better collaboration, or better security, or
whatever.

And then while you're adding features in that direction, oftentimes you don't
need to implement the full Basecamp featureset. You just need to be better in
a direction that's valuable and enough of the base featureset to have an OK
product. Seriously, it's not a good idea to start up a new product and expect
to build all of Basecamp AND add new features and be successful. That'd take
years to even get the first version of the product out. Avoid unless you have
millions in funding and an excellent team from the get-go that knows exactly
how to execute this strategy.

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nradov
This basically nonsense, at least for some markets. Customers for our
enterprise health information exchange products absolutely do rate us against
our competitors on features. Customers have evaluation committees go through
and rate us on long lists of features, and knock off points if the competitor
has something we don't. There are other factors in the purchasing decision but
it's just naive to think that you don't have to compete on features. (And no,
we can't sell a simpler product to individual consumers. No point in that.)

~~~
run4yourlives
I think you need to be careful not to assume that all customers are
enterprises with committees.

In fact, I'd argue that it's dangerous for a non-enterprise entity to target
enterprise customers at all; you may as well try to sell your English novel to
the Chinese.

A lot of people a lot smarter than me have written extensively on this, but
none better than Joel.

[http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/CamelsandRubberDuckie...](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/CamelsandRubberDuckies.html)

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Shenglong
Makes sense to me. I remember a wonderful article in HBR
([http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/04/make_your_competition_irrele...](http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/04/make_your_competition_irreleva.html))
that made a similar point.

I think the one main point is: if you compete on features (and please don't
argue semantics), even if you succeed, it'll likely only be by a small margin,
and you'll have to keep reinvesting into your product, inhibiting or denying
it from evolving into a cash cow.

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flocial
The less features mantra has been the new black for some time now. However, in
reality features are a good thing. The real evil is when features become
features, knobs and whistles for their own sake. When I first used an Android
phone after using the iPhone, I found it hard to do simple things that seemed
"intuitive" on the iPhone (kill an app for example). Those are most definitely
features, not the in your face, sticker happy, slogan heavy gimmicks but
something that took a team to think through and deliver. These features are
amazing because they are executed to be either intuitive or "accidentally"
discoverable.

When you look at the way Apple releases, they focus on what matters at that
given moment, pushing aside something that might seem as essential as "copy
and paste", rather than deliver half-baked solutions. So, when I read articles
like this, it makes you wonder why Nokia is struggling against smartphones.
After all they nailed the basic features? It's a phone isn't it?

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hxf148
I got some things to think about from this.. thanks for posting it. Been
working head down on <http://infostripe.com> for so long that sometimes I have
to remember to look up and consider what we am presenting to people.

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wccrawford
I guess you have somehow define feature to not include 'ease of use' or any
features of the interface in order to make this article apply.

Otherwise, I totally disagree. That the users can use your product smoothly
and efficiently IS a feature.

~~~
freejack
The article doesn't say "Don't build features", it says "Don't compete on
features". In other words, what is your focus when it comes to selling your
product or service? Andrew is arguing that the focus should be on a unique
experiental aspect of the service and not raw features. To that I would also
add "Don't compete on price". That's not to say that you shouldn't have a
price, or that the price shouldn't be competitive, but simply, that price
isn't your primary differentiator. We differentiate on service, but we've also
got some great features and competitive pricing - we just don't dwell on it.
Decent features and good prices are just table stakes - service is our ante
and we're all-in.

~~~
enjo
What is a product if not the sum of its features? Features aren't extraneous
things, they are what your product actually _does_.

This article strikes me as one big platitude to be honest. Yes, simplifying
your interface and creating well defined interactions are very good things.
Yes, your product will be better (and more successful) as it gets easier to
use. I agree with that, but that doesn't mean stripping away functionality is
always the right approach.

Most here would agree that the iPhone is a pretty functional device. Its
hardly "simple". It does a ton of things really well. It's not that the device
has stripped away features, it's that they have implemented all of those
features really well.

I guess I'm saying this: don't blame features for terrible UX. Blame poor
engineering.

 _edit: I also want to address this:

_ You’ll never win on features against a market leader*

This might be true, but not always. Often you can clearly differentiate your
product at some low level, but you still have to build out a commiserate
feature set to satisfy customer needs. In the end you have a better product,
but adoption is slowed until you achieve feature-level parity (at least on
certain core features).

~~~
ctdonath
Old adage: "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts." If the whole
meets/exceeds user expectations, you don't need to list the parts. If you're
listing the parts, you're trying to distract the customer from the inadequate
whole by saying the parts are good enough.

