
Ask HN: How to get lucky with Hacker News? - abhishekdesai
I keep reading overnight success stories of people, who posted their new products on HackerNews and in no time those products got a great traction. For e.g.<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;crew.co&#x2F;backstage&#x2F;blog&#x2F;how-side-projects-saved-our-startup&#x2F;<p>I am a Hacker News member since many years now. I admit that I am not a very active one and very few times I have interacted with the community. But I believe there are many like me and still they have tasted more success than me.<p>What am I doing wrong? Is there a better time to post on Hacker News? Should I do something else after posting it on Hacker News for e.g. ask some member to review it, etc.? What am I missing?
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CyberFonic
I've wondered along the lines of your question. So I was hoping to find more
information. Totally agree with you, that there seems to be a huge factor of
"luck" involved in using HN to promote products.

Since I was very curious about your situation, I checked your profile, past
posts and comments. Whilst my comments don't directly answer your question,
these are the things that stood out for me:

You have been on HN for over 8 years and in that time you have only amassed
107 karma. That immediately signals to other HNers that you are not a
particularly involved member.

Most of your posts and comments have a "marketing slant". HN is, IMHO, a
technically oriented forum. I often notice a certain level of hostility
towards posts made by sales people, recruiters, etc. For me you would have
more "impact" by contributing to various technical discussions.

Looking at your two products and the comments on them by other HNers suggests
that they are not as "exciting" as you think. There are thousands of products
(I use the term very loosely) out there. You have to make your stuff really
stand out, capture interest and of course a huge measure of luck.

Finally Show HN is but one of potentially dozens of avenues to promote your
products. Perhaps identifying forums that deal with your application area is
useful. I know some people who are very active in domain specific forums on
LinkedIn, thus they have a certain profile. They then in turn contact other
active persons on the forum to canvass for business.

I hope my comments will provoke some rebuttals. My comments are just one data
point. You need a broad spectrum to base any decisions upon. Good Luck.

~~~
abhishekdesai
I agree. I need to become a more involved member and earn some Karma before I
submit something again.

------
Tomte
I have had a very short look at your submission history, and I still have no
idea what product or service you're offering.

Why do you expect "success" with something nobody even notices?

~~~
abhishekdesai
Well, that's a surprise. May be I am doing something completely wrong because
the previous two submissions (apart from this one) were of the products, we
have recently launched.

[https://www.readboard.io](https://www.readboard.io)

[http://apps.baapps.com/preview](http://apps.baapps.com/preview)

And that's what my question is, why HNers are not noticing things I am
posting? :)

~~~
detaro
Well, your readboard submission got noticed, just not in a positive way... and
promptly flagged, so most people can't even see it. Yay, spam filtering works.

Your other submission I very nearly missed the "example data" field, it looked
like a very empty page that wants some unspecified data otherwise.

Put a page that tells people _what they are looking at_ , don't force them to
click things and follow steps without knowing what the end result is. Step-by-
step onboarding is nice if a user has signed up for something, but you have to
show what you offer before that happens. (and most people here will close the
page as soon as there is a sign-up prompt, unless you really convinced them)

~~~
abhishekdesai
Thank you for your feedback. This really helps.

------
abhishekdesai
BTW I found some great insights in following article and its comments about
posting on HN.

[https://www.groovehq.com/blog/hacker-
news](https://www.groovehq.com/blog/hacker-news)

Especially a comment, which says "My point is simple. Find something worth
writing about that the HN community is hungry for, and come up with a good
title for the post. No need to manually market your post on twitter or to your
friends. Just post and watch your real-time analytics soar."

And a few things from following article...

[http://alexstechthoughts.com/post/29406022580/how-to-get-
on-...](http://alexstechthoughts.com/post/29406022580/how-to-get-on-the-
frontpage-of-hacker-news)

