
Submittable (YC S12): How To Find The Pain That Creates Paying Customers - obliojoe
http://mixergy.com/michael-fitzgerald-submittable-interview/
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xanados
First, let me say that in general I hate the negativity that has come to
infect Hacker News, so it is only with much self-consciousness that I provide
the following negative reaction. The mixergy post says "If you’ve heard me say
that entrepreneurs should start by finding the pain, wait till you hear the
first thing today’s guest did." (And the submission headline supports this
lede.) The advice within the recording is that the founders of Submittable got
together and made a list of their personal problems, and Submittable was like
third on their list. I don't think that's particularly novel helpful advice
given that it's basically the entirety of Paul Graham's famous essay "How to
Get Startup Ideas" which I hope everyone here has read. If there were more
detail on other ideas and ways to find startup ideas, it would be fine, but
this is a one/two sentence explanation of the most obvious and well-known
method, being used to justify the entire interview. The real question is what
do you do when you don't have any problems and you don't know anyone with
business problems.

That said, this isn't a reflection on Submittable as a company or the
Submittable founders. I'm sure they are awesome and have an awesome service,
and I hope they have the best of luck.

~~~
AndrewWarner
This isn't negative. It's a great comment.

I think there's more to my interview than your short summary. For example,
Michael made a mistake that's common to people who start with their own pain,
so he pretty much had to scrap a whole year's worth of work.

What he learned was that he -- as an author -- was experiencing a ton of pain
when he submitted to manuscripts to publishers. But the pain wasn't caused by
the way he submitted his work to them. It was caused by the way their
processed what he (and other authors) sent.

The cure for this was to have outside conversations. Picking the right person
to talk to is a whole other part of this interview, but I won't get into it
here. I don't want to recreate the interview.

~~~
asdf333
I personally really enjoyed the interview. It was refreshingly honest to hear
about his struggles and it was a good reminder as to how much work and
dedication it takes.

Some really great quotes about what kind of competition he's most afraid of.

Really thoughtful interview.

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andys627
"I'm not afraid of the guy with 190 IQ, I'm afraid of the sicko who never
gives up"

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randomdrake
I did some work in a similar space. It's amazing how many publications and
organizations out there need a good solution for doing something as simple as
a photo contest or a simple storage for documents. This company did a good job
tackling a specific audience of "publishers, universities and art
organizations." While the work I did was on a product that was able to be
flexible enough (more generalized consumer feedback) to facilitate this kind
of thing, I think they made a great decision to build something specifically
for this type of problem.

I wish them the best of luck in their business, it was an interesting ride for
us.

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orangethirty
May someone from Submittable explain in simple words the work flow issue that
this service improves upon?

I don't understand it very well.

~~~
jasonshen
Organizations and publications often have to receive documents from outside
people for many reasons. Magazines accept article submissions from freelance
writers. Academic journals receive papers from scientists. Companies receive
resumes from jobseekers.

These documents need to be reviewed by the organization and then decisions
need to be made - should the article be published? Should we interview the
candidate?

Submittable makes it easier for the outside people to send the documents, and
makes it easier for the organization to receive, review and decide on the
documents.

~~~
orangethirty
Thank you.

~~~
mfitzerald
Hi. This is Michael (Submittable). I've been on a plane today. Just seeing
this. But this answer is spot on. We came from a publishing background where
publishers have an over-supply of content-see Clay Shirky's Congnitive Surplus
for more on this- and they needed a simple way to accept and curate incoming
work. Submittable was originally a tool for that, but has since branched out
to accept and curate any kind of digital object: manuscripts, film, audio,
images, links, applications, resumes, anything coming in that needs to be
reviewed and acted on.

