Customer Development:6 Things I learned in 2 days with less than 10 users | Hacker News Reader

Customer Development:6 Things I learned in 2 days with less than 10 users

foodmarkit.posterous.com

18 pointsrcavezza8 comments

I've been building web apps for several years now and I still feel weary (though I've obviously learned to get over it) asking people to pay recurring amounts for services I've built. I'd have a hard time asking people to pay $5 (that's $60 a year!) for something that took me 3 days to build and relies 100% on an API I have no control over.

Of course, this is not a criticism in the least; if anything I'm somewhat envious of your confidence. One thing that took me a while to learn is that the ONLY way to set pricing is by soliciting actual customer feedback, rather than going with your gut or deciding what you think is fair (hint: those don't work). So, good job having learned this so soon.

Customer Development: 6 Things I learned in 2 days with less than 10 Users - August 6, 2010

... Rob's a pretty savvy guy. He is only 27 years old, and has been a video game junkie and using the internet for over two decades. ...

Something seems fishy. Anyone who found and downloaded video games for DOS (there isn't much other reason for a seven year old to be on the Internet back then) via FTP without the advantage of Archie should at least grok what Facebook Connect is. Or Facebook's branding of Connect really does suck.

I think the big lesson here is that non technical people that don't post on hacker news each day still don't understand facebook connect or they don't want to give all applications access.

And that's a fine lesson, and we all know that, it's a common theme here. But a 27 year old who was using the Internet at age seven doesn't count as non-technical, so this person is a bad example.

This probably uniquely identifies Rob, actually; there probably weren't more than three or four seven-year-olds on the internet in 1990, and the chance that more than one of them was named "Robert" is quite small indeed.

>people want to see pictures of the food they're about to eat

Cookbooks and cookery programs aren't called cookery porn for nothing.

The potential with this app isn't in charging people to email them recipes, it's in selling the email addresses to companies who want to advertise to people who want recipes emailed to them. Make it free and get more email addresses.

http://foodporndaily.com/ I like this site and I'm not even a foodie :)

this line "Build the ingredients you hate functionality" got me thinking... I suppose a website about social cooking might work, where you get recipes recommended based on previous recipes you tried and liked.

If a person submits a few recipes he tried and liked you can start recommending recipes to him that other users who liked similar recipes liked.

It might even be possible to 'follow' cooks you like etc... This kind of site would have to be offered for free though, social and market norms don't mix well.

just my 0.02 cents

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