Comments on: Quality or quickly?

By: Kirk Henry

Kirk Henry — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 14:54:50 +0000

There is no "silver bullet" in regard to success or failure of a business model or service offering and I agree with Paul in regard to enough demand to keep many business profitable and viable. I lived in NYC for 17 years and there is a pizza shop on almost every block and they were always mouths to feed... It IS a big web and I say go for it as you never know what may hit.

By: Michrome

Michrome — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 11:52:43 +0000

I think a good approach is to deliver quality quickly by reducing the number of features. A small number of quality features will get you online quickly ... your users will let you know what feature should be implemented next!

By: Rob

Rob — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 13:49:07 +0000

I think it all really depends on your product and the market mixed in with a good dose of luck!!
For example I have just launched a new product which is by no means original. It’s an idea we have been kicking around for a number of years but we were not sure that the market was ready.
If we released too early then people would have lost interest before they were willing to engage with it. Too late and some big fish would have come in and claimed our share of the pie.
Also, as mentioned in the post, it’s been useful to look at the other offerings out there and improve on what they have done.
Whether or not we have timed it right, I think, is now down a small slice of luck. smile Time will tell I guess.

By: Benjamin Wiederkehr

Benjamin Wiederkehr — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:57:23 +0000

I would like to add the differenciation between a solid product and a polished one. Sometimes people get stuck in tweaking the visual design of an interface. Losing focus on the "big picture" and losing time may be the results. What we see on del.icio.us or craigslist.com for example are solid applications that provide a needed service. Both of them are (or were, in the case of delicious.com) not very polished on the visual side of things but their functionality is used by a broad range of users.

By: Kyle Larson

Kyle Larson — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:29:40 +0000

Launching early could also benefit you because, although small, I think there is a barrier to leaving and signing up for another service. That changes pretty quickly if there are serious issues with the site, but in the case of twitter its easier to just wait out the downtime than create a new account on another service and try to get friends to change over as well. Good post... pass the baked beans.

By: Cennydd Bowles

Cennydd Bowles — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 13:46:22 +0000

To paraphrase Alan Cooper, there's no large group of people waiting breathlessly to purchase your shitty product. Give me best to market over first to market any day: Google, iPod, Dyson, Facebook. The one exception is that if you're way earlier than others and don't suck, you might be able to cling on if you reach critical mass before competitors overtake you. Twitter is the prime example. I think this is only really the case for services with a large social component or a heavy penalty for disloyalty.