When I was at Intense Debate there was always a constant stream of feedback from users. It was extremely helpful in the development of our product. Users willing to help meant a way to “crowdsource” bug fixing, new feature testing, and more.
Intense Debate, like many consumer web apps, was and remains a free to use plugin or add on. One simply downloads it and activates it to use. I always found it funny when I received angry emails from users who couldn’t wait for a new feature or felt compelled to threaten us with using another service if we didn’t give into their demands for new/random features within their suggested timeframe.They were the first to blog or tweet their issue.
Why did I find it funny? First, because I knew we were offering a superior product to what the competition was offering. Intense Debate has always set the standard in the commenting realm and continues to do so today with the user created comment plugins. More importantly, we were offering a FREE service that gave users more pageviews, kept visitors engaged longer on websites using Intense Debate, and significantly upgraded the commenting functionality. In the long run, we were going to win, but we couldn’t win over everyone all the time.
I see this scenario play over and over–People jumping on a soapbox to complain about the newest webservice in order to draw attention to themselves. I saw it yet again the other day when Twitter announced their future TV show. Michael Arrington posted a rant on TechCrunch about things HE wants before a TV show (note: I think Michael is a decent fellow, but he is wrong here). The comment section turned into a complaint festival full of negativity. Robin Wauters, a writer for TechCrunch, said “a business model” in referencer to what he would want Twitter to work on. Please. Twitter will decide what is best for Twitter, but what concern is it to you whether they have a business model or not? It’s a free service. Plain and simple. Leave those decisions to Twitter Execs and Investors. You can go back to tweeting about hot dogs, farts, and whatever else.
The majority of people who use Twitter barely know how to use it let alone want a group feature, notice downtime, are worried about a business model, etc. This is the disconnect of the early adopter crowd. Once a product does gain a small amount of traction it no longer needs to cater to the blowhorn crowd. Belief in your core product and its acceptance by your ideal user is more important (more often than not it isn’t the editor of TechCrunch).
A non-web example is Adam Lambert’s loss on American Idol. The Hollywood Elites all thought he had it wrapped up. Of course, the people in flyover country thought differently. Now people like the esteemed Kim Kardashian are speaking out on how they thought Adam should have won. As if all of Kris Allen’s Voters are somehow one step away from farm animal intellect.
Opportunity is out there. Listen to people with blowhorns at your peril. Let your sales numbers do the talking.
(Note: This is not to suggest that “The Blowhorns” do not make good suggestions at times. For example, Marshall Kirpatrick, makes lots of excellent points at times. To all “The Blowhorns” please do not read the name as a pejorative. A lot of you are good people)
