Posted by MajorSetback on 09/28/80 11:37

Paul Ding wrote:

>
> People are going to judge you software by the quality of your website.
> You don't want a static website; you need something dynamic. A
> bulletin board lets your users rave about your product, lets your
> users suggest new uses for your product, and provide workarounds for
> the, ahem, "features" we all work so hard to avoid. A blog lets your
> users feel like they know you personally, and not only do many people
> prefer to buy from a friend, even the ones that want to keep an arms'
> length from their suppliers will be happy to believe that it's easy to
> contact you for support. They worry about buying a product they can't
> figure out how to use, with support in Mumbai, complete with such a
> heavy accent they can't undestand.

Seems like an excellent idea. I envision that one of the stregths of
my business is that I will be working directly with the clients rather
than having a mydiad of levels of management having endless meeting
with other management and never having time for the customer. I guess
the only problem I anticipate is that competitors can also read the
blogs and get ideas, not only about suggested improvements but also
about the current product.

The rest of what you said is also very helpful and makes a lot of sense
with the caveate that the sowftare I will be producing with, at least
initially, be mainly targeted at research labs in hospitals and
universities. The users would hopefully be visiting the website and
participating in the blogs but the people with the purse strings would
probably not. My competitors would probably be mainly negotiating
prices (which would probably be quite steep) with the people with the
purse strings.

>
> Good luck in your venture!

Thanks very much and thanks very much for your very helpful advice,
Peter.

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