Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools

Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by laserbeam on Friday July 14, 2023 @12:11AM (#36719401)

If you're selling a devtool, and all I'm seeing is features OR benefits in your pitch, and I can't get limitations, tradeoffs, restrictions, drawbacks or any sort of information about the downsides of using that tool... Then it's still a marketing pitch. If it only lists positives and it's not honest about negatives, it's just marketing.

Show me your drawbacks and I might consider you are a serious vendor.

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Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by siquick on Friday July 14, 2023 @12:48AM (#36719581)

> Show me your drawbacks and I might consider you are a serious vendor.

Can’t remember any other product from any market openly showing what it can’t do, why are devtools any different?

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Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by swyx on Friday July 14, 2023 @01:38AM (#36719880)

in my original landing page for temporal i was very proud to add "what do we NOT do": https://temporaldotio-a0ktr49oc-temporal.vercel.app/#headles...

most founders refuse to admit that they're not fit for purpose for some things. yes need to promise the world to VCs but also it makes it harder for the developer to assess how much to trust you if you are in denial about TAM

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Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by laserbeam on Friday July 14, 2023 @02:19AM (#36720117)

To be fair, my argument has nothing to do with devtools, just that the distinction between features and benefits is pointless or is itself a marketing gimmick.

I'll only get to drawbacks/limitations once I get to documentation. And once I spend a significant amount of time researching a product. And when I don't I feel like I'm buying the marketing.

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Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by CJefferson on Friday July 14, 2023 @05:26AM (#36721503)

SQLite has both when to use it, and when to consider something else: https://www.sqlite.org/whentouse.html

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Re:Benefit Layers: How to avoid sales fluff in devtools by ben_w on Friday July 14, 2023 @05:57AM (#36721763)

> any other product from any market openly showing what it can’t do

ChatGPT, ironically enough given how many times I see people insisting that them saying “we can be dangerously wrong don’t rely on us” is some kind of marketing scheme.

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