Why just ‘knowing’ your customer is not enough

Every customer support forum and blog has at least one post talking about the importance of ‘knowing’ the target customer. This is one of those well established cliche-stereotypes that David Foster Wallace points out in Infinite Jest – we talk about them so much because they happen to be true. The only question is, how …

Stories are Better Than a Feature List

You’re at an event, and you’re ready. You know your product inside out. You know the competition. You know the licensing terms. The deals. The partners. The competition. Technical details. Market details. Detail details. Regulations. Strengths. Compatibilities. Your head is stuffed. Crammed, just when – A customer comes to you. “I’ve got sixty seconds. Why …

#PNMeetup – Showcase your Product & Get Advice from leading CIOs

We are pleased to partner with APAC CXO Forum to put together the 8th #PNMeetup in Noida.  If you have a brilliant Enterprise Product and you just know that its the best out there, here is an opportunity for you showcase your product and get one hour of quality one-on-one time with the CIO community. In this one hour, …

What’s your Sales Story?

Whenever faced by dilemma over any issue pertaining to sales and marketing, I recall a famous quote by Ben Feldman, who is considered one of the best salespeople in world history. Don’t sell life insurance. Sell what life insurance can do. Just by following this one mantra, Ben was able to insurance policies more than …

Action Plan for increasing M&A opportunities for Indian product startups

Indian product companies punch below their weight. Despite huge innovation and rising entrepreneurship, most Indian product companies are invisible on the global map. The reasons are many, but a big one is the lack of meaningful exits for companies that actually create value in their product markets. This paper focuses on a plan to address …

7 tips to build a script :: a Step by Step guide

I wish it was mathematical. But it isn’t. There are unlimited combinations when building a story. That’s what makes it so much fun to consume – you never know how the storyteller tells it…  So instead of giving you tips in a bulleted format – let’s build a script together. What we know (or must …

Product positioning and sales strategy must be approached the way an army fights a war

To position the product, you must first have clarity on the addressable market and its breakdown in terms of different industries or user communities (let’s call both of them as ‘verticals’ for simplicity). Then analyze which of them can benefit the most from your product, where your maximum contacts are, and which has the least …

Where is my story?

Most startups talk about product features and how they are better than their competition in terms of their offerings. They really don’t tell stories, however people remember stories for long and not the facts and figures. Most often than not, people say we are a startup, we don’t have paying customers and we do not …

Quick Research / Usability Methods: Expert Usability Review

(Post 1 of a series on quick research and usability techniques. Start-up’s can use these techniques fairly easily to connect to and understand their end users better, as well as maintain usability standards on their products.) ProductNation in collaboration with a few like-minded design professionals, recently put together an informal forum for designers, engineers, product managers …

Announcing ProductNation OutSights – Structured reports showcasing #MadeInIndia Software Products

As a lead up to India’s 66th Independence Day, ProductNation announces the launch of our OutSights Series. As there are a large number of thought leaders who have a lot of insights on a lot of topics, we decided that what we have, are OutSights. We start this series with structured reports showcasing #MadeInIndia Software …

6th iSPIRT Playbook RoundTable: Challenges in building a global software product company from India

In the continuing series of Round Tables product veterans Samir Palnitkar, ShopSocially and Jatin Parekh, AirTight Networks took the participants through a journey of discovery about why they want to go global and taking a critical look at the challenges they must overcome. It takes a guy like Samir to lay the foundation for such a …

India’s Need For Entrepreneurs and the MindSet

In 1991, the second Independence of India took place – there was an opening up of the economy that led, in its own tortuous Indian way, to the opening up of the minds of a section of the population. The educated middle class that had till then either left the country for greener pastures or …

7th #PNMeetup – Get to millions of visitors without spending money

3 founders, 25 good listeners and a rainy Delhi afternoon. Topic: “Get to millions of visitors without spending money”. It was a perfect setting for sharing of experiences by those 3 doers (Ankur@Akosha, Rajat@Socialappshq, Pallav@Knowlarity) about their own experiences of getting users, when they started. Keeping in its tradition, Avinash and Nakul organized this month’s …

Explara – The new journey begins…

There are some companies which start their business with a bang but can’t sustain their growth. Then there are other firms who seize market opportunities and add value to it. These companies succeed in the Indian Market and then get ready to go Global, including taking on the hard to penetrate Asian Markets. The following Interview is …

Lead, but consciously nurture talent

My wife forwarded me an article recently that Booz & Co. had written on India’s leadership challenge. You can read the full article here. This confirmed something I have long suspected. While there are great leaders in the Indian business, there are very few great companies. Let me explain what I mean by that. In …