Jason Cohen

Pick one and own it What if your company could have only one single advantage over the competition? This exercise will make your positioning and strategy stronger.

Why does 'Obsessed with Quality' make for a compelling sales pitch?

Because in a world accepting of bugs as a norm, a commitment to rapid fixes and true reliability stands out.

This is the value of picking SOMETHING to care about:

You can’t just ask “What’s common among customers who cancel?”

Because those things are often also common among customers who stay. It’s just common stuff.

Must look at what is different 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 those two groups.

You have to be confident enough to devote yourself for long hours, many weeks.

While looking for disconfirmation, tuning for reality, because everything in minute 1 wasn’t correct yet.

Tough to do both simultaneously, but that is the way.

Nothing is true in 𝘢𝘭𝘭 cases. 😄

Anyway, I agree, for sure sometimes first-movers win, by keeping a crazy-high producitivty. Amazon (books, then AWS) and Uber are good examples.

Most aren't though - Google, Facebook, Zoom, many more, all followers.

When being “first” is not a competitive advantage Is it good to be “first?” It seems so -- what’s the point of being a copycat? While “first” sounds impressive, in reality it’s often not an advantage.

If you’re first to market, you show everyone else what mistakes to avoid.

You have to move even faster than normal (which is already fast) to keep up with that.

Typically, you don’t; followers are generally the winners.

Sometimes you hired someone to join a team.

Sometimes you hired someone to change the team.

Conflict arises when you, that person, and the rest of the team doesn’t agree which one it is.

What makes a strategy great Most so-called “strategies” are vague, wishful thinking, written once and never seen again. Don’t do that. These are the characteristics of great strategy.

One of the main goals of a strategy is to find the non-linear things, i.e. where P input yields P^2 output…

…that this particular team is capable of executing.

Because anything less is not going to be enough to win.

🙏

I won't be surprised!

Yeah probably!

Brand can make people pay 10x more for something that’s only twice as good.

Or twice as much for the same thing.

You could say “people are stupid,” or you could figure out how to build a valuable brand for your product, so you can enjoy the same results.

Except, instead of making that explicit, you wasted your time on a statement that’s not even true.

And maybe that perfect customer already bounced off the home page, or never clicked the ad.

(2/2)

“Authentic” is dead. And so is “is dead.” It’s lazy writing. It’s boring and undifferentiated. Say something meaningful, specific, evocative, so your website wins, and you can be proud of it.

“CRM is broken”

No, millions of people use CRM every day. It’s not broken.

What you meant is: You dramatically improve CRM for a specific subset of customers.

Now that’s truly wonderful…

(1/2)

The Kindle Previewer App for Mac uses 1GB of disk space.

Totally reasonable, not bloated at all. I trust that this is great technology.

How to measure the accuracy of forecasts How do you assess forecasts, when the forecast is only a probability? It’s not just about accuracy. Let’s dive into the math.

How do you measure whether something like a “lead quality score” is accurate?

“Quality” is an estimate of whether it will result in a sale.

It’s like predicting the weather, and it’s not quite as simple as you might think:

Right.

😂

Right.

Two great strategies:

1. Broad market share

2. Best in the world at one narrow thing

Probably only one is correct given your constraints, your goals, your budget, your ambition.

Pick. Then only do things consistent with that one, not the other one.

You are already top-1% lucky just be born in this time period in human history and reading Bluesky on an impossibly incredible device.

Haha right!

Your greatest work is still in the future.

So, don’t quit now…

How many views did Mr. Beast’s first video get?
How many views did Seth Godin’s first blog post get?
How many views will your first ____ get?

You aren’t defined by your first attempt.
You aren’t defined by views.

You are your body of work.

If the product failed to sell, but you learned 100x more than in the previous 12 months, and you’re living an exciting life, was it a failure?

The product was. You are not.

You are just more prepared for the next one.

Our unhealthy fixation with emulating #1 Being “undefeated” or “number 1″ might be more luck than you know.

If we reset the clock and the Google founders published PageRank at MIT instead of Stanford, would Google even exist?

How do we know which decisions actually caused success?

What does that mean about being “#1”?

And then your competitor spends three months copying the thing, and they're so proud of themselves, and you laugh because they should have been doing something else.

Think about that the next time you want to copy a feature from your competitor.

(2/2)

Half the time you make a feature, and people don't even use it or it's confusing, and you wish you would just remove it but you don't really have the guts.

(1/2)

“You should be able to explain it to your grandmother.”

Only if your grandmother is the target market. Otherwise it’s irrelevant.

If your ideal customer lands on the home page, 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 had better get it in 2 seconds. That’s the goal.

I don't have a broad insight that fits in 500 chars. Maybe it's more of a feel, or someone who is more expert would know.

I do try to keep it problem-then-solution, I'm just not draconian about it.

Is perfectionism just misperceived margin of error? When working with the physical world there are always acceptable margins of error. When working too long in the digital you never get a sense of what a margin of error even is. When doing something, there is a tolerance within which accuracy doesn’t matter. These tolerances should determine

Just recently found Benedict Fritz’s blog. Interesting stuff; here’s a recent one I liked about what “good” or even “excellent” means, or should mean: