[davidkatz]

A lot of companies don't appreciate the competitive space they're in.

If you're building something that addresses a novel value proposition ("a machine that turns water into wine") you can say it like it is and expect at least some conversion from an audience which cares about your promised value.

When your value proposition is something like "better product management" you're competing with dozens of products which people already use and are happy with. Just saying "we're a better tool for product management" isn't going to fly. You'll need to communicate exactly why you're better.

I appreciate the friendly "talk to us anytime and we'll walk you through it", but I think as a strategy that suffers from a similar problem. It's not going to work with a muddy value proposition, most folks just won't bother.

[simplybastow]

Thanks for the feedback, @davidkatz - I definitely see your point on this one, and it's something we're often testing (as you might expect from a couple product managers!) and working out different ways to articulate our value prop.

Lately, we've been trying out different messages for different audiences - ProdPad is just as valuable to a development team (roadmap visibility, clearer specs) as it is to the customer support team (visibility of impact/progress following customer requests and feedback), but in completely different ways. Obviously product managers are our core user base, but by all means, not the only ones.

Yesterday, we used "Build product roadmaps, manage ideas, and make users happy" on Product Hunt, which seems to have gone over well. Might test a few variations of this and see if it sticks!

Thanks again for the feedback, really helpful.