It would be interesting to poll your subscribers and see how many are paying out of pocket vs how many expense the subscription through their employer. I would bet that the huge uptick in subscribers before the price increase were nearly all people who don't think their company would pay for your newsletter -- and I would also bet that a majority of your subscribers overall are paying out of pocket (despite the potential benefits to their employer). For that audience, $25/month ($250/year) is steep.
I subscribe to quite a few newsletters, to the point that I've had to cancel older subscriptions in order to afford (justify) subscribing to newer newsletters. Several writers I subscribe to live almost entirely on their newsletter income, but they live a near-subsistence life on that income (some other writers have jobs, so the newsletter is "pocket money" on top).
What we're willing to spend personal money on isn't always very rational :)
A couple huge, timely examples of FOMO driving sales: Fortnite and Taylor Swift.
Fortnite's in-game item shop is nothing but limited time offers, on the scale of 1 day (usually) to a few weeks (occasionally). When a beloved item returns to the shop, no one knows if or when it'll ever be back. Players who buy a seasonal Battle Pass get the opportunity to earn items that will never return once the season ends. And nearly all of these items are cosmetics, visible on a player's avatar in game, so they can be shown off for bragging rights.
Taylor Swift's merchandise shop is also chock full of limited-time items. When a new album comes out, there are limited runs of deluxe editions to collect, and limited runs of themed apparel, jewelry, posters, pins, etc. Every few weeks, there's a new limited-time offer, either something new or something returning. And everything is displayable: even the deluxe edition albums can be shown off in specially made display cases sold alongside them.
Sales made through FOMO are another way to put yourself on the hook. People who buy though FOMO will likely have higher value expectations.
Slightly related, it seems like software and other thought-stuff are going into hyper-monetization mode now, pay per action, micro-payments everywhere. I don't know where else it could end except a resurgence of consolidation.
I forget which thinkie where you talked about turning things upside down but this sounds like it fits.
For the business, what's the 'benefit' of bad design etc Vs the 'costs' of improving etc or something like that and then you get to gain the skill of leveraging FOMO for personal gain (while hopefully staying true to your personal values.)
On a personal note, I hugely value the work you're doing on here, it all helps me stretch my brain and learn new ways to think about things, both things I enjoy immensely 🙂
This is really interesting, and makes me think a little bit about how I “sell” myself and the things I want to do within my job, or when changing jobs. The practice of painting a compelling picture of a possible future is something I think of as a leadership tool, but it seems like it bears on personal positioning as well.
Also I would definitely buy a coffee mug with a bunch of “how to make/drink coffee” test cases printed on the side.
Consider that there are many reasons why people buy—perhaps not as many as there are people, but many. And none of us are "rational" about our buying decisions. Everyone (literally) is moved emotionally and subconsciously before their prefrontal cortex rationalizes the decision they've already made.
Some of us support you as a fellow traveler. Some of us support you out of nostalgia or a sense of paying it forward. Some of us are just curious to see what's inside the box. But…
The vast majority of people buy BECAUSE IT'S ON SALE FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY!
Just like every other time it was or will be on sale, but that's what it takes to get an organic computer optimized to pick berries and avoid scary predators to take action. The evolution of human psychobiology demands that we avoid loss far more than we seek gain. Full stop. Many were the times when every not-ancestor who failed to prioritize loss avoidance did not pass on their genetic contributions to the future.
People talk about carrots and sticks as if they're mutually exclusive—because that's how psychology professors inflict them on undergrads in experiments—but they're best used together. Offer both and you'll get more of what you incentivize and less of what you punish every time.
Food for thought: In grad school, I remember a video where they talked about "size of the market." Those booming success newsletters...is the target audience size much much larger than yours?
What are your current roadblocks or challenges in selling?
One more thing comes to mind. They say tech books are nothing more than high effort business cards. It's one way to market yourself. Geared toward your target buyer, it should drive traffic to your training services funnel (whatever that looks like).
I hope you might find it worthwhile to read some of our new book, “The Heart of Innovation: A Field Guide for Navigating to Authentic Demand.” Your idea, that people buy based on FOMO can be much more fully illuminated. If not buying is okay then people can be indifferent to buying. The key to whether someone is a customer is whether they can be indifferent. And the key to understanding what makes a customer a customer is understanding what makes some not indifferent. Even reading the first chapter may open some worlds. The Amazon link is: https://a.co/d/hqMTvGn
It's not just FOMO. You have to create scarcity. People don't want to sign up for a newsletter. They want to be in a limited space curated community. That locked in scarcity is what allows the membership to tell their story.
FOMO is the emotional experience of this. But could it also be viewed as risk control? If the price goes up in the future, that reduces my future options. Buying now is rational if control and stability are valuable to my risk portfolio. So I wonder how much of the lesson here is emotional, and how much is about the value of selling an increase of control.
Viewing it as control might lead to important additional monetizaton strategies which the emotional lens would not. For example, how can you market your wisdom and techniques to highlight the control and predictability that they offer to teams? What if teams don’t actually care about software quality or velocity (even if they say they do), but what they truly want is control (which they don’t want to admit and don’t allow themselves to say)? I suspect this is the case. We want control. Quality and speed are good but secondary. And if that’s true, surely the offering of incresased control is an important ingredient in your product/service marketing.
It would be interesting to poll your subscribers and see how many are paying out of pocket vs how many expense the subscription through their employer. I would bet that the huge uptick in subscribers before the price increase were nearly all people who don't think their company would pay for your newsletter -- and I would also bet that a majority of your subscribers overall are paying out of pocket (despite the potential benefits to their employer). For that audience, $25/month ($250/year) is steep.
I subscribe to quite a few newsletters, to the point that I've had to cancel older subscriptions in order to afford (justify) subscribing to newer newsletters. Several writers I subscribe to live almost entirely on their newsletter income, but they live a near-subsistence life on that income (some other writers have jobs, so the newsletter is "pocket money" on top).
What we're willing to spend personal money on isn't always very rational :)
A couple huge, timely examples of FOMO driving sales: Fortnite and Taylor Swift.
Fortnite's in-game item shop is nothing but limited time offers, on the scale of 1 day (usually) to a few weeks (occasionally). When a beloved item returns to the shop, no one knows if or when it'll ever be back. Players who buy a seasonal Battle Pass get the opportunity to earn items that will never return once the season ends. And nearly all of these items are cosmetics, visible on a player's avatar in game, so they can be shown off for bragging rights.
Taylor Swift's merchandise shop is also chock full of limited-time items. When a new album comes out, there are limited runs of deluxe editions to collect, and limited runs of themed apparel, jewelry, posters, pins, etc. Every few weeks, there's a new limited-time offer, either something new or something returning. And everything is displayable: even the deluxe edition albums can be shown off in specially made display cases sold alongside them.
Now I just need to find someone to run my merch shop. KB branded index cards, “It’s not easy being green” JUnit coffee mugs , …
Sales made through FOMO are another way to put yourself on the hook. People who buy though FOMO will likely have higher value expectations.
Slightly related, it seems like software and other thought-stuff are going into hyper-monetization mode now, pay per action, micro-payments everywhere. I don't know where else it could end except a resurgence of consolidation.
I forget which thinkie where you talked about turning things upside down but this sounds like it fits.
For the business, what's the 'benefit' of bad design etc Vs the 'costs' of improving etc or something like that and then you get to gain the skill of leveraging FOMO for personal gain (while hopefully staying true to your personal values.)
On a personal note, I hugely value the work you're doing on here, it all helps me stretch my brain and learn new ways to think about things, both things I enjoy immensely 🙂
For me the announcement is a chance to say "thank you". instead of FOMO.
This is really interesting, and makes me think a little bit about how I “sell” myself and the things I want to do within my job, or when changing jobs. The practice of painting a compelling picture of a possible future is something I think of as a leadership tool, but it seems like it bears on personal positioning as well.
Also I would definitely buy a coffee mug with a bunch of “how to make/drink coffee” test cases printed on the side.
Consider that there are many reasons why people buy—perhaps not as many as there are people, but many. And none of us are "rational" about our buying decisions. Everyone (literally) is moved emotionally and subconsciously before their prefrontal cortex rationalizes the decision they've already made.
Some of us support you as a fellow traveler. Some of us support you out of nostalgia or a sense of paying it forward. Some of us are just curious to see what's inside the box. But…
The vast majority of people buy BECAUSE IT'S ON SALE FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY!
Just like every other time it was or will be on sale, but that's what it takes to get an organic computer optimized to pick berries and avoid scary predators to take action. The evolution of human psychobiology demands that we avoid loss far more than we seek gain. Full stop. Many were the times when every not-ancestor who failed to prioritize loss avoidance did not pass on their genetic contributions to the future.
People talk about carrots and sticks as if they're mutually exclusive—because that's how psychology professors inflict them on undergrads in experiments—but they're best used together. Offer both and you'll get more of what you incentivize and less of what you punish every time.
Food for thought: In grad school, I remember a video where they talked about "size of the market." Those booming success newsletters...is the target audience size much much larger than yours?
What are your current roadblocks or challenges in selling?
One more thing comes to mind. They say tech books are nothing more than high effort business cards. It's one way to market yourself. Geared toward your target buyer, it should drive traffic to your training services funnel (whatever that looks like).
I hope you might find it worthwhile to read some of our new book, “The Heart of Innovation: A Field Guide for Navigating to Authentic Demand.” Your idea, that people buy based on FOMO can be much more fully illuminated. If not buying is okay then people can be indifferent to buying. The key to whether someone is a customer is whether they can be indifferent. And the key to understanding what makes a customer a customer is understanding what makes some not indifferent. Even reading the first chapter may open some worlds. The Amazon link is: https://a.co/d/hqMTvGn
It's not just FOMO. You have to create scarcity. People don't want to sign up for a newsletter. They want to be in a limited space curated community. That locked in scarcity is what allows the membership to tell their story.
FOMO is the emotional experience of this. But could it also be viewed as risk control? If the price goes up in the future, that reduces my future options. Buying now is rational if control and stability are valuable to my risk portfolio. So I wonder how much of the lesson here is emotional, and how much is about the value of selling an increase of control.
Viewing it as control might lead to important additional monetizaton strategies which the emotional lens would not. For example, how can you market your wisdom and techniques to highlight the control and predictability that they offer to teams? What if teams don’t actually care about software quality or velocity (even if they say they do), but what they truly want is control (which they don’t want to admit and don’t allow themselves to say)? I suspect this is the case. We want control. Quality and speed are good but secondary. And if that’s true, surely the offering of incresased control is an important ingredient in your product/service marketing.