Ryan Hops discusses how to avoid antagonizing customers when launching changes to a product or website. He provides six steps: 1) Give warnings before changes, 2) Find power users and connect with them personally, 3) Show mockups of changes for feedback, 4) Invite users to test beta versions, 5) Give legacy options for those resistant to change, and 6) Recognize that customers are sometimes wrong and innovation requires risk. The case of Digg's failed redesign that lost users is presented as an example of not involving power users and implementing too many changes at once without communication.

1. Ryan Hops
HOW TO (NOT)
ANTAGONIZE YOUR
CUSTOMERS
IN A LEAN STARTUP WORLD
Loyalty World
March 2013

2. MY GOAL
I WANT TO LEAVE YOU WITH:
How to succeed in the digital era, in the
world of lean startup, and not piss off your
customers.

3. ME:
✓ 20 something entrepreneur
✓ Product guy
✓ From Chinese HedgeFund
to fintech entrepreneur
✓ UWO - Bachelor of Finance

4. WALL STREET SURVIVOR
SOME NUMBERS: 3M+ pageviews/month, 500k+ users
JOINT VENTURES: With huge financial portals like AOL and the
Motley Fool
OUR TECH: Our tech powers 80% of the top business
schools in the US

5. THE EVOLUTION OF WSS
Like many consumer internet startups,
WSS is the poster-child for being a pivot machine.

6. IDEA #1
Let’s create a gambling website
(2007-2008)

7. LEARNING #1
Gambling was a little too grey.

8. IDEA #2
Yahoo Fantasy sports for stock market
(2008-2012)

9. LEARNING #2
Managing a sports team is a
more fun than managing a
stock portfolio.

10. 3RD TIME’S A CHARM
Financial Education

11. LEARNING #3
Huge opportunity to integrate onto
3rd party sites.

12. THE 6 STEPS
WE TOOK TO NOT PISS
OFF OUR
500 000 USERS
(AND NOT LOSE OUR $1,000,000
INVESTMENT)

13. #1 - WARNING
✓ Give people warnings...
✓ Like lots of warnings...
✓ Like early, often and everywhere...

14. SOCIAL MEDIA

15. BLOG

16. ON-SITE MESSAGING

17. EMAIL

18. TIP:
✓ Don’t worry about your
competitors.
✓ Stealth is VERY
overrated.

19. #2 - FIND YOUR CORE
✓ Who are your power users/customers?
And how can you reach them?

20. Reach out and make it personal.

21. WALL STREET SURVIVOR’S
TWO BIGGEST FANS
The Johnson brothers from West Monroe,
Louisiana

22. TIP:
The more you connect with
your power users:
✓ the more passionate they will
become about your company
✓ the more you will learn about
your all users

23. #3 - SHOW MOCKUPS
✓ Get feedback early. Show to your future
customer base as well as existing.

24. FIRST MOCK LAST MOCK

25. TIP:
✓ Show, Show and show some
more. The more you show, the
less drastic your launch will be.

26. #4 - BRING THEM INTO
THE PROCESS
✓ Create an invite-only beta version
✓ Behavioral vs attitudinal data

27. Install Feedback-gathering tools
QUALROO
GETSATISFACTION
CROWDSCIENCE

28. TIP:
✓ If you are proud about your
beta, you’re doing it all wrong.

29. #5 - GIVE THEM OPTIONS
✓ People hate when change is forced on
them

30. 2,794,000

31. 2,794,000
That’s how many people still use AOL dial-up!
Bottom line: Some people WILL not change.
If it’s still profitable to do so, give them options.

32. Legacy.WallStreetSurvivor.com is still available.

33. TIP:
✓ Make them feel like the old site
is a rusty old car.

34. #6 - SOME CUSTOMERS
ARE WRONG
✓ Don’t listen to your customers too much
✓ Customers (sometimes the best
customers) are biased

35. TIP:
✓ If companies only cared about
what their customers wanted,
there would be no iPhone.

36. BONUS: CASE
STUDY
DIGG V4

37. DIGG V3
✓ Digg was founded in 2004 by Kevin
Rose (picture on the right)
✓ In 2008, Google offered to buy it for
200m.
✓ By 2010 it was one of the ten biggest
sites on the internet

38. DIGG V4
✓ In 2010, Digg relaunched the site
with a brand new design and a
totally revamped functionality
✓ In one month after their launch
traffic dropped 34%
✓ The never really looked back. In
2012 they sold to Betaworks for
$500,000.

39. FATAL MISTAKE #1
✓ They didn’t involve their power
users.
✓ Digg was a community that thrived
on it’s power users (less than 100
people).
✓ When the site launched, they were
as shocked as everybody.

40. WHAT HAPPENED?
They headed over to Reddit to complain
and stayed there.

41. TODAY
Reddit.com is one of the most popular
websites around
Image source: newsone.com

42. FATAL MISTAKE #2
✓ They implemented features that
none of their users wanted
✓ They built features like My News
that no one wanted

43. TAKE-AWAY:
✓ Test, test, test.

44. FATAL MISTAKE #3
✓ Too much change - too quickly!
✓ No communication
✓ No roll-out of features

45. COMPARISON: FACEBOOK
Facebook has had as many unpopular
changes as any startup but they roll-out their
features slowly - not all at once!
2006 - mini feeds
2008 - the Wall
2009 - Fan pages and the Like button
2010 - the Wall is gone... the Newsfeed is here!
2011 - Ticker and Timeline

46. Ryan Hops
THANK YOU!
Q&A TIME!
Linkedin.com/in/ryanhops
@ryanhops