2 books, content & product blogs, Twitter accounts, countless interviews & presentations, & now a podcast -- all driven by a consistent, unique message and business transparency.
After watching 37s over the years, anyone who hires a PR firm today hasn't been paying attention.
(Having said that, I don't know how they find the time for it all.)
There was a great Inc.com interview posted on HN yesterday (until some jerk commented on one line from the interview and ruined the whole conversation...) about what an average day looks like for Jason: http://www.inc.com/magazine/20091101/the-way-i-work-jason-fr...
This sort of wide-eyed devotion is their PR. You're not going to replicate it in your own company by buying into it.
From the article: I don't use an alarm clock. Lately, I've been naturally waking up at 6:38 every morning. I used to wake up at 7:31 every morning, which is actually when I was born. So that was kind of creepy.
How self-indulgent must you be before you agree to a piece like this?
But, I do think if you're "buying into it" by creating a unique voice & finding low-cost ways to get your message out to the public -- & not by just trying to be another 37s -- that's a positive thing.
It is a good article indeed. And I agree with you on the way the discussion went off-track. (though I don't know if I'd call the guy a jerk) I think it got just under a hundred comments but there wasn't much very interesting in it. It was mostly comments about Jason Fried not reading fiction but watching fiction on TV…
"After watching 37s over the years, anyone who hires a PR firm today hasn't been paying attention."
A PR firm is just a different path to the same destination, though most of them DO suck.
Believe it or not, there ARE PR firms out there that chase a similar strategy to 37s. The 37s guys are awesome at PR. If you are not awesome at PR, then you can hire a firm. But yeah, if you hire a crappy firm that sends out press releases, you probably HAVEN'T been paying attention (and neither has the PR firm).
But I'm starting to believe that -- just like Craig Newmark and Fried suggest doing your own customer service (as long as humanly possible, Newmark still does it daily b/c he's crazy, I think Fried has hired a couple people to do the daily, easy-to-handle questions & problems) so that you "feel the pain" -- you should do your own PR, not just b/c it's cheaper, but also so you can sense what connects and what doesn't and give your small company/startup a human face as soon as possible.
Surprisingly, a few years ago (2006), I received some mail from a PR firm who actually represented 37S. Whether or not they still use a firm, I'm not sure, but it's interesting to note that this success wasn't entirely built from their blog.
@access_denied - wow, that actually makes me feel better. One other thing I wanted to point out was that it's not as if this came naturally to these guys; they have worked really hard for a very long time to get where they are.
From dhh in the podcast: "The 37signals' job board made 1.5 million in the past 18 months for 1 and a 1/2 days of work." Not too shabby. But you gotta remember that that was 5 years of community building that made that revenue possible.
Just ran some rough numbers for the fun of it.. no hard science here.
$1.5m over 18 months works out at about $2777 per day. Currently there are 135 jobs on the job board - we'll assume they're all $300 jobs (they also offer $50 listings for internships). This averages out (on the 30 day lifetime) to about 4.5 jobs posted per day over the last month, or $1350 of revenue - less than half the revenue necessary to meet the trend..
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 49.1 ms ] threadAfter watching 37s over the years, anyone who hires a PR firm today hasn't been paying attention.
(Having said that, I don't know how they find the time for it all.)
Definitely worth the read.
From the article: I don't use an alarm clock. Lately, I've been naturally waking up at 6:38 every morning. I used to wake up at 7:31 every morning, which is actually when I was born. So that was kind of creepy.
How self-indulgent must you be before you agree to a piece like this?
But, I do think if you're "buying into it" by creating a unique voice & finding low-cost ways to get your message out to the public -- & not by just trying to be another 37s -- that's a positive thing.
If you said "I use an alarm clock", no one would care or read any more. Saying "I wake up naturally at xx:xx" draws people in. Even if it is utter bs.
37s are very good at PR. I'd say it's their primary business.
I don't use an alarm clock, and I wake within a few minutes of the same time each morning. I always thought it odd, but maybe it's common.
A PR firm is just a different path to the same destination, though most of them DO suck.
Believe it or not, there ARE PR firms out there that chase a similar strategy to 37s. The 37s guys are awesome at PR. If you are not awesome at PR, then you can hire a firm. But yeah, if you hire a crappy firm that sends out press releases, you probably HAVEN'T been paying attention (and neither has the PR firm).
But I'm starting to believe that -- just like Craig Newmark and Fried suggest doing your own customer service (as long as humanly possible, Newmark still does it daily b/c he's crazy, I think Fried has hired a couple people to do the daily, easy-to-handle questions & problems) so that you "feel the pain" -- you should do your own PR, not just b/c it's cheaper, but also so you can sense what connects and what doesn't and give your small company/startup a human face as soon as possible.
another reference: http://37signals.com/svn/posts/307-what-do-you-want-to-know
How do I remember all this junk and not stuff that really matters?!
$1.5m over 18 months works out at about $2777 per day. Currently there are 135 jobs on the job board - we'll assume they're all $300 jobs (they also offer $50 listings for internships). This averages out (on the 30 day lifetime) to about 4.5 jobs posted per day over the last month, or $1350 of revenue - less than half the revenue necessary to meet the trend..