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Comment by wmal | Hacker News Reader

Most people don’t operate this way. Choice is painful and induces anxiety. There’s a high chance of getting buyers remorse even if you chose the „objectively best” model.

A good salesperson will make sure the choice process is relatively quick and painless. You will feel good afterwards knowing that all the 125 aspects that differentiate this model from the other ones are not that important. The one you chose runs your favourite apps, integrates well with your car and your home entertainment system.

Understanding this and learning how to sell helps in life, incl. negotiating architectural changes with non technical decision makers.

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> A good salesperson will make sure the choice process is relatively quick and painless.

The best salesperson isn't the one whose customers are leaving the shop smiling just like a TV advert where buying X or Y will solve every problem in life, but rather the one whose customers leave the shop angry after having purchased this or that product or service, because that is an indicator they were squeezed until just before the point they tell the seller to stick their product somewhere and leave for the competition. Not that I like it, but that is how I see it.

what makes you think that this is the best way to obtain loyal and more customers?

Prisoners Dilemma vs Iterated Prisoners Dilemma.

Low trust == maximize mechanical power and optimization

Higher trust == invest time, relationship-building and lower individual transaction profit over a larger volume of profit

Few consumer sales interactions fall into the second category.

prisoner’s dilemma is a dilemma for a reason: it optimizes the total outcome badly. maybe this is why the pessimization of the modern business cycle everyone loves to cry about always works out that way — we’re all interacting in a commons where trying to screw everyone else as hard as possible is the rule, not the exception.

Depends on the market of course, but scarcity, either natural or artificial, can do wonders.

This isn’t zero sum.

I don’t understand why you’re downvoted. It’s absolutely true that most people don’t like making purchasing decisions by privately comparing spec dumps, even though many programmers enjoy that.

You're telling me some people out there don't create spreadsheets and a scoring system to compare 10 different ceiling fans before purchase?

Absolutely not. It should be abstracted out enough that it can be applied to all purchases and not just ceiling fans. Otherwise, you're going to be duplicating effort for the next purchase and you don't want to have to repeat yourself.

I was actually thinking of scaling to a site first, and then expand horizontally to all ceiling-mounted products. Because what's the point if I can't monetize my decision-making system?

OK but don't you hate it when you're trying to sign up for internet service and they're like "what sorts of things do you do on the computer?"

I know what I need just gimme the 100 MBPs plan!

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