Later this year we’re considering holding our first 37signals Customer Summit. We’d like to bring together anywhere from 100-300 of our customers to share our ideas, their ideas, and see if we can all learn a few things from one another.
The summit would be in Chicago. It would be priced at about $100 per person. The summit would be between 6 and 8 hours.
Some agenda ideas we’re considering include demos of all our products, a conversation about building useful software, lengthy Q&A with our designers and programmers, tips & tricks, demos of third party products that integrate with ours via APIs, “15 minutes of fame” sessions where customers can demo how they use our products to run their own businesses, and more.
We’re looking to make it casual, accessible, and valuable. It’s primarily about sharing ideas to help our customers get the most out of the products.
If you were to attend what would you like to hear? What sort of talks or demos would you find interesting? Any and all suggestions would be helpful so we can put together a valuable agenda.
Thanks!
Jacob Patton
on 19 Apr 07Great idea for a conferenc—ahem, I mean summit, Jason!
As far as topics are concerned, what about talking about how you guys actually use the products you build, especially with remote workers? Maybe you could even rope the Coudal gang into sharing their work-process, too.
It’d be great, too, to hear how you and other 37s users get new team-members and contractors to start using the products.
Also, if you’re still looking to put together video testimonials for your goods, why don’t you set up a RealWorld like video booth and capture some candid interviews? Better yet, hire a director to shoot the event and produce something akin to Apple’s Why Mac videos.
David Ham
on 19 Apr 07I think this is a great idea. I am a one man shop and use Basecamp whenever I can, and am already getting a lot of value out of Highrise.
Some of the companies I contract for use Basecamp but-and this is very strange to me-use it only barely, even while suffering with the very kinds of communication and productivity problems that Basecamp excels at solving.
I think a Basecamp Best Practices talk, something like Merlin Mann’s best practices for email, would be really useful for people.
A talk on the theory and motivation behind Highrise would be good too. I am getting a lot out of it but I suspect there is a big Aha! waiting in it for me.
Larry Myers
on 19 Apr 07Wow, consumer research that your customers pay you for instead of the other way around? Brilliant!
B
on 19 Apr 07Wow, consumer research that your customers pay you for instead of the other way around? Brilliant!
Only the cynic would say that. It seems to be everyone will get a lot of value out of a gathering like this. There’s nothing wrong with asking people to pay for value. Salesforce charges $295 to attend their annual customer event.
Dave Rau
on 19 Apr 07I remember Seth Godin talking about this type thing to Google in some video I saw online. Great idea, get customers talking and create some relationships. Well done as usual guys.
BJ
on 19 Apr 07I’m with Larry. I don’t get it. Is this for the “fans” to come and meet DHH?
You say: “We’d like to bring together anywhere from 100-300 of our customers to share our ideas, their ideas, and see if we can all learn a few things from one another.”
Ideas about what? If it’s rails, isn’t that what RailsConf is for? If it’s about Getting Real, some of us paid for it before you gave it away.
I think more explanation is needed (but probably not cause i’m sure there’s a bunch of people that would jump at a chance to meet 37s for $100).
Stan Hansen
on 19 Apr 07One demo I would find interesting is a day in the life of Highrise. Where basically a super-user of highrise goes through all the shortcuts and all of the things that add value to a business. I havent had time to completely dive in to Highrise, so it would be nice to see like a 20 minute demo on extracting the awesomeness.
JF
on 19 Apr 07BJ: Ideas about how people can get more value out of the 37signals products they use every day.
People can learn a lot from each other—they can share ideas, tips, use cases, things that have worked for them. Beginners can learn a lot from powerusers.
How are people using Basecamp? How are people using Highrise? When do they use Backpack instead of Basecamp? How do they use the Backpack Calendar and their other calendars? How are people using Campfire to replace email? How does Writeboard help people keep their documents up to date?
We’re constantly amazed at all the ways people are using our products. Some customers have exposed us to new ways of using our own products. We know there are hundreds of ideas locked up in hundreds of silos. We want to expose those ideas in the flesh.
We’re here to facilitate the sharing, provide our own feedback and ideas, demo our products for people who want to know everything they can about them, show off other products that work with ours, answer questions, and more.
Joe Han Mok
on 19 Apr 07Why do people have to pay $100 to meet 37signals? You can save your bucks by simply reading the forum.
What about the feature requests? What about ‘SEARCH’ function in backpack/basecamp?
Justin Reese
on 19 Apr 07The $100 thing seemed a bit funny to me as well, until I realized that a free event would probably get lots of gawkers and millabouts. (I think I just made up that word.) A small fee limits the crowd to people who will both give and expect to receive value. My bet is it “sells out” fast and is a success. Cheers.
Chad
on 19 Apr 07I agree with Justin, the $100 ensures that the people who attend are serious and consequently the ‘value’ of the conversation will be higher. I don’t think charging for a user conference is all the out of line for a specialized product shop like 37 Signals. At my previous firm we shelled out big buck for a Hitbox user conference—in that case, however, I cannot say it was worth it!
Chad http://www.wtfShouldIDo.com
Rebort
on 19 Apr 07Justin and Chad make good points, but it still sounds funny.
How is this even different from a focus group?
Mike Papageorge
on 19 Apr 07“How is this even different from a focus group?”
How is this even close to a focus group?
People can learn a lot from each other—they can share ideas, tips, use cases, things that have worked for them. Beginners can learn a lot from powerusers.
I can’t remember the last time that happened with a focus group, let along “15 minutes of fame”, Q&A with devs. etc….
Jack
on 19 Apr 07“A small fee limits the crowd to people who will both give and expect to receive value. My bet is it “sells out” fast and is a success. Cheers.”
MS hold event all year long and they don’t charge you anything. You also get free software.
like hell i’m going to pay 37singals $100 to give them my idea that will benefit them more than me. No thank!
Des Traynor
on 19 Apr 07Jesus guys, if you don’t want to go, don’t go, stop throwing the rattle out of the pram over it.
For $100 I’d go, unfortunately I’m in Ireland, so it’s not an option.
One thing I’d love to see coming out of this is a definitive “here is when you’d use Backpack, and here is when you’d use Basecamp” answer.
EW
on 19 Apr 07Charge 100$, give 75$ to charity – everyones happy, (and those in need, too!)
Austen
on 19 Apr 07@Jack, you must be kidding. MS needs loyal customers and needs feedback. 37sigs has loyal customers and want to give their own feedback.
you have better ideas? make your own software. when did people stop believing in improving something that improves their lives?
Kyle Pike
on 19 Apr 07One thing I’d love to see coming out of this is a definitive “here is when you’d use Backpack, and here is when you’d use Basecamp” answer.
The great thing about 37signals products are how simple and versatile they are. For example, once I saw highrise and realized 99% of all my tasks were related to people (including me), I switched from using Backpack for productivity to Highrise. So, use the product any way that works for you.
Chris Busse
on 19 Apr 07I’d go. I’d be really interested in learning more detail about how others are using Basecamp to its fullest, and how other people are splitting up things between Highrise and Basecamp.
I’ve found a way that works for me, and sure people share ideas on forums, but there can be a lot to be gained by meeting face to face with other passionate users.
Jeff Mackey
on 19 Apr 07I am interested, even though it’d mean a quick drive from Detroit to Chicago. I’d like to learn from hardcore Basecamp users who run successful web (or other) businesses on how they set up projects (default to-do lists, etc). Now that Highrise is in the picture, and the forum for that product is running hot with ideas, it would be great to learn and share ideas as to an overall project work-flow using the two products together.
I remember seeing a teaser post a while back on upcoming Backpack features/functionality. I know 37s doesn’t comment on future releases, but as a daily (if not hourly) user of Backpack, it would be great to see an insider’s look at what’s coming. Perhaps even a one-time discount for attendees who are using the free plan, as a way to entice them to sign up for one of the paying plans?
My only feedback on the concept of a Customer Summit would be that as planned, it may be too short (6 or 8 hours may not be long enough). But Jason and Co. may have ideas on that already.
Looking forward to hearing more about it. Thanks!
Adam Brand
on 19 Apr 07I’d be interested in hearing more about the logic and concepts behind some of the screens in various systems. Why was choice A made over choice B, etc.
Anonymous Coward
on 19 Apr 07$100 is tied to commitment. Otherwise 200 people would sign up, the event would fill up instantly, and then way more than half of the people wouldn’t actually go. Then the people who really want to be there wouldn’t be able to get in.
Diego
on 19 Apr 07You guys should do it online too, try to gather some of your overseas customer on campfire and have a sort of online version.
Peter Kaizer
on 19 Apr 07What would interest me as a user of almost all of your products is looking at the interoperability of the the different products. I use Basecamp the most but am increasingly using Highrise and am always looking at ways to make to 2 work better together. I think it would be interesting to hear how you all create interoperability between your applications and to hear how others do as well. Also to hear about how Basecamp in particular can work well with larger enterprise class Digital Asset Management systems.
BTW – I do think these types of ‘user summits’ are great, I have attended several for other software products I use. I’d definitely be interested in attending.
~peter
gary
on 19 Apr 07to pile on to further comments – this sounds simply like another profit making opportunity for the company. Now there is nothing wrong with making profit – but this smacks a bit of heading toward the sleezy side.
To the argument that a fee limits the event to only serious parties – this may be true – but doesn’t really support the stated objective – a customer summit to share ideas. Unless you only want ideas from ‘serious’ customers.
I agree with mr. meyers…you’ve simply found a way to charge your customers to provide feedback…
TomC
on 19 Apr 07I am confused too – why do the customers have to pay ?
JF
on 19 Apr 07For those that think this is about profit, we’ll likely be taking a loss on the event. $100/person will not cover the venue, catering, and time involved in putting this event together. Our Getting Real workshops are for profit (we charge $900/person). The customer summit ($100/person) is not.
We have limited seats. The $100 is to make sure the people who want to be there can be there.
As was mentioned above, if we only have 200 seats, and there is no barrier to saying “sure, I’ll be there” we’ll end up with a lot of people saying they’ll go and then not actually show up. Then we have 200 seats spoken for, but only a fraction of people actually showing up.
By attaching a modest cost to a full-day event we’ll have a better chance at a full audience made up of people who really want to be there. That benefits everyone.
Kyle Pike
on 19 Apr 07I agree that a reasonable event fee is necessary. Especially with a limited number of seats. Chicago is a reasonable 10 hour drive for me so…who do I send the check to? ;)
Bill P
on 19 Apr 07The $100 makes sense. Given the agenda, there’d be plenty of benefit for all (read the post everybody).
Jason, on a somewhat related note…
Do you have any plans about perhaps packaging up past Getting Real workshop(s) onto DVD and selling them? I don’t think that you taped the one I attended, but if you did tape later ones I’d be willing to pay oh… ~ $100 ~ for that…
Patrick Rhone
on 19 Apr 07I for sure would be there for $100.00. As a matter of fact, I would be there if it was $200.00. Then again, I am a (known) fanboy and avid supporter so maybe I do not represent the majority.
That being said, I would love to have a portion of the event that would be like a BarCamp where participants could sign up to demo their own tips, tricks, uses and how they are “getting things done” with the products.
Feel free to sign me up for this if you decide to do it.
JF
on 19 Apr 07That being said, I would love to have a portion of the event that would be like a BarCamp where participants could sign up to demo their own tips, tricks, uses and how they are “getting things done” with the products.
That’s definitely something we’re considering.
Brian Bailey
on 19 Apr 07This is a terrific idea. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of the main benefits is the connections that are made between customers. As the community grows around the apps (including developers), the community is better off and so is the company – the knowledge and support become increasingly shared.
The biggest challenge will be fitting it all into a few hours – that’s a lot of content! One idea: as people register, have them choose which two apps they’re most interested in and submit a question or two in advance. This may help you plan the day and get a feel for what people are hoping to get out of it.
Ivan
on 19 Apr 07You mean customers should pay $100 to tell you what we need and what you need to do? This must be a joke.
Anonymous Coward
on 19 Apr 07You mean customers should pay $100 to tell you what we need and what you need to do? This must be a joke.
It’s interesting that the comments have taken this route, since the post clearly explains that everyone who attends this summit would benefit from the information shared. 37signals doesn’t need your ideas to run their business, they don’t really need your feedback about how you use their product. Someone with a similar business, however, might benefit greatly, and you might benefit greatly from an idea shared by someone else.
Why is that point so difficult to get across? This is a chance for people to share ideas and questions with OTHER CUSTOMERS, it doesn’t have anything to do with meeting DHH or tricking people into paying to steal their ideas. Get a grip!
Unless you only want ideas from ‘serious’ customers. Who are you to say who a serious customer is? Basecamp is used all over the world by people who plan charitable events on the basic plan, or subscribe to the Max plan for unlimited projects and do nothing with it because no one at their company knows how to use it and they’re too big to realize they’re still paying. Why would the person with a big budget give more important feedback or more SERIOUS feedback than the person with a smaller budget?
It’s increasingly ridiculous how negative people are in these comments, it doesn’t matter the context. 37signals is recognizing on their own that some of their conferences are above the budget of their customers – NOT their fanboys, their CUSTOMERS – and they’re researching ways to include more people who want to learn more about their products. Let’s all start the witch hunt, because obviously they’ve jumped the shark.
Don Schenck
on 19 Apr 07Hmmmm … why oh why can’t this be in, say, Kitty Hawk?
I’d say, at this point, there’s a good chance I’ll be there.
Stephen
on 19 Apr 07I think the idea sounds interesting, but you really are charging people to attend a focus group that you will reap a lot of benefit from. The attendees will probably reap some reward as well, but is it enough reward to warrant paying to travel to the summit and paying to get in?
You can accomplish the attendance goal by paying people to attend, which is what most companies would do when trying to conduct formal market research like this.
I do think that the comment about monitoring your own forums more efficiently has a lot of merit.
Anonymous Coward
on 19 Apr 07You can accomplish the attendance goal by paying people to attend, which is what most companies would do when trying to conduct formal market research like this.
Salesforce.com holds one of the biggest customer summits in the industry and charges $295/person. They’ve had thousands and thousands of people attend. People find it valuable.
Stephen
on 19 Apr 07I don’t this it a reasonable comparison. Salesforce.com is a complicated, bloated system that people have to invest some time in learning to use. 37s products are not. In addition:
Salesforce’s event is a huge “conference” not a gathering of a hundred or so users. Their site says ”...event features 150+ breakout sessions, all focused on helping you succeed with Salesforce, CRM, and the Apex platform. There are detailed presentations, innovative business thinkers, and unique case studies for every role.”
Salesforce’s event is spread over three days.
Past keynote speakers at Salesforce’s event included Michael Dell and Colin Powell.
Are you really saying that this event is the same as what the 37s group is trying to put together? If it is, the day rate for Salesforce’s event is basically the same. Of course, you don’t get Colin Powell at 37s.
Anonymous Coward
on 19 Apr 07These negative comments are a perfect example of why 37signals is smart to charge a modest amount to attend. All these haters would just check the “Yes, I’ll attend” box and never show up if the event was free. They’d do it just to screw other people over who actually wanted to attend. They’d do it just to rain on the 37signals parade.
It’s funny… These negative people are trying to make one point, but they’re proving 37signals’ point instead.
ML
on 19 Apr 07If you don’t like the idea of paying to attend, then you’re free to, ya know, not attend. We’re not trying to exploit anyone. (As JF mentioned above, the $100 fee won’t cover our costs.) This summit is about sharing ideas and helping people get more out of the products they use every day. Will it benefit us too? Sure. We think it’s a win-win situation.
Scott Meade
on 19 Apr 07The noise side of svn is starting to push out the signal side more and more. JF asked a simple question: what would you like to see at a customer summit? To that question more than half the comments come back knocking the 100 bucks.
Think of the question this way: “what would you like to see from a $100, one-day gathering of 37signals’ customers”? What would you, as a 37signals customer, like to share with or learn from other 37signals customers in person? It’s your time and your 100 bucks, it’s your summit. Tell them what you would want to see at it – not complain that “it” should be free. The point is that 37s is asking for help to define “it” so how can you say the undefined “it” should be at no charge?
Please – more signal – less noise.
That said, I’d like to hear at a summit other users’ perspectives on: - how each product is used (e.g. what’s the perceived business spaces for basecamp, highrise, and backpack?). How do you decide when a given “todo” should go into what product? - Anyone want to share their internal processes that worked and didn’t work? - How you, as a Basecamp user say, explain and introduce the products to your customers and what their reactions have been. Any objections you’ve had to overcome? Any training or surprises?
Jack
on 19 Apr 07@ Austen
“you must be kidding. MS needs loyal customers and needs feedback. 37sigs has loyal customers and want to give their own feedback.”
Who say MS doesn’t have loyal customers? C#/.Net can hold its own against RoR.
MS hold event for .Net developers that cost nothing.
Do remember there are many world outside of RoR bubble where developers are loyal to.
RoR is NOT the end all.
Alex Bunardzic
on 19 Apr 07Does this “How to use our products” summit signal the end of 37signals’ philosophy of “less is more” and “simplicity is where it’s at”? I mean, the entire charm of their product line lies in the loudly advertised fact that, due to the absence of infrastructure, code, and feature bloat, these products are a no-brainer to use.
Has 37signals now reached a point where these products are beginning to contract featuritis so that the company all of a sudden feels the need to follow in the footsteps of other entrenched vendors?
I certainly hope that’s not the case. I frankly never thought this day will ever come. I’d like to see 37signals continue to proselytize the irreplaceable values of sticking with the essential and eschewing the hype of the feature clamor.
Please, Jason, tell me that you’re not jumping ships here!
Stephen
on 19 Apr 07Actually my point is that the idea of charging for feedback is an example of ego winning out over business sense.
How many other businesses expect users to pay to give feedback?
Here is what you will end up with:
A bunch of 37s fanboys in a room with stars in their eyes and diehard programmers and geeks looking to network.
What do you miss:
The chance to interact with people who could not care less about 37s, but who do use their products everyday and who have real opinions about them. The people who don’t care about the technology running Basecamp, but who do care about how Basecamp improves their workflow.
You may call comments like mine noise, but the fact that people are responding this way is actually more of a signal.
Scott Meade
on 19 Apr 07Stephen – got your point and I agree with you that a Customer Summit is to be about the customers and products, not 37s.
I don’t think the $100 is going to cause a disproportionate number of fanboys to register and Customers to not register though. Maybe it’s inescapable. Maybe all the tix will sell out to the “tell me more about 37s” and “here’s my cool new app” crowd. But it wouldn’t be because of the 100 bucks. If it does happen that way, I hope those attendees are dissapointed when they attend and find out there is value in sharing product ideas with people that couldn’t care less about 37s, Getting Real, or RoR and that they should have signed up for a workshop, conf. or training.
I called half the comments noise because they did not help answer the question of “If you were to attend, what would you like to hear?”. If one won’t attend out of principle, well, then it doesn’t matter what they would like to hear.
Maybe the signal here and in other posts is that 37s has disgruntled users. Any company with a user base this size does. It just seems that svn readers have to filter through more of it than on other blogs – yet 37s claims to have a 98% customer satisfaction rate.
Hey, I’m certainly not always a 37s fan. I’ve posted that they’re wrong plenty of svn posts. But I don’t think they’re ripping folks off with this summit. They know people would pay more in fact. So they are purposefully keeping it a token amount. My kid’s cub scout troop does a similar thing. They charge $5/person for the annual banquet. It doesn’t cover costs but it does let the organizer know how much bar-b-que to order.
JF
on 19 Apr 07a 98% customer satisfaction rate
It’s 94%. We’re shooting for 98% ;)
Justin Reese
on 19 Apr 07Underachiever.
Rachel
on 19 Apr 07@Stephen, Then what are you proposing as an answer? If it was free, you’d probably have all fanboys and then people not showing up so there would be no content. If they charge more than $100, it will probably limit who comes and they wouldn’t be getting a good slice of their customers.
What’s your opinion of an alternative without charging something, that will still keep it a smallish group of people and weed out guys who just sign up because it’s a free chance to schmooze or drool over DHH? Not harassing, I’m honestly curious what model you would go with if you were in their shoes…you didn’t seem to mention what you thought was a better path.
Stephen
on 19 Apr 07@Rachel. I think the solution is to invite users that represent a broad cross-section of the user base to participate in a day long discussion group. However, instead of charging users for access or having 37s decide who is going to participate, I would find a reputable market research firm to recruit people to participate.
Of course, this route would be more expensive then the method proposed here, but it would also be more effective. You could recruit a group of users with varying opinions of the existing applications and different ideas for how they should be evolving.
The bottom line is that this strikes me as a big meet & greet, not a focused panel designed to feel out what the core user group really feels about the products in question.
I, for one, would be willing to shell out 100$ to go to a meet and greet with the 37s team. I am sure it would be interesting.
In the past, the 37s team has designed and developed products internally and then released them to the public. This method worked with Basecamp. Did it work for Highrise? If this summit is filled with the first 200 people willing to shell out 100$ are you going to create an environment that could create an idea like Basecamp. It could happen, but the likelihood is not as great as it could be.
(By the way, I feel like I am totally off-topic here. I think the summit will be fun and interesting, but not terribly productive…I also think that the 37s team should do more events like this)
@JF. As you mentioned on the survey post page, this survey was not scientific. You only surveyed users and you only surveyed users who had logged in within a 48 hour time period. This means that the odds of reaching users who were “satisfied” with your product was significantly higher then they might have been if you had surveyed all users via email or if you kept the survey running in perpetuity and restricted how frequently a user could complete the survey. In addition, how you calculated the satisfaction rate remains a mystery :)
It may have been worthwhile to conduct a “Net Promoter Score” style survey that asks users to rate how likely they are to recommend you. (Just thinking out loud here).
I certainly recommend Basecamp, but I only do so after qualifying the person I am making the recommendation to. If the user needs powerful task management, I don’t recommend Basecamp to them because it lacks prioritization and filtering.
Scott Meade
on 20 Apr 07It’s 94%. We’re shooting for 98% ;)
Only 94%? Oh – I take it all back then. :)
Justin Reese
on 20 Apr 07@JF: Great ideas. I would recommend booking more time for the individual Q&A/discussions (“schmoozing”) than the presentations. I learned from a Tufte seminar that the most valuable interactions came after the one-to-many presentation, during the “autograph session”, when people were lined up and asking Tufte specific questions and getting individual answers. (Much less intimidating than asking him in front of a room, where you tend to keep your questions generic, “smart sounding”, and utterly useless.)
That being said, presentations are a valuable way to get conversations going and communicate compressed versions of complex ideas, so please do keep them, just in a minority role.
Wish I could be there!
Why is everyone presupposing DHH will be the drool recipient? Sam Stephenson will be there! JavaScript library developers are hot.
Patrick Rhone
on 22 Apr 07I saw David Heinemeier Hansson (He hates being called “DHH” by the way) today at MinneBar. He was great. Certainly drool worthy in that one geek to another sort of way.
MinneBar was fantastic and, like most BarCamps, free to participants. Therefore, I was happy to give a little drool to the cause. I expect that if I am paying a fee to attend, Jason and Co. will make the time to let me show others how I am using the hell out of their products so I can get drooled on a little myself.
:-)
This discussion is closed.