Disqus - Latest Comments for rganguly47

Re: The Ultimate SaaS Guide to Setting Up the Perfect NPS Campaign

Robi Ganguly — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 18:54:54 -0000

Hi Chad, your bias is showing :).

In-app input is much much much better at scale for software experiences. The reason? Representative answers and broad customer interaction. This isn't just true for NPS. It's true for marketing campaigns, CS research, product experiments, etc.

Email delivery and open rates are plummeting. This isn't something you can change.

By continuing to advocate marriage to a channel where customers aren't listening and responding, you're advising your customers to purposely be deaf to the data (and assume that they won't hear from the majority of their customers). I appreciate that you are in a tough spot, but it's a real shame that you're pushing an agenda out of line with the results that are required: representative input from your customers (all of them, ideally). Email has its uses, but when it comes to defending it as a channel that is "best" it's out of line and I think your characterization of Wootric or anything else that is in-app as "fundamentally flawed" really de-legitimizes your own arguments for some of the strengths of the channel.

As an observer of your arguments online in other venues, it's a real shame that you are so defensive when Jessica comments and accuse her and her team of "hijacking" a conversation. A focus on customers and their voices would be something much more beneficial to both of your companies and the market as a whole.

Re: Top 10 Tips To Giving Awesome Customer Service

Robi Ganguly — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 02:58:12 -0000

Thanks Carl! It is a shame how few people are really focusing on their customers today, but I think we're seeing more and more people invest more in their retention and overall experience. Software experiences keep getting better and more personal :)

Re: Senior Send-Off - Pomona Team Challenge

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 14 May 2015 14:29:26 -0000

People ask this question all the time without knowing what their actual passions are. Be honest with yourself and identify them. Invest in them in your personal life and your professional life. If you're doing that, you'll find yourself getting better and better at marrying your passions with your work.

Re: Senior Send-Off - Pomona Team Challenge

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 14 May 2015 14:26:29 -0000

You'll come to realize that no matter where you go in the world, many of your closest connections and the people you truly share the most with were people you met over the past 4 years. Sagehens are a special breed - invest in maintaining your friendships and deepening them. Your life will be monumentally better for keeping connected with the people who you're graduating with right now.

Re: Six Things App Developers Need To Know about ASO

Robi Ganguly — Sat, 08 Nov 2014 20:06:42 -0000

This is some solid advice. In particular, the ratings and reviews components are mattering more every day - the algorithms for search and recommendations, along with customer download decisions, depend a lot on what other customers are saying. In order to ensure that your customers are happy and that you're doing a good job getting them to come back and say great things, you need to think about how to engage and communicate with your customers inside the app. Some good advice on that front here: http://www.apptentive.com/b...

Re: These charts show exactly what’s wrong with Seattle’s startup scene, and what’s right

Robi Ganguly — Sat, 01 Nov 2014 15:03:16 -0000

Tony's right: given this data set, the most useful comparisons require a per capita calculation.

John, part of the problem with your analysis is that this is a tiny data set to determine the health of our startup community.

Focusing myopically on the investment climate assumes that Seattle businesses require as much investment in order to succeed in a meaningful way. "Business is all about growth" - your words. But does that growth come organically or is it fueled by outside investment? Is investor money required for all of the growth our companies are seeing?

The answer is no. For example, TUNE, recently acknowledged as Seattle's fastest growing company (http://www.inc.com/will-yak... has done it in a tremendously capital efficient way. At a time when more VCs are ringing the alarm bell about high burn rates isn't it useful to think about if all that investment is causing other problems?

Seattle is consistently building healthy, growing, customer-obsessed companies. Measuring VC trends is akin to measuring the amount of vermouth someone's adding to the shaker when making a martini: sometimes more isn't better for the end result.

Re: Mobile Games and Their Sequels – Are Sequels Loved Less?

Robi Ganguly — Mon, 16 Jun 2014 17:28:06 -0000

That's a great point Game Mob, you're right, sometimes the sequels are just rehashing the previous game and don't deserve great reviews. In those scenarios, I think our Love Score is properly identifying that the apps may not have gotten the love and care they deserve.

Re: Apple Removes Fake And Purchased App Reviews And Ratings On The App Store

Robi Ganguly — Sat, 14 Jun 2014 12:05:24 -0000

We talked about this phenomenon a few weeks ago. It's usually pretty easy with a bit of judgement to figure out which app reviews are fake / useless. The important part, for Apple and Google, is being able to detect them automatically so that they don't taint their algorithms: http://www.apptentive.com/b...

Re: The Mobile Downturn

Robi Ganguly — Mon, 14 Apr 2014 18:44:17 -0000

There are two aspects of this that people seem to make blanket statements about: 1) App store search is broken and 2) The app store isn't a growth or discovery channel for mobile apps.

On point 1: from the consumer's perspective, app store search works reasonably well. There continue to be improvements in both major app stores (unsurprisingly Google is leading the charge here) and the personalization and ranking methods are getting better. However, "app store search is broken" tends to be a complaint by app publishers who want to rank differently.

On point 2: the influx of mobile apps certainly makes it hard for many app publishers to stand out in the crowd. However, this does not mean that new apps can't find growth and discovery in the app stores. We have hundreds of clients who started off small and have grown, mostly through the hard work of building and iterating on a product and improving it as they listen to their customers.

Re: New In-App Feedback

Robi Ganguly — Mon, 20 Jan 2014 16:37:24 -0000

Yay! So happy to be working together. We love the Haiku Deck team's approach to building amazing software :)

Re: The Best Leadership Advice I’ve Ever Gotten

Robi Ganguly — Wed, 15 Jan 2014 14:35:56 -0000

Absolutely love this! So so happy for you, your journey and your relaxation :)

Re: Top tips to stop users uninstalling your apps | Latest news from the game development industry | Develop

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 21 Nov 2013 21:15:33 -0000

This is some good basic advice around how to reduce the amount of annoyance you create in a mobile app. The general principle here is to be convenient and personal in the way you connect with your customers. For example, as you mention, we know that apps ask for ratings and that those are important, but doing it at the right time and in the right way, is incredibly important. We've actually shared our thoughts on the right way to do this (http://www.apptentive.com/b... and have found that a simple philosophy of trying to focus on the end consumer first is a winning strategy.

Re: Crash Dev: Native mobile: a new (and scary) link in the enterprise value chain

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 14 Nov 2013 15:16:22 -0000

Fantastic thinking here Chris, thanks so much for sharing. As you touched on, one of the big reasons that thinking that mobile is an extension of the web is a mistake is that the web, while "always on", has not been "always-on" from the consumer's perspective.

Whether it's firing up your desktop or flipping open your laptop, there's ultimately been a cost in getting online for consumers. Designing for mobile means rethinking the consumer's experience starting with the assumption that you're connected, globally, as soon as you put your device in your pocket. We repeatedly see the way in which the consumer experience can be reshaped when respecting this change: whether it's Uber turning into a remote control for transportation or HotelTonight enabling a new mode of lodging discovery and booking; when consumers don't have to think / take action in order to be connected, commerce changes dramatically. Exciting times for sure.

Re: Ratings to Affect Apple App Store Rankings

Robi Ganguly — Tue, 01 Oct 2013 10:11:17 -0000

Thanks Betsy, we're glad you liked it and yes, it's certainly not unique to mobile apps. Treating people like human beings in all of their experiences is crucial to long-term success :)

Re: Ratings to Affect Apple App Store Rankings

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 21:33:08 -0000

We think it's super important. An underestimated aspect of the consumer experience to be sure. Thanks for reading and sharing Tim!

Re: Developers "simplistic or reactive" in measuring performance - Crittercism

Robi Ganguly — Mon, 23 Sep 2013 01:12:30 -0000

Interestingly, we've found that companies who are actively conversing with customers and listening to their opinions are much more quickly iterating on their products and achieving business success. While monitoring the reviews in the app store can certainly lag behind other methods (like in-app feedback and communication) it's not clear that this lag is more than a few days. The real challenge companies have is managing and prioritizing the opportunities. Analytics about app performance can certainly help reduce friction, but figuring out why customers are using your apps and what they might like to see next is how to engender love and loyalty. Without loyal customers each app is just an app, not a sustainable business.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Fri, 06 Sep 2013 12:22:06 -0000

Absolutely! Food is totally crucial and yet for most of us it's an afterthought, I love this panel idea.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:53:30 -0000

Mobile is reinventing our daily lives - this is an awesome panel, can't wait to hear their thoughts and insights on how we can learn from what's happening and be part of the reinvention process.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:50:52 -0000

"What does it mean to develop for man's best friend?"!!!!! Yes! I want to know how you do UX research here :) Such a cool topic.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:50:06 -0000

It feels like online storytelling is starting to truly pull away from print and TV in execution. It's an exciting time to be an information consumer - can't wait to learn more about what we'll be seeing next and how the tools are shaping the creative experience.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:47:10 -0000

Oh man - if I could figure out how to make some of the hardware ideas floating around in my head that'd be awesome. I can't wait to attend this panel.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:40:00 -0000

I was fortunate to have a few key teachers who were amazing storytellers. They made the information interesting and relevant and captivated me with ideas, which helped me learn more effectively. It's my sincere hope that more of tomorrow's teachers will adopt creative and visual techniques in order to engage more of their students.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:36:33 -0000

If you're a startup struggling to figure out the "pitch" you absolutely must listen to these two experts. It's rare that you get to spend time with folks on both sides of the fundraising conversation and to get candid advice - this will be dynamite.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:35:08 -0000

In today's incredibly noisy world, clear stories are more important than ever before. Being memorable is crucial to having your story get shared - learning how to do this better is an essential skill for anyone participating in our digital economy.

Re: SXSW PanelPicker

Robi Ganguly — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 19:31:09 -0000

Too many people think that the search war is over. We're just at the beginning. Over the next decade more than half of the global population will come online - are we prepared for what that means? Is search going to work well for us then?