Free Marketing Lesson From Steve Jobs

A few days ago, I came across an interesting video on YouTube.

It was Steve Jobs speaking at the Worldwide Developer Conference in 1997.

During that conference, there was a moment where an audience member, who was clearly upset, asked young Steve Jobs this attacking question:

“...It's sad and clear that on several accounts you don't know what you're talking about. I would like for you to express in clear terms, say how Java, in any of its incarnations, addresses the idea that it embodies in OpenDoc. And when you're finished with that, perhaps you could tell us personally what you've been doing for the past seven years.”

Before I explain, let me give you some context.

OpenDoc was a software Apple created in 1992. Their developers have been working on and improving it for five years until Steve Jobs decided to pull the plug on the project.

At the time, Apple was losing a lot of money and everyone expected them to fail. Plus the software had a lot of flaws so it made sense to discontinue it from a business point of view.

So this man was upset because the developers that spent seven years worth of effort on this software were basically wasted and got laid off.

And this was Steve Jobs’ summed up response:

When you’re trying to make change, you can’t please everyone. What makes it even harder is that the people who argue against the change may sometimes be right.

And the hardest thing?

Figuring out how it fits into the bigger picture so they’re able to sell billions of dollars worth of the product a year.

Then he said, in my opinion, the most profound thing in his talk, which was:

“You have to start with the customer experience and work backwards to the technology.”

In other words,

Start with your target customers first. Find their problems and needs, then build something to solve them.

Yes, I know it’s nothing new. It’s marketing 101, but still very important nonetheless.