Technology

Has anyone been to any kind of convention for nerdy things. Nerds are so captured by the marketing and products being sold that they let it take over their personality and they can’t stop buying junk.

This... strikes me more as self-aggrandizing than informative.

Yes, many technical folks are put off by certain marketing tricks. Good marketers just use different techniques when targeting people in this market, when they bother to at all.

We're not immune to manipulation; and thinking that we are makes us more susceptible to it.

You are not immune to propaganda

Nerds are some of the biggest consumers of stupid pointless bullshit on the planet.

Yeah, no prices. I move on. Same with job ads, no salary no application. If I get an intrusive ad, I'm not buying that product, I'll deliberately seek out another brand in fact.

Is that a weird attitude to have? I thought it just made sense. We shouldn't be rewarding this BS.

Here's the thing... I want to be sold something. Not anything, but certain somethings. There was a brief time when Google AdSense was new that I was excited for the experience. (I now know how fucking stupid I was, but hey, I was young).

The idea that a new product aligned to my interests and designed with me in mind would be advertised to me instead of feminine hygiene products or mesothelioma lawsuit ads seemed awesome.

I do not want your bullshit hype machine alpha male inside club cool kid image peddled as the reason I should hand you my money. You've got the wrong guy. Tell me what it does with a side of what I can do with it. And the "what I can do with it" shouldn't be "get laid".

As a former developer with probably 40 games under my belt, I'm gonna say this is a highly specious article designed to stroke egos. Yes there are very valid points being made that I can personally identify with, but they come from a one-dimensional perspective that also manages to leave out data, and conspicuously lacks basic understanding of the efficacy of 'general' sales/marketing, instead filling in with presumptions of comparative efficacy.

As a System Admin, I totally feel this. I fucking hate vendors and their bullshit marketing. In generally during the times that I have to deal, I will usually hear them out. But if the rep is annoying I will start the Q&A with questions that are designed to destroy their presentations or expose how little they know about their products. Good sales reps know how to react but bad ones just dig it in deeper and it becomes a show.

Clearly the author have never seen the audiophile community. $100 cable, anyone?

we are not immune, we are just able to install a fuckin adblocker. noone is immune to propaganda.

the rampant consumerism in nerd spaces seems to disprove the Lemmy title in the large, even if this specific example indicates the opposite wrt marketing by software firms aimed at developers.

If we have to talk to someone to find out the price, the product may as well not exist.

I have never felt so seen!

Yeah pretty much, i mean you cant just assume because someone is a developer that they have a brain but this sums up my relationship with all the sales people ive met in my career

Me: Hey i need information about your product

Sales: Hey id love to swing by and show you our product line. How many can we put you foen for? Can we schedule a call?

Me: finds a different vendor

The way I've always looked at it, a good product/service can typically stand on it's reputation. If a company needs to spend millions on advertising to move their stuff, they're probably not all that good or are overpriced. Someone is paying for all that advertising and it always ends up being the consumer.

I'll just add that a white paper with technical information about how the product works is actually valuable. A white paper that reads like an ad in the form of an infographic is a waste of time.

And here I was hoping this was some psychological study and not a dude ranting for paragraphs how he's the most specialest one.

That's why just about every technology forum ends up being a consumer board.

Marketing absolutely works on Nerds, what a ridiculous statement. Just because certain types marketing will push us away doesn't mean all marketing is pointless. Be honest, let me know what your product does, give me a proper datasheet and a price, and I'll explore it. Try to shove some hyperbolic BS down by throat while hiding the things I actually care about and I'll never buy from your company.

Bullshit

Funko pops. Lego. Star wars. Marvel

Why do people keep using the word marketing to just mean ads and promotion? Marketing is more than just that, even a software developer is engaging in marketing when they for example beta test their software on their target audience.

They tend not to work on neurodivergent people and there is a huge overlap between NDs and "nerds."

Good insights, and not just software developers, really. We don’t like ads, sensationalism, or anything reeking of bullshit

Its a big list of major assumptions by someone who never bothered to verify if they're even true. He's mad he had to work with a heavily marketed product that his boss liked, and wrote this about it. Check out this quote from the article;

And the really fun part is that “astroturfing” a thread about your product on Hacker News or Reddit is just about impossible. If you go to the places where developers hang out and try to promote your product, you will be shot down faster than Mark Zuckerberg at a privacy conference.

Dude. Reddit is practically more bot than person at this point, and its impossible to know by how much, because of how good they are at fooling everyone. https://www.clrn.org/how-much-of-reddit-is-bots/

Good marketing absolutely works on nerds. We will literally share cool ads (funny world best) with each other in the same way with memes, which is part of "viral marketing".

At the same time though, those lame ads using low-grade, overused memes (usually the comic ones) trying to be edgy pretty much make me want to pass on a product. Crappy AI-gen ads are even worse.

But next time I go to Japan, I absolutely still want to try a Sakaeru gummy because THAT marketing campaign was just brilliant and entertaining

( https://youtu.be/LQsMp4Oo6xM )

I've also seen a few cool tech things in ads that I've looked into. Generally nothing I'll grab right away but they often end up in a list of things that I potentially buy later when I've some free cash or the need. Aliexpress is pretty good with this as it tends to suggest neat tech things that are a cheap to add and fill that "free shipping" gap.

What DOESN'T work is cheap/lame broadside marketing with little to no product details. I don't want a video as an ad - especially not one from an influencer who has no clue but looks pretty - but I'm happy to look up an actual product demo that includes key features/points.

Honestly though, the best thing is if the product demonstratibly works. This is especially true for FOSS-based products that have stuff I can try for free at home (personal use) or ones where the main product is usable for limited seats etc and has a commercial/premium license with value-add like AD/SAML group integrations or SSO/MFA.

That said, any asshole who cold-calls me pretending an existing business relationship to setup a marketing meeting is going on "the list", and vendor "demos" that are just marketing slides aren't far off on that either

yes it does

I wouldn't say immune, I just have a low tolerance for unfounded claims, and little interest in most of the impulse purchase junk that most ads are trying to sell.

Give me an ad for good tech at good prices (and actually list the fkin price), and I'm interested.

Like OP said, if there's no price, just a "call to get a quote" or some other similar nonsense in place of a price, then I'm either not buying that product, or I'm buying it somewhere else that they list the damn cost.

"Call to inquire" can be adequately translated to: we want to sell this shit to your entire company, call us so we can convince you to do just that" meanwhile you want to buy one so you can check it out to see if it's even useful because marketing claims are almost always bullshit.

And every public service app and webshop should have a "developer" section where you can report bugs. I'll do it even for free you fucking morons!

developers want to read documentation

they won't look at any white papers

?!?!?!?!!

Marketing 100% works on anyone. If you dont think it does its because the marketing has done such a good job on you you don't even know it.