#vendorpitchdecoder — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #vendorpitchdecoder, aggregated by home.social.
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"We've done this before" is the most comforting line in a vendor pitch — and the one that needs the most unpacking. Similar is not the same. The real value of experience isn't the solution they built last time. It's what went wrong and what they learned. Ask: can you walk me through what went sideways and how you handled it?
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"You need a custom solution" is often the most expensive answer to a question you haven't fully asked. Most early-stage products aren't as unique as they feel from the inside. The cost of custom isn't just the build — it's the maintenance forever. Build custom where it matters, borrow everything else.
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"We follow best practices" is the vaguest promise in a vendor pitch. Best practices for whom? What works for a bank processing millions of transactions is overhead for a startup finding product-market fit. Your ten-person company shouldn't be built with Fortune 500 ceremony. The best practice for early-stage founders is working with people who know when the textbook doesn't apply.
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"It's fully scalable" ends the most questions in vendor pitches. It should start them. Everything scales until it doesn't. A system for 500 users looks nothing like one for 500,000 — different architecture, different cost profile. Scaling isn't just a technical milestone, it's a financial one. Ask: scalable to what?
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"We'll build it in six weeks" is the most seductive line in a vendor pitch. Six weeks usually gets you a demo, not a product. The gap between "it works when I click through it" and "it works when a thousand customers hit it" is called phase two — and that's where the real time and money live. Ask what's deferred.