undefined | Better HN

0 pointstyoma4y ago0 comments

The strategy is extremely effective, especially for high-priced but rarely purchased items like dishwashers, cars, flooring, etc.

Consider: one of the hardest parts about advertising is figuring out when someone is ready to buy the product. That is why car companies bombard ads everywhere, just to catch you in the rare moment when you may be buying a car. Lets guess that maybe the odds of a random person wanting to buy a dishwasher is 1 in a million.

Now consider someone who has just bought a dishwasher. What are the odds they need a new one or a second one? Maybe the one they bought is a few cm too tall/wide/deep. Maybe it came broken on arrival. What are the odds here? I have no data, but I would guess like 1 in ten thousand.

The odds of you buying a dishwasher and then needing to buy another are much better than the odds of someone wanting to buy a dishwasher in the first place, because the hard part is finding people who want to buy a dishwasher.

0 comments

icoder4y ago

I'm sorry but that doesn't make sense to me at all. Is that based on anything more than intuition because if not I'd like to say that mine sides with op. I'll add some numbers too. If a dishwasher has a lifetime of 20 years and a person is 'sensitive' to adds for dishwashers for a month surrounding the time it breaks, you're talking about a 1 in 240 chance if you 'randomly' target people with a dishwasher, which should be doable to predict with a 1 in 4 chance using some basic demographics. That's roughly 1 in 1000 'total', 10x better than your 1 in 10.000 ;)

quesera4y ago

The reasonable explanation I've read elsewhere is:

Something like 30% of purchased products (including appliances) are DOA or returned.

The follow-on advertising is hoping to capture your replacement activity.

drw854y ago

Pretty sure this doesn't apply to medication or dishwashers. :D

1 more reply

tyomaOP4y ago

I do not have concrete numbers, but would love to know for sure if anyone on HN is from the industry.

I think once your dishwasher breaks, the time you are “live” to buy is closer to a week :). Also it is (maybe?) harder to identify a person with a broken dishwasher than one who just bought one and may need another.

baremetal4y ago

dishwashers have standard dimensions

"A standard dishwasher is about 24 inches wide, 24 inches deep and 35 inches high. Most cabinet openings are made to fit a standard dishwasher size. Note that certain handles may affect the overall dishwasher depth. Oversized dishwashers are built wider than the standard opening."

they come in three sizes compact standard and custom.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse