from Hacker News

Shoot the arrow, then paint the target around it

by inetsee on 5/1/23, 10:07 PM with 99 comments

• by Gustomaximus on 5/2/23, 2:44 AM

  This is a big marketing lesson in general. All to often I see managers tell me they want to be the <insert something popular> brand. More often than not I ask them is that true about this company? Many don't see the connection between promoting something true to your core vs what you want to be perceived as. Some literally feel offended no being what they want to be even when it's clear.

  The line I reuse is, "Find a fundamental truth, then celebrate it"

  Truth doesn't mean you cant polish and choose the best angle, but the truth must be there and exist today.

  One of the classic examples is the Guiness dancing man. They literally celebrated how long it takes to pour a Guiness vs ignoring or tying to make out it's not that long. Brilliant marketing: https://youtu.be/69MpLiYhsXw

• by aqme28 on 5/2/23, 11:09 AM

  This feels like textbook survivorship bias as advice. Plenty of artists try to do their own thing and are not culturally rewarded for it.

• by Fricken on 5/2/23, 10:53 AM

  >Instead of aiming for the same target as other musicians—trying to out-sing or out-play them—Springsteen instead doubled down on the quality that made him unique: His ability to write song lyrics.

  No, the ability to write song lyrics does not make Bruce Springsteen unique. He didn't exploit some weird angle that no other performer had considered. And it's worth noting his breakout hit, "Born in the USA" was popular because few people actually listened to the lyrics. It sounds like a patriotic song until you actually listen to what he says.

• by bambax on 5/2/23, 10:45 AM

  This isn't bad advice. The obvious risk is you can spend your whole life (and then some) waiting for the world to catch up with your own special weirdness.

  But maybe that doesn't matter. Short of starving, some people are happier being themselves than trying to fit into someone else's dream.

  Not all people, though! You need to decide where you belong (but at some point it's going to be obvious anyway).

• by noufalibrahim on 5/2/23, 5:32 AM

  A big point that the article is missing is the work put in.

  If you're the kind of person that shoots several arrows, one (or more) of them is bound to hit and then you double down. It's a mix of luck, insight into opportunities, timing etc. Not a reliable formula for success but one that increases chances.

  Just doing a lot of work opens up opportunities that idle planners can't even imagine.

• by mrhektor on 5/2/23, 6:56 AM

  While I agree that the article is a bit specious, I think there is a deeper argument to be made about Springstein's specific kind of lyrics.

  As mentioned in the article, his lyrics are about blue-collar workers and the associated struggles and life. This was probably an under-served / poorly talked about community when he was on the rise. It's just a case of focussing on an under-served market. I'm not sure of Springsteins' background, but if he came from a blue-collar background, then he would have known his community / market really well.

  So I guess the lesson is, serve an under-served market with talent that's good enough. It helps if you, yourself, are the customer :)

• by cwillu on 5/2/23, 7:36 AM

  Paint the general area where the arrow might go, then shoot the arrow, and finally remove all the paint that doesn't constitute a target perfectly hit. That way you're not doing suspicious things to the target people might call you on.

• by anigbrowl on 5/2/23, 2:41 AM

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_sharpshooter_fallacy

  Of course, your ability to hit a target in reality has nothing to do with the number of other people aiming at it - in this case, Bruce Springsteen's ability to write great songs is not constrained by the existence of many other brilliant songwriters.

  This sort of free-association discourse seems very popular in marketing/ entrepreneurial/ motivational blogging but sadly it's not that informative or educational.

• by plq on 5/2/23, 5:52 AM

  Oh sure, do that. But don't forget that these kinds of articles are written by lucky people whose "targets" were of interest to others. Would you care if I told you I held a world record in the 98m sprint?

  Embrace your weirdness, but unless you are lucky enough to have a weirdness that resonates with people, you are just an outcast.

  Enjoy everything in moderation, including your qualities that may come off as unusual to others, whatever they may be.

  You are probably an ordinary person. Chill out and just do your best.

• by elevaet on 5/3/23, 1:56 AM

  > the qualities you suppress the most—because they make you weird or different from other people. At some point in your life, you were probably shamed for embodying those qualities, so you learned to conceal them.

  > But here’s the thing: We notice things because of contrast. Something stands out because it’s different from what surrounds it.

  The other thing that happens is that you get so used to your own quirks and traits that they don't seem remarkable whatsoever, like how the fish can't tell it's swimming in water. And then particularly for introverts, if you don't get out and contrast yourself agains the people around you, it's easy to go around life with no concept of what makes you unique.

• by tinkertamper on 5/2/23, 3:04 AM

  I was hoping this was about my coworkers tuning on our cloudwatch alarms until pagerduty stops calling

• by dclowd9901 on 5/2/23, 2:26 AM

  Funny he pins Springsteen’s success on his lyricism when he was using a rhyming dictionary to write basically all of Welcome to Asbury Park and was obviously aping the blue collar poeticism of Bob Dylan.

  I love Springsteen, but it’s mostly because the E Street band is absolutely bonkers good.

• by atorodius on 5/2/23, 6:24 AM

  I was hoping the piece would be about this sentence from the intro

  > Here was this 73-year-old guy dancing, jumping, and sliding across the stage, pulling off moves that would put people in their 30s to shame

  How does one keep so fit all the way to 73?

• by khazhoux on 5/2/23, 5:07 AM

  Ridiculous hogwash. Springsteen didn't "paint a target around his arrow." He is just insanely talented in a way that resonates with millions of people.

  Step 1: Be Springsteen

  Step 2:

• by starkparker on 5/3/23, 3:22 PM

  For the full Eno quote in at least a little more context, there's this 2010 Guardian interview: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/jan/17/brian-eno-inte...

• by d--b on 5/2/23, 4:45 AM

  That’s utter bullshit.

  To correct the metaphor: you don’t paint the target yourself, the target paints itself and it’s quite lucky if your arrow is somewhere in it.

• by markeibes on 5/2/23, 6:17 AM

  The thing that barely anybody seems to mention is that what elevates Springsteens best moments is Roy Bittan's piano playing.

• by vxNsr on 5/2/23, 2:58 AM

  This is a good idea but the piece reads like an idealistic LinkedIn post that’s been overshared and rewritten a thousand times.

• by nicbou on 5/2/23, 7:12 AM

  I was greeted by a massive newsletter banner before I could read a word. It’s for a guy who knows everything about success, apparently. The advice is predictably trite, in the way the horoscope usually is.

• by whiddershins on 5/2/23, 2:28 AM

  This makes the most sense when there is an oversupply of arrows for a given bullseye.

  If, otoh, there is a massive shortage of something and you can supply that thing, no need to reinvent the wheel.

• by rr808 on 5/2/23, 1:17 PM

  I heard it as look at which way the ship is drifting and announce that as the strategic direction. It isn't supposed to be a complement.

• by stefs on 5/2/23, 10:33 AM

  pedantic nitpicking: "People often want to aim for the biggest, most obvious target, and hit it smack in the bull’s eye. Of course with everybody else aiming there as well that makes it very hard to hit."

  this makes no sense. the analogy doesn't really work, because no matter how many people are aiming, the difficulty to hit the bullseye is always the same.

• by whartung on 5/2/23, 2:45 AM

  If I’m not mistaken, the concept of shooting and drawing the target around where it hit is known as “Kentucky windage”.

  Edit: apparently I am mistaken.

• by RosanaAnaDana on 5/2/23, 2:47 AM

  'This above all: to thine own self be true'

  -Polonius

• by noduerme on 5/2/23, 9:10 AM

  Guh. Springsteen is a great songwriter, great musician for a lot of reasons. Using him as a prop/example for the cheapest of cheap worthless nonsensical self-help garbage that doesn't even rate as an article or an original thought; not so cool.

• by blendergeek on 5/2/23, 2:42 AM

  In accordance with Hacker News guidelines the headline should be: The key to becoming extraordinary.

• by Eddy_Viscosity2 on 5/2/23, 9:43 PM

  In engineering this is called "draw your graph, then plot your points"

• by wunderland on 5/2/23, 2:58 PM

  Sometimes I forget that most people on HN are huge dorks

• by golemotron on 5/2/23, 1:39 PM

  This the advice of Peter Thiel in the book Zero To One.

• by sakerbos on 5/2/23, 11:42 AM

  Started reading this as it was vaguely intriguing but after a few sentences I was confronted by a "Enter your email to continue reading" dialog. It seems like the author has taken his own writing to heart. Unfortunately for the author, the arrow won't land again.