Aspirin vs. Vitamins

Posted on by

Andy Monfried, who writes the excellent You Ain’t Gonna Learn What You Don’t Wanna Know blog, has a great post titled Finding Pain and Creating Value.

In start-up speak, being an aspirin is much more attractive than being a vitamin. Aspirin solves a customer’s pain while vitamins help maintain wellbeing. Aspirins are a must have, vitamins are nice-to-haves.

In this letter providing guidance to HBS students on business plans, Paul Baier lays it out nicely:


Entirely too many of the business plans clearly do not identify and clearly segment the **pain** the target customer is feeling. How bad is this pain? What is it costing in terms of dollars or time? What are the implications of not solving this problem? Too many of the plans address “vitamin” or nice-to-solve problems (e.g. my garage is dirty) and not “aspirin” or must-solve-today problem.

I don’t know Andy, but he’s had a successful career in online advertising and writes well-informed posts – this guy knows his stuff. His new company, Lotame, appears to solve a real problem for both social networks and those advertising on them by utilizing the tremendous amount of information available to accurately target ads.

The inability to effectively monetize social networks continues to be a pain for both the networks and advertisers, good luck to Andy and Lotame on their quest to solve this problem.

  • http://thelongprocess.com/01/08/2007/48 The Long Process

    Are You an Aspirin or a Vitamin?…

    I love metaphors.
    Fraser Kelton from Disruptive Thoughts uses a great one as he writes on marketing:
    …being an aspirin is much more attractive than being a vitamin. Aspirin solves a customer’s pain while vitamins help maintain wellbeing. Aspir…

  • Andy M

    You said it better than I could… Thanks for the kind words and the props. The “aspirin vs vitamin” comparision is 110% dead on precisely what my company is based on. Rock on, and keep up the great work. Andy

  • http://www.lotame.com Andy M

    You said it better than I could…

    Thanks for the kind words and the props.

    The “aspirin vs vitamin” comparision is 110% dead on precisely what my company is based on.

    Rock on, and keep up the great work.

    Andy

  • nate archer

    Great post and a really interesting metaphor. I think it comes down to knowing your user. Most businesses and products solve a problem but it is essential to find out whether your user actually needs to solve that problem. I also see things that are maybe “essential vitamins”, these are things that meet a non-essential need but do it so well that they become an essential supplement to our lifestyle. The best example of this is the Internet, although It wasn’t at first essential it become a “vitamin” that we needed to maintain our health.

  • http://trackingimagination.wordpress.com nate archer

    Great post and a really interesting metaphor. I think it comes down to knowing your user. Most businesses and products solve a problem but it is essential to find out whether your user actually needs to solve that problem.

    I also see things that are maybe “essential vitamins”, these are things that meet a non-essential need but do it so well that they become an essential supplement to our lifestyle. The best example of this is the Internet, although It wasn’t at first essential it become a “vitamin” that we needed to maintain our health.

  • Fraser

    Nice thought Nathan. Instead of being a vitamin/aspirin, instead do you think the internet is a platform/conduit (“series of pipes”:)) that introduced us to many more vitamins/aspirins? i.e. certain web services are aspirin while others are vitamins? (and still others are neither, they’re simply cool technologies)

  • http://www.disruptivethoughts.com Fraser

    Nice thought Nathan. Instead of being a vitamin/aspirin, instead do you think the internet is a platform/conduit (“series of pipes”:)) that introduced us to many more vitamins/aspirins?

    i.e. certain web services are aspirin while others are vitamins? (and still others are neither, they’re simply cool technologies)

  • Abhijit Nadgouda

    A very interesting perspective. Aspirin v/s Vitamin is probably the best way to put it. I always consider constraints of the user, and breaking a constraint provides the maximum benefit.

  • Fraser

    Abhijit, that’s a good way of thinking of it as well. Many of the best aspirins don’t break a constraint – they present an entirely new path/direction to follow.

  • http://ifacethoughts.net Abhijit Nadgouda

    A very interesting perspective. Aspirin v/s Vitamin is probably the best way to put it. I always consider constraints of the user, and breaking a constraint provides the maximum benefit.

  • http://www.disruptivethoughts.com Fraser

    Abhijit, that’s a good way of thinking of it as well. Many of the best aspirins don’t break a constraint – they present an entirely new path/direction to follow.

  • http://oneadayvitamin.info/?p=890 One A Day Vitamin » Aspirin vs. Vitamins

    [...] Fraser placed an interesting blog post on Aspirin vs. VitaminsHere’s a brief overviewIn start-up speak, being an aspirin is much more attractive than being a vitamin. Aspirin solves a customer’s pain while vitamins help maintain wellbeing. Aspirins are a must have, vitamins are nice-to-haves. … [...]

  • http://www.mirriad.com Allison

    last week i was researching enterprenurial thinking and came across and article (i thought by you) on the aspirin v vitamine analogy but cannot find it in its entirty today. i wanted to share it with my staff. we are a new company that i believe is an aspirin and was using your example as a way to make a point about solving our own problems as well as others.
    can you provide me with the link to that article?
    thanks’a

  • http://www.linkedin.com/in/heartburnhomeremedy Heartburn Home Remedy

    The topic is quite trendy on the Internet right now. What do you pay attention to when choosing what to write about?

  • http://viralogy.com/themes/demo-choupress/?p=13 choupress » The First 90 Days of an Entrepreneur

    [...] sure you focus on Aspirins instead of Vitamins. One solves a real PAIN, while the other is just a good-to-have. With EXTREMELY good marketing, you [...]

  • http://www.viralogy.com/themes/demo-phenpress/?p=13 PhenPress » The First 90 Days of an Entrepreneur

    [...] sure you focus on Aspirins instead of Vitamins. One solves a real PAIN, while the other is just a good-to-have. With EXTREMELY good marketing, you [...]

  • http://www.acai-antioxidants.com/acai-extract.html Acai Extract | Acai Antioxidants, for a healthy mind and body

    [...] aspirin vs. vitamins – andy monfried, who writes the excellent you ain’t gonna learn what you don’t wanna know blog, has a great post titled finding pain and creating value. in start-up speak, being an aspirin is much more attractive than being a vitamin. … addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fwww.acai-antioxidants.com%2Facai-extract.html’; addthis_title = ‘Acai+Extract’; addthis_pub = ”; [...]

  • http://yukaichou.com/entrepreneurship/90-days-entrepreneurship/ The First 90 Days of an Entrepreneur | Yu-kai Chou

    [...] sure you focus on Aspirins instead of Vitamins. One solves a real PAIN, while the other is just a good-to-have. With EXTREMELY good marketing, you [...]

  • http://www.topicsoft.com/topicblog/how-to-create-repeatability-with-the-sales-campaign How to Create Repeatability with the Sales Campaign

    [...] that your solution is well suited for… and how important that pain is to him.  The age old “are you selling a vitamin or an aspirin?”  No matter how good your product is, there will be some people who will think it’s a vitamin [...]