wilson parry

SQL, zoning expert...CEO of a NYC zoning and air rights application. Free time: make art, triathlons

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

Anyone know when @NotionHQ will have a CLI?

[Ted Merz @TedMerz]

Bloomberg offers a perk for clients that is known as the “lose-your-job free trial.”

It works like this: if you are a paying customer who gets fired, you can request access to a Bloomberg terminal at no cost for some number of months.

The program helps explain one reason Mike Bloomberg has been so successful: he understood his real clients are the traders who use his product, not the firms that pay for it.

The idea was hatched early on during a bump in the market.

It was pretty straightforward: Wall Street is a volatile place where people are constantly getting fired and rehired. Mike wanted to help smooth out that process.

The Bloomberg terminal was one constant in the professional life of traders who were frequently forced suddenly to find new jobs.

The terminal’s vaunted message system in particular served as a communications lifeline, allowing continued access to the financial community.

The offer was as generous as it was unusual. It’s hard to think of another professional information system paid for by an employer which is offered for free to individuals after they are fired by the company footing the bill.

It’s worth unpacking because it sheds light on one of Bloomberg’s deep competitive advantages: it’s connection to the individual user.

The Holy Grail for many software and fintech companies is to establish a one-to-one relationship with users.

Bloomberg, like most vendors, is usually purchased by a company for the benefit of financial professionals like traders or portfolio managers.

By offering a free trial when people are fired, Bloomberg garnered goodwill and cemented a direct relationship with the individual user of the product.

When those same individuals went looking for their next job, many would insist that the new package include a Bloomberg terminal.

This is why Jeff Cohen, who headed terminal sales at Bloomberg in the 1990s, says that the real sales people at Bloomberg are the customers.

Jeff said that Mike figured out better than most other companies how to get paying customers to sell the product more effectively than any salaried employee could.

Over time the lose-a-job free trial has become a part of the Bloomberg culture. It is — like the legendary Costco $1.50 hotdog – both a brand marker and super effective marketing.

Officially, the brand name for the lose-your-job free trial program is Stay Connected.

Nobody on the Street calls it that, of course.

Jeff and I were talking about the program because we came across an old email from Nov. 20, 2002 sent out by Lex Fenwick who was running the company at the time.

The market was reeling from the dotcom crash. Amid widespread pessimism, Lex wanted the sales force to remind customers that if fired, Bloomberg would help them try to stay in the game.

Wall Street is portrayed in Hollywood films as a cut throat place. And there’s a lot to that.

But it’s also a place that remains to a surprising degree a relationship business.

(Part of a series of business lessons I learned from three decades working at Bloomberg LP)

@business

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@NotionHQ How do I remove the (9+) in my page title? As you can see, when you have multiple tabs open, all I see is the (9+) and I have no idea what the page title is whereas with google sheets or other tabs I know what the page title is. If you could email me, thanks. 🙏

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Airbnb And "Display Total Price" actually looks like a search bar like other real estate websites like Zillow, Redfin, Streeteasy!

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Airbnb (1/1) The UI/UX of the homepage needs work. First, there is no sticky search bar for a location. Second, it takes two clicks to enter a location, which is you find by click "Anywhere", which is not super obvious and also in a clumsy area at the top of the page.

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Airbnb (1/2) Third, where you would normally expect to find a search bar is a giant box taking up an unruly amount of the screen with a slider for "Display total price." Not only is this "Display total price" the biggest box on the screen, it is smack in the middle of the screen.

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@espletz @sethrosen with a few LEFT JOINS ON arrays

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@OrenKessler @RLPGBooks congrats oren! and congrats on the press in the WSJ -

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@RobertLustigMD @DrCaseysKitchen After hearing this podcast, I told my wife I’d prefer to eat my dog’s food on a bed of frisée rather than seed oil infested Impossible or Plant based Burgers.

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@OrenKessler Looking forward to reading this!

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Pentosh1 How’s the spearfishing?

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Pentosh1 Humans are impatient. Combine that with fear and you have time - based capitulation.

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@AuBit_and_Me Nice. Glad you weren’t getting that boost from a Celsius loan.

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@AuBit_and_Me Very nice. How did your surpass 43%, which I thought was the max?

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@Pentosh1 Go to williamsburg, where I live but not there now, and go to domino waterfront park and then get dinner or lunch in neighborhood. Midtown (and most of Manhattan) is not enjoyable.

[Sahil Bloom @SahilBloom]

23 lies you've been told about the world:

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@maestroatcrypto @DeFi_Made_Here @0xHamz @TaschaLabs @SaveToNotiom

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@realcryptoface https://t.co/aJTcxoN2Nk

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@realcryptoface But the thing is it wasn't just newbies. Biggest crypto VCs in the space were behind it. I think it was more the "logic" that bc big money was behind it, therefore 👌. - Pantera Capital
- Lightspeed Venture
- Jump Crypto
- Three Arrows Capital
- Galaxy Digital Holdings

[wilson parry @wilsonmakes]

@wclemente GM - is yours a cockapoodle? Best animal on earth.