Dynamics of Software Development, Second Edition

#54: Create a winning image

To underlie all of your efforts, products, and messages, you must create a winning image, for several reasons.

• Customers identify with their software. Software is one of those things, like cars or homes, with which customers strongly identify. Probably because they spend so much time using their software, they tend to view themselves as a product x expert, or a product y user. Even the terminology is suggestive: customers don’t buy software; they adopt it. Think about that.

• Customers want something others perceive as desirable. The software they use is a measure of your customers’ status, their “with-it-ness.” As they see it, their relevance in this computer era is determined in large measure by your relevance. The ...