“If you own the distribution, you control everything”.
Distribution by meaning, is how a product reach a market.
But to understand the how the product reach the market, we first have to understand what is reach.
Reach by definition is “stretch out an arm in a specified direction in order to touch or grasp something.”
Grasp by definition is “comprehend fully.”
Comprehend = Understand
Understand have two three distinction:
- perceive the intended meaning of (words, a language, or a speaker).
- interpret or view (something) in a particular way.
- be sympathetically or knowledgeably aware of the character or nature of.
So now we’ve come to understand what exactly reach means, but why is this important?
Product essentially is a medium to solve a problem.
A problem causes pain, that needed a cure.
There are two ways you can cure something painful, either you use a painkiller (mediating the pain with a medium, a pain relief treatment, a shortcut, a tangible solution) or you can prevent the pain (like a vitamin, working out, doing things slowly, long-term maintenance).
Either how pain essentially exist due to the nature of how the reality is, how the world actually is.
There are few world’s problem that just hard to be solve, and there are few niche problem that might can be solve.
But essentially these pains needed to be cure, and these cure can potentially serves up as a product.
However to understand real pain, that’s the harsh truth, the painful thing, most of the time the world’s and individuals pain is simplistic. Most of our pain is coming from misalignment between our expectations (what’s in our head) vs. our outcome (how the reality is), some pain just nature’s behavior or systemic. Either how, pain is simple, it’s a real thing. However solving it has not been simple.
The misalignment between pain and cure here, is what I call suffering. Suffering is this void where there’s no light (cure) and dark (pain), where it just empty, it’s almost confusing but it’s not, it’s almost doubting but fear at the same time, it’s a void. It’s a suffering.
Suffering is the question here, each human have different suffering, and these suffering is depending on the understanding of the individual. Suffering heavily relies on one’s philosophy (a theory or attitude that acts as a guiding principle for behaviour) of life.
Due to this, there’s another layer that exist, and this layer is a layer where a product (solution/cure) can be understood by a person.
This layer is what product marketing was told to be done, to educate ICP so they can understand their true problem, and understand how our product can solve them. This effort of trying to get to touch the user suffering, whilst understanding that truly that suffering is coming from a pain, is what I call a proposition. We propose to a user a way/method/medium to that suffering in hope, in return it can solve the real pain, which in return the user would want to pay for that value.
A proposition is a simple message, that was meant to touch the user understanding of the world (their philosophy). Why? because human’s ability to understand/grasp something is limited to their world view, so there a need spark a view instead. Which then shed the light (cure) into the void.
However I think fundamentally, when the (pain & suffering (understanding) & proposition & product) align = growth. This is where we’re getting that smooth traction, where there’s no need for marketing or educating the user, instead there just a need for scaling.
And this is what I believe owning a distribution looks like, an alignment between the pain, the suffering, the proposition, and the cure. A distribution in a world of digital, is a pure magic, and magic is these.
However it’s easier to said, but it is not easier to engineer. Until now we have no idea of what is suffering, pain, cure and even proposition. This required trial and error, cause that’s how we find it.
GPT-improved: “If you own the distribution, you control everything.”
Distribution, by definition, is how a product reaches a market.
But to understand how a product reaches the market, we must first grasp what “reach” truly means.
“Reach” is defined as “to stretch out an arm in a specified direction in order to touch or grasp something.”
“Grasp” is defined as “to comprehend fully.”
To comprehend is to understand.
Understanding has three distinctions:
- Perceiving the intended meaning of words, language, or a speaker.
- Interpreting or viewing something in a particular way.
- Being sympathetically or knowledgeably aware of the character or nature of something.
Having dissected “reach,” why does this matter?
A product is essentially a medium to solve a problem.
A problem causes pain that necessitates a cure.
There are two ways to cure pain: a painkiller (mediating pain through a tangible shortcut, like relief treatments) or prevention (long-term maintenance, akin to vitamins or exercise).
Either way, pain exists as an inherent part of reality. Some problems are systemic or too vast to solve; others are niche yet solvable. Regardless, pain demands a cure—and these cures manifest as products.
Yet understanding real pain—the harsh truth—is deceptively simple. Most pain stems from misalignment: expectations (mental constructs) versus outcomes (reality). Other pain arises from natural or systemic forces. Pain is primal. Solving it is not.
The chasm between pain and cure is suffering—a void where neither light (cure) nor darkness (pain) exists. It is confusion laced with doubt and fear, a hollow tension. Suffering is the question, unique to each individual and shaped by their philosophy (the guiding theory of behavior).
This introduces another layer: how a product (cure) is understood by a person.
Product marketing’s role is to bridge this layer—educating the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) about their true problem and how the product solves it. This effort to resonate with a user’s suffering while acknowledging its roots in pain is the proposition. We propose a method to navigate suffering, hoping to resolve the underlying pain—a value users will pay for.
A proposition is a simple message that aligns with the user’s worldview. Why? Human understanding is confined by their philosophy. To transcend this, we must spark a new perspective, casting light (cure) into the void.
When pain, suffering (understanding), proposition, and product align, growth emerges. Traction becomes effortless; marketing gives way to scaling.
This alignment is owning distribution—a harmony of pain, suffering, proposition, and cure. In the digital realm, distribution is pure magic.
Yet this is easier said than engineered. To this day, suffering, pain, cure, and proposition remain elusive. They demand trial and error—the only path to discovery.