Hi there, 

All of us love a good revenge story, and this one has it all - high-stakes drama, luxury cars, and proud Italian men. Read on; there's also a business lesson there. 

In early 20th century Italy, a young man named Ferruccio had a knack for machines. After serving as a mechanic in World War II, he started building tractors in Northern Italy. The tractor business took off thanks to the industrial boom and his excellent artistry. 

Like all of us, Ferruccio decided to treat himself. I prefer fries; Ferruccio liked cars. His collection included Mercedes, Jaguar, Maserati, and his favorite - a Ferrari 250 GT. 

Being an automobile man himself, it irked him to realize that the clutch in his Ferrari was subpar; he had to replace it frequently. He decided to tell Enzo Ferrari himself. 

In a tale that's been retold many times over the decades and has become a legend in automotive circles, Ferrari famously said, "Let me make cars; you stick to making tractors." 

Guess who wasn't pleased?

Ferruccio Lamborghini (that's right!) set out to make a better car than the Ferrari, and as we all know, the rest is history. 

Ferrari's inability to take constructive criticism created one of his most formidable competitors. It also gave us some gorgeous cars, so we're not complaining, but the lesson still holds true. 

In this week's edition of Compass, we're looking at why you should pay closer attention to your customer feedback and what insights you might be missing if you don't. 

What we're reading

An account of the Ferrari-Lamborghini rivalry by Valentino Balboni, a 40-year employee who heard it from Lamborghini himself. 

For all the petrolheads who are reading this >

Speaking of luxury cars, BMW is now selling subscriptions for heated seats in some countries. 

Would you pay $18/month for a warm car sea? Apparently, not a lot of people would. 

Some are calling it a microtransaction hell!

For the ‘thread’worms

No idea is trivial. No, really. Some stupefying items from this thread: 

  • Someone who made $500K+ from a PowerPoint template

  • A paid community for Lego lovers which makes $10k/month

  • Spotify podcasters who make $18k/month making white noise

The Twitter thread >

Leela Srinivasan, CMO at Checkout.com (ex-SurveyMonkey) talks about leveraging customer feedback to craft GTM strategies. Nuggets from her conversation with Bill Macaitis >

A framework to use customer feedback effectively.

How can you balance customer priorities and your roadmap?

Customer feedback is “business-oxygen” but feedback loops can suffer from a lack of commitment. Here are some case studies of how Chargebee incorporated customer feedback.

From people asking him how product management differs from project management, he tells us excitedly that he now gets questions about the future. In this week's episode, Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia, Founder and CEO of Product School, shared his growth journey of building the world's largest community of product managers.