But we’re getting there…
the next version of kickfly is almost ready to show (private beta).
The current site will be moving to a different URL, something like old.kickfly.com or test.kickfly.com.
We’ve redone everything in the latest version of Flash, new graphics, etc.
Will let you know when it is done!
Just a little update for our fans out there.
Migrating the backend to Amazon EC2.
Re-writing the front-end in pure Flash (no Ajax).
Updating the look and graphics.
It all takes time but we are cranking away.
Stay tuned — !
One of my least favorite words is refactoring. I know it’s necessary to clean up the internals every so often, but a more optimal way would be just to design it right the first time. : )
OK, I’m kidding. It’s not always possible to do that.
I was just reading an excellent old post by Dan Dodge, called Is your product a vitamin or a painkiller?
To sum up, some products are painkillers - you need them to solve a pain point. Others are vitamins, nice to have, but ultimately, not necessary. Triggers are events that make a potential customer feel the pain to have your product. Sometimes, external events can turn vitamins into painkillers. Dan gives the example of Sarbanes-Oxley and compliance software.
So the question for us is, what pain points are we solving, and, are the events on the horizon that will turn us into a guaranteed painkiller?
Of course, we need to finish refactoring first before any of you can see what we’re thinking about!
So I spent some time out at the TieCon show (www.tiecon.org) this past weekend.
It’s billed as the world’s largest trade show for entrepreneurs. The highlights were Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, both ex-Paypalers. Both Peter and Elon are undeniably brilliant. There were some other interesting panels, and the panelists that impressed included Joanne Bradford of SpotRunner, and Dave McClure, Master of 500 Hats (Dave also led a panel at the Web 2.0 Expo).
Peter described his framework for investing. He described it as a combination of two factors: ‘good fundamentals’ + ‘being out of favor’. For example, when he invested in Facebook back in 2003, Friendster had just crashed in burned. So Facebook was not an ‘obviously good’ investment. If something is ‘in favor’ - especially in the Silicon Valley echo chamber, there will likely be too much competition, reducing returns for everyone.
Elon is on his way to going 3 for 3 with his latest ventures - Tesla, SpaceX, and SolarCity. Terrific stuff.
Went to a Tech Meetup here in New York City. I have to admit it was fun but a bit disconcerting, reminding me of our famous bubble from 8 years ago. You might suspect that the coming layoffs on Wall Street (carnage) would take away some of the froth. But it looks like the local correction hasn’t affected the tech sector yet. There were plenty of people talking about ideas that are applications, not businesses. Where are the unfair advantage that professional investors look for? Where are the network effects? What is the market space and what is the big picture growth story? Just because an app scratches an itch (many do) doesn’t mean it needs to have a team around it. Yes, there is a new-media/tech industry here, but it has more substance out in Silicon Valley.
The best time to be in an industry is really when others are (unreasonably) down on it. This means that talent is available and at fair cost. We have the opposite problem right now in new media (and have had it for the last 2 years). We’ll hit that sustained downturn in real estate in the next year, and that will provide savvy investors with good opportunities. I wouldn’t be surprised if the same thing happens in the tech industry with a decline in AdSense revenues and CPMs, hitting us in a year’s time.
We’ve been getting a lot of email from new friends that we’ve met at the last couple of trade shows. Before heading out to TieCon this Thursday (at www.tiecon.org ) I thought we’d put down some of our favorite launched (and almost ready to launch) sites.
Acquia - Drupal services. Boy, it’s really needed.
Chictopia - Fashion social network for girls
Okupy - Digg for Frat Boys
Profy - Cool Blogging tool, cool people
Rearden - ok, I think the name’s a bit creepy, but they are really successful
RockYou - Love Jia Shen’s hyper-kinetic presentation style. OK, they are too ‘established’ for this list, but they are real thought leaders in the social network app space.
TheWorldIs - Watch out for this social network.
Triggit - Graphical Adsense Inserter - top voted at the Web 2.0 Expo, nice guys
many more to mention in future posts. Let’s see who makes it..
We were reading Xobni’s great article about how they started off with a different idea, and converged to an idea that seems to be getting traction.
Here’s the article:
http://gigaom.com/2008/05/11/xobni-our-path-from-wrong-product-to-killer-app/
What’s most interesting is the negative commentary by the peanut gallery at the end of the article. C’mon- it’s hard and a lot of work to build something compelling. Give the Xobni guys a break.
Some notes from the Sun’s fun Startup Camp, held May 4 and 5 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.
So, how do you get your first 50,000 users on your consumer-facing Website - and get past the ‘cold start’, without paying a lot of money for advertising? Here’s the theory.
So let’s say you have a website that you feel is ready to share with the world, with zero (0) users.
The basics:
1. The first milestone is to get to 100 real, engaged users. It’s all about engagement- time spent on the site, repeat visits, and a good user experience (say 8 out of 10 on a satisfaction scale).
You can do a lot of testing/iteration/improvement with just 100 users. So email your friends, tell them to pass the email on. If you are having trouble even finding 100 users (let’s say you just don’t want to spam all your friends), then try Google AdWords. See #2 below.
What’s the goal at this point? The goal is to make sure that your product either looks good, or works good. If it satisfies either criteria, then it has a chance of catching on in the market. It may be unlikely that you’ll have satisfy both criteria in a new application (but if you do - kudos and keep on going).
2. Once you have a reasonable product (aka it looks good, or works good), the next step is to ramp up traffic. There are a few ways to do this:
- Use Google Adwords. Search is the second most common activity on the Internet (after email) and comprises about 40% of Internet advertising revenue. This means that using search methods (Adwords or SEO) to drive traffic is a good idea, even if it means paying a little money.
The great thing about Google Adwords is that you can measure and A/B test landing pages, and improve copy, graphics, etc. So you can iterate and discover what works and what doesn’t.
So buy some traffic from Google, measure conversions, and hopefully your user base will start to increase. At the least, you’ll learn how to make your application better.
- Use SEO techniques to improve your position on search results.
2.1 Use viral marketing techniques & build viral loops into your application. This is something that social networking (Facebook/OpenSocial) apps typically do. For more about viral marketing and loops, read this terrific blog: Andrew Chen’s Futuristic play. Viral techniques allow you to acquire users at very little cost, assuming that you have designed things well.
3. Track metrics, A/B test, and iterate.
Your site can definitely be improved. Use Google Analytics to see how your site is doing. Make changes to improve conversion rates, reduce bounce rates, and drive traffic to the pages you want people to go to. Use A/B testing to improve copy and graphics.
4. Reach out to people by email. Consider a email service like ConstantContact.
4.1 Reach out to people even after they have registered on your site. For example, if they haven’t come back to visit the site in a week after registering, send them a reminder email.
5. Participate in the blogosphere. Read and leave comments on other blogs, and write your own.
6. Partner with other startup companies to drive awareness of each other. Together we stand!
Some other ideas:
7. Consider using an affiliate marketing service, like CommissionJunction .
8. Use social engineering with a time limit to entice users to sign up. For example, ‘the first 25 users to sign up in the next week’ will be featured on our home page.
9. Consider a giveaway, for example, some hot gadget that doesn’t cost a lot, like a iPhone, tied to an email promotion.
10. Paying more money - PR or marketing consultants or trade shows. Trade shows can be well worth it, if you are starting out.
So, you’ve reached 100 users. What’s next?
Consistently track and analyze page views, unique visitors, time spent on site, referral sources, bounce rate, and registered users - so you can spot trends and trouble, and either continue what you’re doing or change course quickly.
So The next milestones are:
1. Get to 1,000 registered users. If you can’t get here in a reasonable amount of time after launching, you may want to consider changing what your consumer-facing site is about.
2. Get to 10,000 registered users. No big celebration here - just keep on going. Hopefully you’re getting that major hockey stick in terms of website traffic… (hello TechCrunch).
3. Get to 50,000 registered users. Once you get to this number, all sorts of wonderful network effect things happen, and if you can keep it going, you’ll be on your way. Congratulations on a nice start.
This post is by no means complete. Any other Startup Camp attendees, please let me know if I’ve left obvious stuff out. Gotta go to sleep now.
PS Many thanks to Mary T. from Foldier , a cool online file-sharing service, and Lee from TheWorldIs , a social network with lots of nice pictures - for their participation and comments.
This is adapted from watching some cable news station en route to San Francisco:
1. Lose weight (that’s right - each pound less is a pound less that your car needs to carry).
2. Don’t drive your friends. (Imagine - 300 pounds less in your car!)
3. Lose the 50 pounds of junk out of your car trunk.
Conclusion: Losing weight is good for the environment. So is having fewer friends to drive around.
Something I noticed while out at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco:
There are a lot of smart, accomplished engineers, executives, and entrepreneurs out there.
But in order to really get superstar-credit as a young entrepreneur, I think there is a clear bar:
Start at least 2 companies with exits of at $1 billion. Doing more than one shows that it wasn’t a fluke.
There’s just a handful of entrepreneurs on that list. Marc Andreessen (Netscape, Loudcloud) is getting a lot of credit these days for Ning. Max Levchin (Paypal, Yelp, Slide) also is getting a lot of press. He’ll probably hit the bar. Obviously, Steve Jobs, amongst the older generation, and all the other A-list names that you already know.
Larry and Sergey are undeniably brilliant, but who knows if they had to start from scratch, and if they hadn’t stumbled upon the biggest technology gold mine invented in the last 10 years? I guess reaching a $100+ billion valuation qualifies you for the superstar list, even if you’ve only done one.