closing_brace
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I skimmed the pitch. I think you are probably correct that there is a business opportunity in this area. Nevertheless, my main view is that a good idea or business opportunity is only a small part of building a business.
Consequently, your pitch seems a bit more like a theoretical paper on a business case, such as in a class project as school. That's different from attracting consumers (who require good marketing and design, not spreadsheets) and investors (who need to believe that you in particular are capable of executing on your idea).
I will continue to recommend that you learn more about design and marketing, and ideally work with other people in... (read more)
Yes, it's probably true that there are successful startups who began with less resources than the incumbents in their industries. Yet these companies may start out with more resources than you seem to have available.
There are many business models other than launching a multi-million dollar mass consumer website that monetizes from advertising. In my view, such a business is relatively risky and resource-intensive. It seems to me that you have chosen an especially challenging business model for your first startup.
Bringing a product to a mass market is a challenge; see the examples edanm and I raised of restaurants and movies flopping because they fail to resonate with the market. The wider the... (read more)
But the other, MUCH BIGGER issue, is that you might not know what people want. If you're building something for consumers, there's a problem in that most people don't know what they themselves want (imagine describing Facebook to someone years before it existed).
Yes, it's very difficult to predict what people want and will actually use, especially for a solo person. Asking your friends isn't enough because they will just try to make you feel good.
To underscore your point, and try to help us calibrate risks, let's examine the risks of significantly smaller projects:
My overarching point though, is that it could be monetized, not that advertising is the best way to do it. My evidence is that all my major competitors are multi-million dollar companies, and that I think I could out-do them (more users, more engaged users, better information, more brand recognition...).
But you can't put yourself in the same reference class as these companies, because it's most likely that they started out with more resources, bigger teams, more experienced founders, and/or more connections than you.
Ask yourself: once you break a demand down far enough into its components, is it still hard to say whether or not those components are things people want?
The problem is people don't want things independently of how they are presented and packaged. Design, UI, and marketing matter.
Regarding other things (hiring, cofounder, investors...) keep in mind that you just really need to satisfice, not optimize.
How do you know this? How do you know what level of optimization you need, and when satisficing is good enough?
It's good that you acknowledge that you lack experience, and that you are trying to create the starting point for a discussion. Nevertheless, a lot of your... (read 646 more words →)
I came to similar conclusions. Seriously attempting a startup would be very time-consuming and stressful. The original poster doesn't understand why this is, because he miscalculates the execution, production, marketing, and team risks involved in his project. But unless he has a serious financial safety net, he will soon start burning through the limited resources of his money, time, and energy, which could hurt his social development.
Personally, working at an early-stage startup has a much higher expected value for me than trying to run my own thing.
I've considered it, but I figure that the value of having it outweighs this. I don't see it as something that is strong enough to draw too many people away from the site.
I would caution you against the Typical Mind Fallacy and believing that other people will perceive writing the way you do.
In projects I've seen, the founders and marketing people worked on marketing copy, and spent a lot of time fine-tuning the messaging. As as programmer and a LW reader, it is unlikely that you are well-calibrated about marketing and messaging (similar to how the typical marketing person would be miscalibrated about web development). Getting feedback from others is important to avoid biases in this area.
I am a web programmer / designer. I work at a startup, and I have attempted several (failed) website projects. I will offer an "inside view" from my own experience.
My main failed website was a cool idea. Everyone said it was cool. Everyone said they would use it. So I spent months building the functionality. Then I started working on the design and UI. As a newbie to design, the web design and UI sucked. The site was useable, but nobody cared except a couple friends. The Facebook page got around 5-10 likes. I realized that the design sucked and it would take a rewrite to improve it, but I couldn't justify... (read 1029 more words →)
Yes. And these are all challenges with significant risks. My claim is that is that it will be hard to build significant momentum prior to getting a level of design and marketing which is significantly beyond your current ability as someone with a programming background. Even if you pay people to... (read more)