November 12, 2008 at 22:06Conference “Monetization of Internet projects” from the HSE business incubator with a presentation of startups
I learned about this event with good advice, and since the topic of launching a startup is quite relevant for me, I really did not want to miss it.
The event consisted of 2 parts: expert reports and project analysis:
* WhyHome - calculate the exact cost of your apartment online,
* Timepad - a calendar of your events and an event creation engine for their organizers,
* Ratia - selection of banking products (loans, deposits)
* stories for uplifting.
By the beginning of the first part, I did not have time - but I completely found more than an hour-long presentation by Fedor Virin (Mail.ru) about the methods of monetizing Internet projects (which was actually the topic of the conference). The performance is so brilliant that adding anything to it is very difficult. Moreover, Fedor in context showed knowledge of offline businesses.
Probably, Fedor is living so well, since he does not stir up his startups with all this knowledge. Or (which is believed more) - his character warehouse is different, non-entrepreneurial, and research-analytical. But he can advise brilliantly :)
Between 2 parts there was a coffee break, at which there were absolutely no problems in order to get to food and drink and taste it.
Even after completing the program, I was able to calmly stop by again and have a bite :)
And now the actual projects.
All of them would like to advise you to go to ideablog ... but the site still does not work :)
Go in to understand the main idea: the highest priority thing for a startup is attracting customers (and not the ability to do it), and not an idea, technology or team.
Project presentations talked about everything - but not about that.
It also rushed that the advertising was divided into media and contextual, although these are words from 2 different dimensions - the content and way the ad unit is displayed. The electors of the media context of such a abuse would not have survived :)
How muchHouse ( akmute Alexey Kulichevsky)
The idea is to enable the user to calculate the cost of his apartment, and to do this project. According to Alexei, cost calculation is a non-trivial process, it takes him a long time to train, and ripping it off so simply will not work.
However, doubts about the success of the project appeared immediately.
Optimistic estimates about the volume of banner advertising sales were quickly broken by Fedor Virin, and together with Philip Smirnov (InVenture), according to the formula "person per day = dollar per month from advertising", they estimated the project with an attendance of 5,000 people at $ 5000-10000 (in a presentation on The results of the 1st year featured a figure of $ 20-25,000).
As for Lead Generation, it’s not very clear how those evaluating the cost of their apartment become willing to buy an apartment. Apparently, we are talking about evaluating someone else's apartment, not your own. But there are much fewer than a few thousand a day - with all due respect to the size of the apartment market.
And why 5000 per day is also not clear.
These people can walk around and watch real estate news - but never rate it (boring).
The issue of audience retention was voiced - but no solution was proposed.
There is a clear and common solution - turning a resource into an information portal - but it is quite expensive for a startup.
And most importantly, it is not clear how the project is going to survive if it is successful. The creator is not the bearer of the formula by which the calculation is carried out, and therefore, as soon as the project becomes more or less successful, it should be inclined by leading players who have no problems with attracting traffic.
Alexey believes that it will be easier for them to buy his project than to repeat it - but taking into account the integration of a new service into an old working resource, it will probably be more profitable for a company to write a service code independently.
Although maybe they will be another Yandex.Auto - we'll see. In the meantime, it is not clear how the service will differ from its existing counterparts when the new version will work.
Timepad(Daria Ustyuzhanina). With the help of the project, the organizers can use the ready-made engine for their events, and users can create their own event feed and learn about updates.
It was correctly noted by experts that now people spend time on other resources, and events are already there in functionality, so it’s easier to collect users there than drive them to a new resource.
I agree - although in my experience the popularization of an application for Vkontakte (which seems to be really useful) is still an undertaking.
The social component of the project has not been told and is not yet clear. The project is initially being made for sale and has already received funding, some of which you can even say refused, preferring to finance your own while it is possible.
Since he himself was engaged in the development of events functional not so long ago, he shared with Dasha the idea that it would be useful to record events at the organizer's website (via iframe or something else).
Ratia ( ookozyrev Oleg apparently Kozyrev). The project is dedicated to the selection of the optimal banking product (loans, deposits) and has previously been presented at Habré . The relevance of the data and ease of use were named as its advantages. In this case, no fundamental differences from bankir.ru (in which everything is fine and the database is relevant) were not named. And they are going to maintain relevance at this stage by the forces of one girl.
The project was rightly advised to reorient to another market, because it is completely unclear how they are going to gain a foothold in this market with such a product.
Stories for you (Denis and Olga).
The project is at the stage of developing an idea, but an interesting idea - mood management.
That is, if you want to change the mood - you need to call, you listen to the story and you will feel better.
Quite rightly, it was noted that it’s quite difficult to pull it all ourselves, and rather you need to partner with some kind of large content aggregator that will take all the overhead on itself.
And of course, the cost and share should be such that the aggregator does not have a desire to make a profitable project on their own.
In fact, the site here is an auxiliary tool (for selecting stories and socialization - but it will probably be socialized in the same Vkontakte, etc.), and this is no longer an Internet project. Despite the fact that the project is not copied head-on - the team does not have unique competencies for creating the product, and if the idea works, people with traffic will be able to collect stories faster and better. Perhaps the non-internet of this service will help - because the stories you just collected cannot be beaten off. From this point of view, the project is good.
I think that a lot will depend on the discipline of potential users, how much the idea will enter their heads, that if they want to change their mood, they need to call. I expressed this in my question to Denis. Because it is one thing to know something, and another to do. Those who have everything in order with self-discipline - they can control their mood :)
Others know a lot, but do nothing.
That is, there must be a social effect so that people from different angles receive reminders about the service.
But on the other hand, people use mobile services ... True, for entertainment, and not for profit.
The event consisted of 2 parts: expert reports and project analysis:
* WhyHome - calculate the exact cost of your apartment online,
* Timepad - a calendar of your events and an event creation engine for their organizers,
* Ratia - selection of banking products (loans, deposits)
* stories for uplifting.
By the beginning of the first part, I did not have time - but I completely found more than an hour-long presentation by Fedor Virin (Mail.ru) about the methods of monetizing Internet projects (which was actually the topic of the conference). The performance is so brilliant that adding anything to it is very difficult. Moreover, Fedor in context showed knowledge of offline businesses.
Probably, Fedor is living so well, since he does not stir up his startups with all this knowledge. Or (which is believed more) - his character warehouse is different, non-entrepreneurial, and research-analytical. But he can advise brilliantly :)
Between 2 parts there was a coffee break, at which there were absolutely no problems in order to get to food and drink and taste it.
Even after completing the program, I was able to calmly stop by again and have a bite :)
And now the actual projects.
All of them would like to advise you to go to ideablog ... but the site still does not work :)
Go in to understand the main idea: the highest priority thing for a startup is attracting customers (and not the ability to do it), and not an idea, technology or team.
Project presentations talked about everything - but not about that.
It also rushed that the advertising was divided into media and contextual, although these are words from 2 different dimensions - the content and way the ad unit is displayed. The electors of the media context of such a abuse would not have survived :)
How muchHouse ( akmute Alexey Kulichevsky)
The idea is to enable the user to calculate the cost of his apartment, and to do this project. According to Alexei, cost calculation is a non-trivial process, it takes him a long time to train, and ripping it off so simply will not work.
However, doubts about the success of the project appeared immediately.
Optimistic estimates about the volume of banner advertising sales were quickly broken by Fedor Virin, and together with Philip Smirnov (InVenture), according to the formula "person per day = dollar per month from advertising", they estimated the project with an attendance of 5,000 people at $ 5000-10000 (in a presentation on The results of the 1st year featured a figure of $ 20-25,000).
As for Lead Generation, it’s not very clear how those evaluating the cost of their apartment become willing to buy an apartment. Apparently, we are talking about evaluating someone else's apartment, not your own. But there are much fewer than a few thousand a day - with all due respect to the size of the apartment market.
And why 5000 per day is also not clear.
These people can walk around and watch real estate news - but never rate it (boring).
The issue of audience retention was voiced - but no solution was proposed.
There is a clear and common solution - turning a resource into an information portal - but it is quite expensive for a startup.
And most importantly, it is not clear how the project is going to survive if it is successful. The creator is not the bearer of the formula by which the calculation is carried out, and therefore, as soon as the project becomes more or less successful, it should be inclined by leading players who have no problems with attracting traffic.
Alexey believes that it will be easier for them to buy his project than to repeat it - but taking into account the integration of a new service into an old working resource, it will probably be more profitable for a company to write a service code independently.
Although maybe they will be another Yandex.Auto - we'll see. In the meantime, it is not clear how the service will differ from its existing counterparts when the new version will work.
Timepad(Daria Ustyuzhanina). With the help of the project, the organizers can use the ready-made engine for their events, and users can create their own event feed and learn about updates.
It was correctly noted by experts that now people spend time on other resources, and events are already there in functionality, so it’s easier to collect users there than drive them to a new resource.
I agree - although in my experience the popularization of an application for Vkontakte (which seems to be really useful) is still an undertaking.
The social component of the project has not been told and is not yet clear. The project is initially being made for sale and has already received funding, some of which you can even say refused, preferring to finance your own while it is possible.
Since he himself was engaged in the development of events functional not so long ago, he shared with Dasha the idea that it would be useful to record events at the organizer's website (via iframe or something else).
Ratia ( ookozyrev Oleg apparently Kozyrev). The project is dedicated to the selection of the optimal banking product (loans, deposits) and has previously been presented at Habré . The relevance of the data and ease of use were named as its advantages. In this case, no fundamental differences from bankir.ru (in which everything is fine and the database is relevant) were not named. And they are going to maintain relevance at this stage by the forces of one girl.
The project was rightly advised to reorient to another market, because it is completely unclear how they are going to gain a foothold in this market with such a product.
Stories for you (Denis and Olga).
The project is at the stage of developing an idea, but an interesting idea - mood management.
That is, if you want to change the mood - you need to call, you listen to the story and you will feel better.
Quite rightly, it was noted that it’s quite difficult to pull it all ourselves, and rather you need to partner with some kind of large content aggregator that will take all the overhead on itself.
And of course, the cost and share should be such that the aggregator does not have a desire to make a profitable project on their own.
In fact, the site here is an auxiliary tool (for selecting stories and socialization - but it will probably be socialized in the same Vkontakte, etc.), and this is no longer an Internet project. Despite the fact that the project is not copied head-on - the team does not have unique competencies for creating the product, and if the idea works, people with traffic will be able to collect stories faster and better. Perhaps the non-internet of this service will help - because the stories you just collected cannot be beaten off. From this point of view, the project is good.
I think that a lot will depend on the discipline of potential users, how much the idea will enter their heads, that if they want to change their mood, they need to call. I expressed this in my question to Denis. Because it is one thing to know something, and another to do. Those who have everything in order with self-discipline - they can control their mood :)
Others know a lot, but do nothing.
That is, there must be a social effect so that people from different angles receive reminders about the service.
But on the other hand, people use mobile services ... True, for entertainment, and not for profit.