Has already been thought of.
Is already being worked on.
In all probability already launched.
Maybe they are entering phase 2 of their launch?
Best we get over it, share our secrets and improve them. Heck, launch them anyway, maybe we’ll do it better.
When rentoid.com was launched. I believed in the concept, the dream and the process. (still do).
So in order to make the site work I had to put some stuff to put up for rent. Stuff I didn’t even own – yet. Once the site went live, it needed stuff on it. But at that stage we had no members, so we had to populate the site. Content was and is King. Included in my listed stuff was a home gym. A rental came in for it. So I went and bought it. It cost me $400 to buy. I rented it out for $140. Then Sold it on Ebay afterwards for $280. (We now have other suppliers of gyms for rental on rentoid)
Net result:
A good user experience for a new member
A $20 profit
And I felt the excitement that goes along with bootstrapping; finding creative solutions, and most importantly, inventing transactions.
“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take”
Michael Jordan.
You’ve probably heard that Ebay is about to enforce the use of it’s wholly owned payment service “Paypal” on every Ebay transaction.
The blogosphere and government regulatory bodies are up in arms about this. As they should be. In fact the ACCC (Competitive regulator in Australia) has just made a draft ruling blocking the move as Anti-competitive. Although Ebay claims it ‘significantly enhances protection of buyers and sellers against fraud” – which it may well do.
Here’s the thing Ebay – you’re clearly using monopoly power to force people to use a service you own, to extract more revenue. And your customers know this.
Startup blog says – Ebay should be true to the launch platform of being open, transparent, a market where users decide, what to pay and how to pay.
Never let the arrogance of success change how you treat those who made you successful in the first place.
Next time you have 30 minutes available – instead of wasting it watching TV, watch this instead:
http://www.justin.tv/hackertv/97862/DHH_Talk__Startup_School_2008
It’s a keynote speech from one of the 37 Signals team. It’s the perfect reailty check for web startups and gives some great perspective on stuff like:
It’s really funny and enjoyable too. Start up blog says: get on it.
The ability to make decisions is crucial. Maybe it’s why we escaped our cubicle – to make our own decisions. But this insight doesn’t stop us from occasionally facing moments of indecisiveness.
Here’s what to do – Outsource it.
Not literally, but metaphysically. We should ask ourselves what our most revered and respected entrepreneurs would do. And just do that. Done, decision made.
The fact is we know what they (Insert favorite entrepreneurs name here: Branson, Jobs, Brin, Bezos ?) would do, because we’ve read so much about them, we’ve seen them in action, so we know exactly how they’d act. And often, the have the courage and conviction we strive for.
So when in doubt, just be them.
This is ‘radvertising’ for many reasons.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3M2mABv2RAI&feature=related]
