How many of you are running or have plans for starting a 2 sided marketplace like Airbnb or Ebay?
If so, what are some of the challenges you're facing in the early stages of making an MVP, etc.
If so, what are some of the challenges you're facing in the early stages of making an MVP, etc.
Some of the challenges I've faced with early stage marketplaces and using Studiotim as specific marketplace example have been:
In the case of Studiotime (www.studiotime.io), I was not initially immersed in the industry/market so it was not an easy process to speak with enough potential users, then first adopters quickly enough as the marketplace then began to rapidly gain traction and scale. I ended up making a bunch of business and revenue model assumptions that were then changed as I spoke with more people.
With Studiotime, this was nearly impossible to do in the beginning as hundreds of studios created listings when press picked up our launch and there were studios that ranged from home studios in people's apartments to top-line and private studios.
In the case of Studiotime, we experienced a false growth/liquidity fallacy with too many listings that came with the press and not enough demand for them (due to supply variance, location, etc). I had to learn how to then create liquidity using manual processes, then try to automate this very quickly.
With Studiotime, this was a huge issue in that a large number of transactions were being taken off the platform and I couldn't initially identify why from monitoring messages and transactions. I put a subscription in place for studios to list, which accounted for this and then focused on understanding why transactions were being taken off Studiotime and then fixing this issue. It ended up being not enough information/details on the studio listings for artists to book, the booking request flow, and some other product limitations with the initial MVP.
The above are just some of the challenges I've faced and some supporting insights with Studiotime as the marketplace example. Hope it helps others!
Thanks Mike, it's always great to hear from your experience with Studiotime. Could you elaborate a bit about part 3? In order to match supply and demand - how did you get the demand?
Sure thing!
To provide a bit of context first, we had a few initial studio listings (5-6 as sort of placeholders) that were all in LA (where we're based) at the time of launch. We didn't limit to LA on launch, but allowed anyone to list their studio so within about two weeks of the launch and press, we had hundreds of listings all over the world.
In order to create some true initial liquidity and not just a few booking requests here and there, I had to do the following:
Identify existing channels/people who had a constant demand for booking studios. What I found out very quickly was that management companies and managers that had large artist rosters were ideal to reach out to. This resulted in multiple first time and repeat bookings. Now, we have some managers that use Studiotime as their go-to for all artist bookings. We also have a high word-of-mouth referral rate for this as you can imagine. I would say managers and freelance producers/engineers are our "power users".
Closely monitor all transactions and act as sort of a "booking concierge" in the early stages to try and reduce friction (notifying users of messages and following-up on this to ensure prompt reply rates, helping studios/artists with requests, suggesting tips, etc). Doing this not only helped increased booking rates, but was incredibly insightful for truly understanding real booking use cases, product feedback, etc.
Learning how to market to artist community groups one-off in the beginning based on factors such as genre, point in their career, etc and speak to how Studiotime can help them. I had to focus a ton of time and effort on building the Studiotime brand and awareness with communities that might not have an immediate need for a studio, but would in the future and wanted Studiotime to be top of mind when they have a need and intent to book a studio.
Hope the above helps!
That's very helpful indeed, thanks for elaborating on this Mike. You created an interesting system here . 2 things I really like about your model: (1)You "can afford" the leakage because you charge subscription fees (2) You created a system that is convenient for your "power users". 1+2 create a sustainable incentive for both sides of the marketplace.
No problem!
Wow this is really awesome. Thanks for the detailed analysis!
No prob and hope it helps!
I tried to get a 2-sided marketplace running about 2 years ago. It was for people to find personal trainers that operated in their areas.
At the time, I found it hard to find PTs that provided outdoor group sessions. Hence why I gave the idea a go.
I came to the following conclusions from my first foray into startups:
as mentioned by others, the chicken and egg problem is super hard to solve. I went after trainers first because I figured a decent listing amount was going to help the most. I basically did everything for those who came on board first - there was only two and neither of them paid anything (that was a mistake, btw, but I'll get to that). I posted all their sessions on their behalf and basically tried to market the daylights out of it for them.
I realised then I had no way to solve the other side of the chicken and egg problem. Putting it in front of consumers was actually way, way harder than finding trainers to list.
I found that because I wasn't charging the initial PTs - because I thought my product was pretty weak - they weren't mentally invested in seeing it succeed. So they took the foot off the gas very early.
So, my advice would be to ensure you clearly understand how you are going to target both sides before diving in. Double down on one side and at least have it starting to be saturated with either consumers or providers. And to ensure, depending on your app, that SOMEONE IS SOMEHOW PAYING.
p.s. Personal trainers are the worst to work with. But that's another thing altogether.
That's super interesting, thanks for sharing. I have a similar marketplace, only it's for online personal workouts. Not a very common practice yet. Looking back - would you charge the teachers subscription fee from the beginning?
Hey Yael,
Looking back I would charge the trainers a subscription fee. If they are willing to pay that then they are more likely to be invested enough to promote your service through their own channels.
All the best with your product!!
Thank you!
I have a few more questions if that's ok -
How did you find trainers? Did you DM trainers that were listed in similar apps (like fitnesstrainer)?
Why was it so hard to find customers? Was there something specific that made it problematic? Can you elaborate a bit on this part?
How did you advertise/market the app to customers?
Sure no problem.
I started with those closest to me. At the time I worked up the road from the gym I frequented. I pitched it to a couple PTs that worked there that also ran outdoor sessions.
I guess I found it hard because I had literally no experience before in this sort of thing. I didn't have any strategies for where to find the demand side until too late. At the end, I started using things like gumtree to 'do things that don't scale'. e.g. I started contacting people posting that they were looking for a PT and asking them if they'd like to attend a session I "found" on my service. But it boiled down to me just not knowing enough on how to hustle this part.
See above ^.
I'd also add that I think most personal trainers are terrible business people. It's my assessment that a lot of them got into the industry because they enjoyed doing it themselves and saw it as a way to make some money.
A lot of trainers I approached wanted to do the bare minimum to drum up business. Which, for most, meant just working out of a gym where leads literally walked up to them.
Edit: in an effort to not derail Vidy's thread feel free to email me if you have more questions. Should be on my profile!
Yeah I can definitely relate to this. My first launch 2 months ago was completely targeting the supply side and I had no clue how to generate demand and everybody stopped using the platform. I was very close to giving up until 2 weeks ago, I decided to go after demand first and get them to create a "listing" which would then attract supply. 30+ people have used the marketplace so far :) It's a lot of experimentation and testing which can be very draining
Nice work! Keep grinding!
I really like your new strategy @vidythatte ! Makes a lot of sense. How did you find people to post their requests?
I think they can be pretty tough to crack with the obvious chicken and egg problem between the regular visitors and the posters.
Some random ideas for the beginning stages:
Give the posters a benefit to posting on your site. Depending on the market, many may have websites, and allowing them to link to it for SEO may get more posters early on.
Similarly, if you can, collecting links to those with websites/external postings may help establish you as a repository of that info, so regular visitors can look to your site as a place to check and improve your SEO.
Give the posters value: Maybe they'll pay you $10/mo for the listing, but you'll be taking their money if you don't have viewers. You could provide a free posting plan where they only pay when you provide value. And change this as you gain traction.
Give the visitors value: Make it easy for them to sign up, find the listings that are interesting to them, and get notifications (if they want) when there are new matches for them.
Outreach: Don't be afraid to search for and reach out to the potential posters who would like an additional channel, esp. if you can provide value to them without it costing more than they'll make. And you can let them know you're a human rather than a faceless corporation.
That's just some random brainstorming. Marketers would probably have a different take on it :)
I am, the chicken and egg problem is the major one. But it's getting there for me anyway.
Can't say how many but I am :)
I've posted a very similar question here a few days ago, you can see some answers there, and hopefully we'll see here some more.
https://www.indiehackers.com/forum/are-you-building-a-marketplace-an-uber-airbnb-for-x-439908a603
As for me, my current challenge is getting my suppliers (online fitness & yoga teachers) more customers.
I see! Did go after the supply part first? If so, what made them to jump onboard?
At first it took a lot of personal talks with many trainers, I had to convince them that online classes would work and with some of them I even did a pilot. That took a lot of time. After I had some initial supply I started posting on job boards for trainers - and slowly began to see growth. I don't need put a lot of effort in the supply side as I used to, not even close. However - demand is still a challenge. The trainers don't put a lot of effort in getting customers, which is understandable. I will probably start FB ads soon, after I exhaust free marketing channels.