LTDR: Jump to the questions below if you don't want to read.
LTDR: Jump to the questions below if you don't want to read.
Hi everyone,
It's my first post here, let's see how it goes :)
I'm currently working on a "big"(i think) project, I started to build it about a month ago, and I currently have some kind of an MVP.
I say "some kind", because I focused on the part that is specific to my idea. As part of the project, I need to build a platform before it can be tested by others, that platform, and most of the backend is not ready yet, but I have enough for people to see it and understand the idea, and it's functional, so everyone can play with it, but nothing will be saved(didn't connect it to the backend yet).
As you noticed, I'm careful not to reveal my idea, because I don't have a technological advantage, the only advantage I have is that no one ever did it before, and I know that it's not a good place to start from.
My idea is related to video consumption on the web. I believe that every single person in the world can benefit from it at some point, and it can give search engines a good advantage when searching video. I think that existing platforms like youtube could benefit from adding my idea as a feature, so obviously if it works they will try(and probably succeed) to crush me just by copying it.
(I'm fully aware that this paragraph sounds exactly like what a newbie entrepreneur would say)
Yesterday I presented my idea on some kind of a meetup with investors(I don't know how these meetups are called), and everyone liked the idea(not exaggerating), and the investors asked me a simple, and obvious question, to which I had a well-thought answer, but I would like to ask you guys for help, because its marketing related, and I have no experience in the field.
The question:
"How are you going to penetrate into the market with this?"
Or in other words:
Assuming this idea is as great as it sounds, how will you keep youtube/facebook video behind you?
I answered "My strategy is to do a closed beta with trusted but relevant parties and work on the project until it is good enough to be viral(technically wise) and then try to market it on a list of specific communities on the web that I believe my product can bring the most value to. And if it goes well enough, it'll become dangerous before the giants can afford to copy me, and instead will consider buying me"(it wasn't English but it was close to this)
I have a few questions to you guys. Assuming the idea is really that great:
- Is this strategy valid, and are there any good examples I can learn from that this something similar?
- How can I approach successful youtube creators to give me feedback on my idea without being sent into spam, and being taken seriously?
- Should I try to sell the idea to youtube/facebook?
I actually read something different from "How are you going to penetrate into the market with this?" than what your takeaway was. That question is "What's your Go to Market strategy?" and is one of the most important answers you need to have.
How will you cut through the noise of 1M other things to gain users? What you described is an ideal strategy for you, but is not a Day Zero strategy. How will you find those trusted and relevant parties? What are those specific communities? Investors need to see beyond your idea and how you plan to get it out there and grow the audience.
Thanks, it helps to know that the existing strategy sounds sane.
But you are correct, I don't have a Day Zero strategy.
You’ve gotten a good response already.
Don’t fall in love with an idea. Many more will come.
Since you mention tech giants, here’s some food for thought.
Companies don’t buy ideas. They buy market share and mind share. If what you’ve built has either, or both - you can entertain those ideas. Otherwise you may as well go buy some lottery tickets.
Your gut is telling you that what you have is a feature. You’re probably correct.
1 product manager and 2 engineers from google could probably recreate anything that any of us can build here within one week. I happen to know some people from google and youtube specifically, and I can tell you they have probably thought of whatever you are thinking of already. It sounds like something that helps index the content of a video and let the user navigate directly to a relevant section. Guess what? They already have ML algorithms and the underlying data to do that, and much more.
I think you’re underestimating the difficulty of building a platform with such scale, not just from a technical perspective but from the network effects perspective. Dominate players have a “moat” because network effects strengthen the platform. The switching costs get higher in this situation because everyone wants to be where the eyeballs are. Hoping that something “goes viral” is not a strategy, it’s a dream.
I wish my comments were more positive, and to be fair I could be 100% wrong. Perhaps you have an amazing idea that could be viable. I’m just imploring you to think about probabilities and try to get something working in the real world with what you have to increase your chances of getting definitive data points as fast as possible - so that you can keep going or pivot.
Good luck and don't stop hacking.
Thank you very much, your comment is important. In fact, I agree with everything. I know and understand the difficulties, That's why I'm here, I want to be sure that I'm not missing anything.
And I'm not looking for positive feedback, thats easy to get, I'm looking for critical feedback, and it looks like that's what I'm getting here.
Thank you!
It's super hard to answer this without you telling a bit more about the idea. You say you don't have a technical advantage. I think it's important to be clear on what your advantage is then? Will there be a technical advantage when you finish the product?
If you want to convince investors that this is something they should invest in you need to show them that you have an unfair advantage. What is it in this case? Identify this and play your strategy from here on.
If you compete with "infinite-pocketed" corporations on things that doesn't hurt their pocket the most, you're not a danger, just an annoyance they can afford to spend money on taking down. And if you're not taking a big chunk of the business that's the most fruitful to them, you're an annoyance. I read about this somewhere and it had an example in tech, which I forgot - maybe someone else can contribute?
Approaching successful youtube creators - just send a message, be nice, keep it short, and do tell them what this actually is or they might not bother. Iterate on your message on super small scale and make it personal, don't just spam blast them.
Why would they (or anyone) buy an idea?
Thank you, I agree and understand all of your points.
My idea is basically a feature that helps people find interesting parts of videos easier than any solution today.
Once it's out there, anyone can copy it, and there is nothing super hard to replicate in this idea. I guess that could be said about many ideas, but in this case, it can directly hurt youtube, because users might prefer to use my app/website in order to watch the videos(hosted on youtube).
The only advantage I think that I have is that youtube is in war with facebook and twitch, and if anyone else decides to buy me(either the technology or the team) they will have a big time advantage over the other.
The only way I see myself becoming dangerous is by getting a big amount of traffic, but fast. And that is a big issue for a startup... So I don't know how to approach this issue.
This comment was deleted 7 years ago
Thank you very much for your reply. I am considering patenting it, however, I have been told(by pros) that a patent might not be the best solution unless I have to money to protect the patent, not to mention registering it.
And all that is assuming that the idea is patentable. So I'm keeping it as an option, but most probably it's not possible in my case.