What would you like to say to younger people?
That’s the gist of an idea I’ve been writing up and down.
A person of vast experience in a particular field of life, or just and elder person in general, would write some advice they would like to say to someone younger or inexperienced in a particular area of life, that they think is important to know.
The posted writing would then be available to search and view via it’s category/tag, etc.
A younger person reading it would then be able to “follow” the “advice”, if they applied it to their lives.
Where I’m stuck:
-Verifying the advice giver’s age
-monetizing
-helping users “follow advice”
Thoughts?
Are you thinking of this as just a 2 side market place / open content ?..
Or as some kind of highly curated content?
Why should you care what the age of the giver is? sometimes the best advice/training is from someone who has the thing fresh in mind rather than has aged and as selective memory about a thing and most remembers the after...
I think some of the best advice would actually be from someone who is "similar" to you in many ways, and has made a transformation recently..
If you really wanted to, industries that have to, request offical docs to be uploaded...
Then you can have either a software or a person verify/extract age. (Human automation / API for small jobs exist like mechanical turk)
Probably just don't.
This is it's own thing.
When the thing would be more clear, it would be easier to answer.
One example of what the same context is just training courses, generically speaking and any other content product like books etc.
Thanks for your thoughts @hatkyinc
I had the age of the person in mind because I was envisioning this product specifically for people who’d like the advice/perspective of someone who is, say 45 yrs old and older.
It is true that some older people are static in memory and dump screwed povs, as well as it being true that someone similar to you could give good advice. The opposite is also true, in that some younger or inexperienced people seek the POV of older people, and some of those older people can give great advice for the long term because of their experience. So I guess this age thing needs to be pinned down.
The follow advice feature would be more like self development tracking and the site holding you accountable for it.
Once you niche that down to an area it might look different...
Let's say your 20yo and want relationship advice.
Would you rather get it from a 90yo with a 10 year relationship or a 30yo with a 10 year relationship?
Just really think about that specific case for a while, deeply.
(I known you want to say one that had a 40 or 50 year relationship or something..)
Specifically relationship advice you would find might not have aged well due to the gender equality revolution let's say...
In a totally different niche, when I look at gardening advice I need a lot of context information if the other person is growing in a similar ecological context, in similar weather and for similar reasons let's say, way more than I would care about his age.
What I guess I'm saying is:
Age and experience that are often mixed but are not the same thing.
If you get into niche knowledge/specific areas there might often be more important things than years of experience.
If you look into memory and psychological science, you'd see that memory doesn't age well by itself + the different of view when in the straggle vs after achieving a thing is huge and the advice of after might not fit the person at the start of the straggle.. + our society, environment etc changes so fast nowadays that things become outdated very quickly.. talk with your elderly about how to navigate social media and relationships, or about saving for retirement where they didn't have these concerns.
Do you think you can make something that would validate someone following generic advice from any field? Check he's praying, saying nice things to people around him, meditate, always look left when crossing, swing his stroke left with a bent knee stance... At best at this level of generic, you can just ask him...
Try to take all of this not as a discouragement, but as trying to make you plan more accurate
Thanks for the detailed reply, again, @hatkyinc
To your point about the relationship advice for a 20yr old, it highlighted for me a different benefit of asking an older person for such advice.
A 30yr old or 90yr old in a 10yr relationship will both be involved different context and times so to speak. However they will both be practice skills and ideas that will be universal, such as; picking a partner, understanding their communication, patience, etc. while this is true for both parties, the 90yr old has more experience because of the longer life lived, of course. Additionally, the longer life allowed skills used in the relationship to be used and developed in different arenas of life and in different eras/times.
It isn’t that the 30yr olds experience isn’t valid or useful, it’s just that elders POV has more nuance and practice to it, potentially at least.
As you stated, with the gender equality revolution changes, there are people young and old who are confused about its navigation and what it means. Likewise, there are also those who have decided on a path of navigating the changes that gets them and others what they want.
Same thing applies when there is a technological sweep across industries or other arenas of life.
The skills/ discipline used to come to that decision can many times be learned from an older/more experienced person. Isn’t it a bit similar to a mentor/mentee relationship?
I’m inclined to think that the changes society consistently make will have little effect on how an older person can contribute their knowing or experience. This is because certain things are never going to change, regardless of new technology or revolutions.
Those things that remain a constant are areas where elders could always contribute and where other people young and old will come to listen.
I might just revamp/drop that “follow advice” feature. I didn’t/don’t want it to be some sort of “holding-you-accountable” feature.
I look at it like this: when you get to 90yrs old, would that mean you’re entirely useless to society or even your family? Granted, many people like to speak with people in similar situations as theirs, regardless of age, and there are some who only do so with people around their age and avoid older people.
I can see your point clearer now about niching down. It probably would be more useful/simpler that way.
My perspective of the idea is based on my experience that we tend to ignore older folks or see them as a burden. That seems like a waste of knowledge to me. Of course I could be wrong.
What do you think?
Would you agree that written books are a form of advice giving?
How big is the niche of older books or of books that were written by older people?
Would you consider that a good indication to your market?
I’m not entirely sure on that point.
Thinking of books I personally enjoy then and now, they’ve mostly been written by people over 30 at the time of my earliest memory of those readings.
I mostly listen audiobooks now a days and read a few blogs. Similar thing. Mostly older people write them and the more in depth and intellectual pieces seem to carry older authors...not sure what to make of that.
Those pieces are read by a wide variety of people so I don’t know if older authors frequency in the market is a good representation of demand, if I understand you correctly.
Books are a different experience than a website, of course.
I mean, do you as a reader, while looking for a book on a topic, look at the age of the author, and try to have a book written by an older author? and/or specifically would not read a book written by a younger person, would only see the advice written by a person > age X.
When I ask you, I don't only mean you, I mean is there a group of people that do that...
While not identical, I think that symbolises your audience.
So let say you find X% of the population, does that for books, it might be in that similar scale for people looking for other written advice...
And if you are at that niche, also doing lets say a book recommendation site based on older writers, might attract similar people...
(IDK if such a site or similar already exists..)
And if you don't care about this for book, but you care about it for other written formats, I find that a bit odd personally, as any written advice should follow a similar pattern, and if anything, books which you as a reader is usually more invested into, should carry more weight and you should apply more of your core beliefs into in a way..
Or if you'r thinking about it differently, what makes a post author's age more important than a book author's age?
Also you do know that age is kinda a core discrimination, right?... have you considered the moral and legal repercussions around that?
I can't say that I look for a person's age when selecting books to read. I also don't find it coincidental that the books I enjoy are usually written by older people.
Most other media I use are often filled with younger people; my youtube subscriptions, music artistes, etc.
Where other people are concerned, I don't know as yet.
I don't think an author's age is necessarily more important than what they say - I don't envision older people as more useful/capable or less than younger people, but I do identify certain scenarios where going with an older person makes sense where experience/strategy is concerned, until the best suited candidate is found, regardless of age.
As for the discrimination point, I'd actually argue on the contrary. Older people are many times sidelined in society or just forgotten - even our parents. Some people don't want to give them the time of day whenever they want to speak or share ideas. In my industry, it's very difficult to find many older people in offices working along side younger folk. The older ones are usually in the C-Suite, while the rest of the staff feels as though they can't relate to them and have no desire to. There is some truth to that, but the POV of the older folk is not widely heard or invited, in my experience.
Funnily, a few times in my life, I've seen older people help younger ones gain where employment or relationships are concerned. Some those people were parents. The younger ones could navigate the technological world better that their parents, but they still managed to find help in the insight a longer life lived can potentially give.
But that is not why I'm interesting in fleshing out this idea. I'm not seeking some sort of justice for ignored older people. Nor am I necessarily worried about those who feel excluded from contributing - the whole internet and real world forums are open to them, some of them specifically so.
I'm thinking of just a platform where those of whatever age come to read the POV/experiences of older people on a variety of topics.
I don't know how old you are, and I'm not concerned with it. I do know that there are older people you may be aware of that have useful/fun/insightful life experiences that can move people in what ever way they.
Everyone experiences that with everyone of course, but I'm specifically thinking of older folks here.
While I'm going wide with my questions, the goal is for you to narrow in on your idea.
The vague idea is understood.
The details aren't.
How old is your target writer?
Would you really verify the age? Even if it puts you in a problematic spot?
Or would you just list a verified age, yet lets say allow sorts and filters without pushing in one direction systematically?
Should this just be for any content? Or do you want to focus on something specific?
Would readers actually care? Do you have an indication of that? A sample group that already represents that? Or do you need to go research if that exists? Or do you think your business should educate people about that?...
What are your other base assumption required for this to work? How do you verify them or at least ball park show the potential?
All of this is just for the first part, if you want the follow people to implement advice, how does that look like?... What do you need to track? How often? How do you make an open format text be a verifiable thing?... And again do you have any indication that people value that to the level of let's say paying for that... And for how long would that be a thing?...
How old is your target writer?
I'd say 40+
Would you really verify the age? Even if it puts you in a problematic spot?
Or would you just list a verified age, yet lets say allow sorts and filters without pushing in one direction systematically?
The latter sounds more reasonable to me. I don't know how I would verify their age without scaring them off.
Should this just be for any content? Or do you want to focus on something specific?
Content I'm leaning towards are Relationships, Career and general life experience POVs. This last one I want to pin down more satisfactorily. I'm also interested in hearing how they handle solitude and loneliness as they get older.
Would readers actually care? Do you have an indication of that? A sample group that already represents that? Or do you need to go research if that exists?
I need more research. As I said prior, my older people are somewhat sidelined in the industry I work in, and I see it even with people and their parents in general. I'm quiet sure there are people who'd be interested in the POVs of those older people, and I'm quiet sure, those older people have plenty to offer in terms of life insight.
Or do you think your business should educate people about that?...
This I'm just now considering, since you mentioned it.
How do you verify them or at least ball park show the potential?
I've no clue, actually. I'm one of those who would just try something without seeking the POV of other people, ironically. That's not to say I'm opposed to market research.
What are you struggling with here, exactly? Just talk to advice-givers one-on-one, preferably in-person or via video calls. I think that should be the minimum bar at least. Unless you're trying to make some massive site with tens of thousands of contributors. But even if you are, start small and work your way up. Do things that don't scale in the beginning.
This is a tough one. There's advice all over the place. It's easy to find. There's more good advice out there that any of us have time to even read. When your competition is this stiff, your product (advice) becomes a commodity, making it hard to charge a lot.
IMO you don't want to explore some innovative business model. That's an easy way to waste many years on a fruitless search. Instead, de-risk this by looking at what's already working for others. What do people already buy in this realm? Books, calendars, notebooks, full of advice, maybe? And then there are sites full of advice like Quora that generate massive SEO traffic and sell ads. Or newsletters that get tons of subscribers and sell ads. Or advice sites that go nicher and deeper and become educational courses. Etc.
Providing knowledge to people and then helping them act on it are two completely different problems, and you're making your life incredibly difficult if you try to solve the same time. If you're insistent on doing that, something has to give. You'd need to shrink the scope of the advice you give, or the number people you give it to. For example, my chess coach only sees one student at a time, so he can afford to provide knowledge and help us follow it.
Generally, my advice for you is to focus and start small. It sounds like you have a big vision, but it's impossible to start at the end. You can't jump to the top of a ladder. You have to take it one rung at a time. Work toward your bigger vision with baby steps. Do one simple thing, get that working, then use it to do another slightly less simple thing that's closer to your end goal.
Thanks for the feedback @csallen
This idea came from the internet question “what would you say to your younger self?”, along with my personal interest of gaining insight from those older/more experienced than me.
I agree with all your points, actually. Stepping back from it I can see how it is in fact a big too grand for starters and it’s best I pick/specify one tiny useful aspect of the idea and build on.
As you mentioned Quora, I had that idea in mind but specifically for younger/inexperienced people seeking advice/insight from those who are older/more experienced.
Many of us would read advice from many channels and do with it as we will without even speaking directly with the person giving the advice.
This would be a site specifically made to garner the POV of elders (lol), on various topics and catalog it for those who specifically want to see such information/insight.
As you mentioned, it’s best to start simple with the tiniest productive aspect of the site necessary.