53,651 - 25,000 = 28,651 ;)
You win users one by one. But all that is needed is one person with a bad experience, who by default has a blog and a rss feed, then as soon as they spell your company name currently, their viewpoint is indexed for infinity with googol et al.
Dave Winer adds to the conversation about how many startup users you need to be successful, and says it isnt the 25K or 53,651 numbers mentioned. Namely because there is another dimension to the equation. That being time; The old hotmail example of being bought when it had 9m-10m members @ $30-$40 multiple per user. Now it has 68m or so members doing 75m emails a day.
Now this whole conversation is the 2 edged sword of "network effect" and how much is enough; It's alot different for someone recruiting customers for a hedge fund, mortgage, car lease or even short term loan compared to an ad funded ajax home page.
You look at businesses like Zopa for example, and (type of) numbers they needed in alpha, beta, and YR 1 would be far smaller than a free Web 2.0 Community : In fact 25-53K+ active lenders on Zopa might make a business model that really works in YR 1.
Businesses need to know which metrics they are chasing, and how they are different / earlier / better than their competition and substitutes in doing so.
Basically, all customers (trade and end user) are not created equal : Time and industry affect. Entrepreneurs and Investors will always look for the new and undervalued gold nuggets.
Scripting.com : "VCs may have a good perspective on what makes money, but they weren't around the blogging world when the total size of the blogosphere was measured in double digits (i.e. less than 100). In hindsight, you'd have to agree that 25 users was a significant number in 1997 and 1998, when they were busy courting couch potatoes and their eyeballs."
Dave Winer adds to the conversation about how many startup users you need to be successful, and says it isnt the 25K or 53,651 numbers mentioned. Namely because there is another dimension to the equation. That being time; The old hotmail example of being bought when it had 9m-10m members @ $30-$40 multiple per user. Now it has 68m or so members doing 75m emails a day.
Now this whole conversation is the 2 edged sword of "network effect" and how much is enough; It's alot different for someone recruiting customers for a hedge fund, mortgage, car lease or even short term loan compared to an ad funded ajax home page.
You look at businesses like Zopa for example, and (type of) numbers they needed in alpha, beta, and YR 1 would be far smaller than a free Web 2.0 Community : In fact 25-53K+ active lenders on Zopa might make a business model that really works in YR 1.
Businesses need to know which metrics they are chasing, and how they are different / earlier / better than their competition and substitutes in doing so.
Basically, all customers (trade and end user) are not created equal : Time and industry affect. Entrepreneurs and Investors will always look for the new and undervalued gold nuggets.
Scripting.com : "VCs may have a good perspective on what makes money, but they weren't around the blogging world when the total size of the blogosphere was measured in double digits (i.e. less than 100). In hindsight, you'd have to agree that 25 users was a significant number in 1997 and 1998, when they were busy courting couch potatoes and their eyeballs."
posted by redbarren at 10:46 AM
1 Comments:
Hi Ben,
I have just started (a couple of weeks ago) a new site focusing on Australian Search. I was wondering if I could do a peice on your new blog search engine.
I would like to set up an interview if possible. If your interested email me on pdowse@gmail.com
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