Archive for October, 2008
Revenue At Helium.com October 31st, 2008
I am confused. Helium just stated that the revenue that the garner from their 20% cut in their marketplace gross, has now grown larger then their revenue that the receive from advertising.
That terrifies me.
Take a look at the marketplace: they have twenty articles up there. Average cost, about $30. That means that there is around $600 in open writing contracts. Let’s guesstimate that the average gestation period is five days. $600 dollars every five days is $43,800 per year. They take their twenty percent, leaving them with a paltry: $8760.
If that is actually higher than their ad revenue (which it cannot be), then they are off to the deadpool like a well funded rocket. But they have over a million articles, tens of thousands of writers. Millions of hits. Their ad dollars must be higher than that. If they are not, they need to optimize. \
What is going on here?
Posted in Web/Tech | Comments (0)
Compete.com – Dead Wrong, But I Still Love It October 31st, 2008
Anyone in the web space relies on web traffic measuring services. It is our equivalent of a pissing contest. With the venerable Alexa, and the up and comers Compete and Quantcast, you can quite quickly derive a good idea of how much traffic a site is getting, and what the velocity of that site it. But sometimes a service can get it bass akwards. Take a look at this chart:
Woopra is a new web analytics service, competing with Clicky, SiteMeter, and a few other companies. It is a big space, with plenty of slack room for growth and new players. Look again at the chart: it’s damn impressive. But take a look at this chart:
What is going no here? That is a whole different story! Here is what’s up. Compete relies on fancy (and generally well built) algorithms to synthesize information from around the web to produce its numbers. Woopra, unlike many other stats services utilizes on a downloaded desktop client as well as a web interface to provide its service. Compete here is surely picking up on the data passing back and forth from the client to Woopra.com, and counting it as traffic. It’s an isolated incident, but I am positive that the Compete numbers are bogus. Just as a bit of proof Woopra recently closed their beta, capping it at 50,000 users. No company with only 50,000 users can generate the level of traffic that Compete is showing us.
Food for though, keep on using online traffic trackers, just triple check them and use your gut instinct. Sometimes they are just plain confused.
Posted in Web/Tech | Comments (0)
Snipd – Soon To Deadpool October 31st, 2008
I hate to say this about a startup, but really, sometimes you have to say it. Snipd is the perfect example of the hangover the internet has from Web 2.0 startups. Lets lay it out:
Snipd has a product in a saturated market, with two new competitors that launched recently.
Snipd could be built by 3 guys in four months.
Snipd is going to rely on advertising, with some ridiculous idea of monetizing from “snipping” to social networks. Read: AdSense and a few failed partnerships. This leaves them paying more for servers then the will get in revenue.
They have little/no traffic.
To ever contemplate a sale, they need a vast user base, but given the competition and limited market this is unlikely.
They only have received 15k in funding. So cash must be low and investment is basically out of the question.
What does this leave us? A piece of floating deadwood that has little chance of ever being purchased. Their product is actually mildly useful, which is something. But getting real for a moment, this “company” is not going to make it.
Best of luck, I pray that I am wrong. I just wouldn’t bet that I am.
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Google Knol – Why? October 30th, 2008
TechCrunch just posted that Google Knol is now available in a few new languages. As no one uses it in English I am unsure why I would care that I can now use it in French. The point behind Knol, letting people take credit for their submissions, and some form of monetization is fine. But being 17 light years behind the elephant in the room makes it hard for me to care. At all.
The traffic chart tells the whole story:
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Tip’d – So What October 29th, 2008
I do not understand some things.
When a new consumer launch, even hitting 50,000 users in two months is considered negligible. Not even a blip on the radar of the internet. 50,000 is dead in the water if you are running an ad supported site. So then why all the hype (especially at launch) over the financial Digg-clone Tip’d?
Tipd makes public their stats:
“Current Members: 1198
Published: 607
Upcoming: 1115
Tips: 15977
Comments: 894″
Not that my blog gets huge amounts of traffic (trust me, it does not). But I really do not understand why Tip’d is a big deal. Look at those numbers again, that smacks to me of a soft, soft launch. 1200 users over 13 days is a bit pathetic.
Not to say that Tip’d will not grow to something greater in the future. Just that the ridiculous of media coverage at launch that they received was misplaced. Cover something that is making a difference. Not simply because you know @mslaeem. If they hit 10,000 users by year end, I will sign on. Maybe then I will find the value add.
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Compete makes this all clear:
Posted in Web/Tech | Comments (0)
Who Would Have Thought: Ray Ozzie is Funny After All October 29th, 2008
Ray Ozzie, Microsoft Chief Software Architect gave an interview going over the recent Microsoft Azure and Office offerings. Little did I know that he was a funny man:
Gillmor: And of course for me, it works on the Mac.
Ozzie: Yes, it does work on the Mac. We
Posted in Life | Comments (0)
How To Fix Twitter October 29th, 2008
I love Twitter. I love the idea, the app, the clients, the reach, everything. I love it so much, I would pay for it. Honestly, if Twitter went paid only today I would rush to pull out my debit card. But most people would not, breaking the reason why I wanted to pay in the beginning. But Twitter needs to start bringing in money, in some way. They have cash, I am sure, but no more investment at any reasonable multiple will come without solid revenue.
This is what I say:
Twitter, you cannot charge for premium features. The moment you restrict your feature set people will jump ship. That cannot, and should not, be your monetization model.
Do not restrict entry into Twitter. This also would hurt what makes Twitter so amazing, the people.
Do not put up ads all over the site. This will make me hurt. Also, most people use a client, so that is moot as well. You will not get enough eyeballs.
Do this instead: Once anyone gets to 1000 followers, block them from getting new followers unless the cough up $10/month. Really people. This is nothing to complain about. $10/month, is nothing. But Twitter, get a handle on spam. No one one wants to pay because 890 fake people are following them.
Lets look at the numbers, Twitter has more than 3 million users. Lets estimate that 1% have more than 1000 followers. That is a ball park number, could be wrong. 1% of 3 million is 30,000. That would give Twitter a healthy 3.6 million a year in revenue. Assuming they can keep costs down, that could put them near break even. A good start.
Also, charge any corporate client $100/month. It is nothing to them, but aggregates well for Twitter.
I love you Twitter, don’t you go bankrupt on me now. People love your service, but only the hardcore users will be willing to pay. The follower number is a self affirming meritocratic metric. Use it.
Posted in Twitter | Comments (2)
How To Sell A Computer October 29th, 2008
People are predictable. HP did a good job tapping into that when launching their newest line of netbooks. This picture explains it:
Posted in Life | Comments (0)
Prediction – G1 Sales Beat Expectations October 29th, 2008
I feel someone has to say this: I predict higher than expected G1 sales for the year, and for it to become a mainstream platform in two. Android has the backing of the smartest and best funded company in the world (Google), and hundreds of brilliant developers at the phone companies.
Whatever the analysts bullshit-guesses are, add 30%.
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AdaptiveBlue and Glue – Launch Time October 28th, 2008
A quick shout out to AdaptiveBlue, and especially @Fraser, today for their formal launch of Glue, and the announcement of 4.5 million in funding. Glue is a great new browser enhancement for Firefox. I was part of the alpha/beta period and spent a considerable amount of time talking with their team on the product.
I use it. I recommend it. Give it a try. It is so nice to see companies still getting funding during these difficult times.
Posted in Web/Tech | Comments (0)
