I have 404,772 users. Now what? • Hacker News Board

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#151

Post by AznHisoka » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 1:54 PM UTC

majani wrote: post #105

staunch wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Focus on engagement . Sign ups are almost meaningless if the users bounce and never return. The reason Facebook is so amazing is not just that they have a billion users, it's that they have 80% of them checking the site 5x per week (or whatever). See how many users you can get into the habit of coming back to your site on a regular basis. That's the number that ultimately will drive everything: revenue, long term net…

'Engagement' is overrated. Some sites , e.g Google and Wikipedia probably have super high bounce rates, because they solve your problem on the first page you see. What if people start entering his site mainly from band pages, get all the necessary info and leave? That wouldn't be a bad thing for users.

Actually, that would be a bad thing for his site. If he gets one-time visitors, he will need to keep growing to offset the churn rate. That means he'll probably need to rely a lot on search engine traffic, and for the viral growth to continue. If both go away, his site is dead.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#152

Post by ForrestN » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 1:54 PM UTC

pud wrote: post #36

ForrestN wrote: post #17

What about sponsored content? Pay a per-day fee to get promoted in the listings and therefor be a more visible part of the network?

That's an interesting idea. Kind of like how you can pay Ebay to give your posting a yellow background, making it more noticeable. There's something slightly icky about charging my users for visibility though. Who I consider "starving artists" (even though plenty are probably doing fine...). There's something nice about Fandalism currently being a level playing field for everyone. By the way, Fandalism uses a version…

That all makes sense. It may not work in this case, but in general I like businesses where the customer is clear. I tend to think there's always a tension when the user, the musicians, aren't also the customer, guitar companies for example. Obviously a hurdle that has been overcome countless times before.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#153

Post by ForrestN » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:03 PM UTC

Another idea: marketplace for independent musicians? Seems like with a little tweaking it could be a great way to find studio musicians, wedding bands or even teachers. AirBnB for musician rentals?

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#154

Post by wtvanhest » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:06 PM UTC

pheelicks wrote: post #37

From what I gather, a lot of artists make the bulk of their income from concert tickets and merchandise, as a large slice of the income from music sales goes to a label. Two suggestions: - Make it real easy for artists to sell merchandise through the site. E.g they just upload a couple of logo's and you deal with printing T-shirts, mailing them etc... - Organising concerts. You could take a cue from Kickstarter and h…

Of all the post ideas, I like yours the best.

If Pud just started out with one high margin product (T-Shirts?), and focused on getting a really good system in place to print/sell/ship them it could make a ton of money.

The issue he will have though is inventory management. T-shirts have a (sort of) high fixed cost and you have to sell a bunch of shirts to break even. He would need to collect a deposit from the bands to make sure they were in it to sell the merchandise.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#155

Post by vineet » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:18 PM UTC

Firstly, Congrats. Around half a million users in three months is a great achievement.

But as for 'now what?': I noticed that there is nothing in your list that I would state as being a direct win/win. Almost every item on your list seems like a distraction (yes, a distraction that will get you the really important money).

The exception is your suggestion of 'premium features'. But, if not done correctly, you start competing with yourself - and your free users might start to resent you. Instead, what if you focused on one or more features that are:

(a) free but bring you revenue - like helping users sell albums (and taking a small cut).

(b) require payment because of some limitations - like showcasing a users profile for a day.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#156

Post by xiaomei » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:21 PM UTC

aymeric wrote: post #14

xiaomei wrote: post #10

You could sell the site on http://flippa.com

Imagine: You have a growing successful website and you wonder what to do with it, would your answer be: I should sell it on flippa? I think this is a poor advice, especially in an entrepreneur community.

It may be poor advice but it is an option nevertheless. pud asked for what to do next and selling the site is a potential road to take. I'm disappointed that some people have down voted this to death. I am following the rules of the site. I feel bullied after expressing an opinion.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#157

Post by kephra » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:22 PM UTC

Some ideas:

Advertising is an idea, but the problem is, that you likely don't want random ads, selling phone sex, or other products a musician does not want.

I bit to late. I would have said "Come to Germany", one to three month ago, "join me at Frankfurt Music Fair, and we hustle around to hunt targeted advertisements, by shaking hand with the right people".

The other idea is to expand the business into a premium membership for live acts. I know that people are willing to pay for listening live to shoutcast streams. Managing shoutcast severs for musicians is one of the many small parts of my income. A good musician can earn about $50 in average per hour, by sitting in underpants in front of his computer, because people love paying tip!

All you need is a premium membership (accept pp and cc from listeners, payout with paypal), an own geoip shoutcast relay network, and charge some percent.

Last is your cost structure. You hobby costs $2,500/month. Thats a lot of money for the cloud trap. Own hosting or even co locating could be much cheaper in the long run. But you need some more admin work.

You can contact me in IRC (freenode #startups) or at my website http://kephra.de/

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#158

Post by kephra » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:27 PM UTC

vineet wrote: post #155

Firstly, Congrats. Around half a million users in three months is a great achievement. But as for 'now what?': I noticed that there is nothing in your list that I would state as being a direct win/win. Almost every item on your list seems like a distraction (yes, a distraction that will get you the really important money). The exception is your suggestion of 'premium features'. But, if not done correctly, you start c…

I think (b) is the right way. You must generate a win/win for the musicians (sell mp3s and live acts), the listeners (buy music legally and directly), and yourself (some percent)

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#159

Post by faster » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:41 PM UTC

pud wrote: post #12

j45 wrote: post #9

Some (random) thoughts / ideas. They might or might not hit what you're looking for but they're some types of connections that came to mind when surfing the site: - On first sight, I get the impression that it's a profile site. The musician in me wants to find others like me, or that complement what I'm doing to connect, relate, share music with, maybe collaborate with.. - Events - Maybe music related events (learnin…

I like all these ideas and want to do all of them in one form or another. Most of them I'd want to make free (like the learning stuff). But.. events ... that could be a fun one. Specifically, I envision a huge trade show like CES but for musicians. There's currently one called "NAMM" but it's not open to the public. It would be a lot of hard work but I think would be fun. Ideally it would be free or cheap for musicia…

Why not a virtual trade show? Let equipment manufacturers sponsor a forum section and require that they participate on the forum to answer questions from users. It's not an in-your-face ad, but gives the mfr exposure and an opportunity to demonstrate their customer service skills (and maybe offer discounts to subscribers?), and you get money. Done right, it would be a fair exchange of value that benefits your users.

Re: I have 404,772 users. Now what?

#160

Post by ccoggins » Tue, Apr 17, 2012, 2:46 PM UTC

pud wrote: post #33

ccoggins wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going along with the idea of helping musicians find gigs, make the venues pay a membership fee to get connected with musicians. I would think venues more likely to be able to pay for a service over an aspiring musician. Also, I enjoy seeing such an honest response from someone in charge of a business :)

I think the supply/demand is backwards here. Most amateur musicians gig for free. Many actually pay to perform (by pre-paying the venue for x number of tickets, then hoping to recoup costs by selling those tickets on their own directly to fans). Big touring acts pay to play too, by renting out the venue.

Ah, I had no idea. I'm not a musician by any means. That makes sense though. I guess a venue probably isn't willing to actively recruit unproven acts.