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Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

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Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#61

Post by subbu »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #27
sachinag wrote: post #12

While I applaud your initiative, I cannot believe that teachers would feel comfortable using something made by a single person who just graduated/will graduate? high school this year. You can keep your name, but I'd recommend taking out your relative youth. Also, I'm always a big fan of competitive analysis charts, especially if you're competing on price. Here's ours: http://www.dawdle.com/selling/index.php/fees/ I w…

I'll give some more thought to revealing my age on the about page (I'm now a college freshman, by the way). Any specific reasons you say teachers would be uncomfortable with it? I'm hesitant to add more plans at the risk of creating too many options for users, but I am looking into the possibility of institutional accounts. Also, I hadn't fully realized the disconnect between that screenshot and subtitle, thanks.

I'm hesitant to add more plans at the risk of creating too many options for users

Read 'The Truth about Relativity' in Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. He explains this problem really well.

A quote from that chapter: most people don't know what they want unless they see it in context. We don't know what kind of racing bike we want—until we see a champ in the Tour de France ratcheting the gears on a particular model. We don't know what kind of speaker system we like—until we hear a set of speakers that sounds better than the previous one.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#62

Post by fuzzmeister »

subbu wrote: post #61
fuzzmeister wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll give some more thought to revealing my age on the about page (I'm now a college freshman, by the way). Any specific reasons you say teachers would be uncomfortable with it? I'm hesitant to add more plans at the risk of creating too many options for users, but I am looking into the possibility of institutional accounts. Also, I hadn't fully realized the disconnect between that screenshot and subtitle, thanks.

I'm hesitant to add more plans at the risk of creating too many options for users Read 'The Truth about Relativity' in Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. He explains this problem really well. A quote from that chapter: most people don't know what they want unless they see it in context. We don't know what kind of racing bike we want—until we see a champ in the Tour de France ratcheting the gears on a particular mo…

I think I've actually read that quote before, but somehow it slipped my mind. I'll check out the whole argument.

To present different options would pretty much require a shift from my one-class-free model to an extra-features-for-money model, so that's something I'll have to wrestle with.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#63

Post by oxygen »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #52
oxygen wrote: post #25

I like the design and the core concept. My suggestions: 1) The video was helpful and I would out it right under the "Try it for free" tab 2) In terms or pricing strategy, I like the idea of giving away one class for free and then adopt a per class pricing at around $30. I am sure there would be some teachers out there who would just use their one class slot for all classes but then you will always find 10% of your cu…

1) That's good to hear, I'll try to make the video more prominent. 2) What's your reasoning for the $30 price point, as opposed to something lower? Also, having more than one class in a slot would cause some confusing overlaps in homework due dates and such, but you're right, there will always be some people trying to do it. 3) That's a good point, I'll look into a database of schools that I can put behind an AJAX pi…

I would check if teachers think about their job in terms of workload per class or per month and work backwards from there. The real question is: how do I get to $X/teacher?

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#64

Post by fuzzmeister »

vyrotek wrote: post #31
fuzzmeister wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instructure looks like a very good product. Slightly more college-focused and LMS-like than Eduset, but certainly similar. I'm definitely working on more features to differentiate from generic platforms that could be used (Facebook, Wordpress, etc). As for the price, do you think that it would become justifiable to someone like your sister once more features are added, or do you think that she and other teachers like…

I sent her the link just now and we talked a bit. Turns out the school district currently offers a very basic website for teachers to interact with students online. This is the site they gave her - http://barnes.myteacher.dvusd.com which was created using http://manila.userland.com . As you can tell, its nothing fancy really. She mentioned that students can create accounts and interact on her page but that its too co…

It's great to hear feedback like that. I intentionally designed Eduset to have less customizability than options such as the one you linked, or even Google Sites, as it's almost always the customizability that introduces the complexity. Further, from what I've heard, having an institutional payment option seems like the way to go.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#65

Post by fuzzmeister »

patio11 wrote: post #51
fuzzmeister wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That logic usually works, but I've found that teachers are a stingy group when it comes to paying for classroom services. I think that the risk of making the product seem too cheap is outweighed by the risk of teachers being reluctant to spend a significant amount on their classes. Wikispaces, another product partially targeted at teachers, has a $5/month option as well.

I've found that teachers are a stingy group when it comes to paying for classroom services. What data do you have which supports this contention? Is it more of a "gut feeling"? I had that gut feeling once myself, and you know what? It is a lie. A myth. Totally contrary to empirically observable fact. The average teacher in the United States spends $200 to $400 of her own money per year (varies with level and geograph…

You're right - it was a gut feeling. Thanks for the data.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#66

Post by NoBSWebDesign »

"Eduset completely changed the way I interact with my students." - High School English Teacher

Would be much more effective with a name (and even a picture). My first impression was that you made that quote up. Here's a good tutorial on using testimonials: http://www.marketingexperiments.com/improving-website-conver...

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#67

Post by jbyers »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #14
brandnewlow wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't $5 so low as to undermine the value you're offering? I paid $5 for a cheeseburger today at lunch. I'd look to offer something in the $30 range as your first paid tier.

That logic usually works, but I've found that teachers are a stingy group when it comes to paying for classroom services. I think that the risk of making the product seem too cheap is outweighed by the risk of teachers being reluctant to spend a significant amount on their classes. Wikispaces, another product partially targeted at teachers, has a $5/month option as well.

While we have a $5/month option, Wikispaces has offered a free service (no ads, same features as paid service, no strings) for K-12 teachers since early 2006. We've given away around 225K wikis under this plan. http://www.wikispaces.com/site/for/teachers

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#68

Post by joez »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #48
callmeed wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Does anyone have any experiences with overcoming this hurdle? " Ask them if they can hold some of the money in escrow ... or go with a different underwriter that will allow yearly subscription (but at a higher rate). You could also just do one-time payment for the year and require them to re-purchase. Might even look into accepting POs from schools. If you're into cashing checks :)

I'll talk to them further about the possibility of escrow - that sounds like a potentially reasonable solution. I asked previously about one-time payments, and they said that doing so does not negate the issue, which is interesting. Also, if a school wants to pay the good ol' fashioned way, I'm more than happy to oblige.

It's going to be really difficult to get schools to pay for anything in this environment. Definitely a worthy goal. I'd have a school administrator page or portal or something target at people who purchase 30 accounts at once.

But you need an entry point. Cold calling schools is likely ineffective. Try seeing which schools use Blackboard and then see if you can convince someone to try it out Eduset. Administrators are definitely looking to cut costs where they can. If you can provide their current LMS functionality for cheaper, there might be a play there.

Another thing to try is once you have users, suggest that they tell their friends about it. Maybe suggest it on a newsletter? Make it easy for them to share it with their peers and even their administrator.

This is probably a revenue model decision for you. The way I see it, 60 bucks a year is not much. If the teacher cares enough, then they should be willing to spend it. 60 bucks is not painful enough for them to push the school to pay for it. If it were more money, you'd lose teachers because they weren't willing to try it but you may net a whole school. A way you maybe able to solve this is offer some really expensive but cool tool at a higher pricing point. Base is 60 bucks but if you want to be able to track how students/classes/races are doing it's going to be 800 (maybe more?) bucks a class. Okay that idea was from a quick brainstorm, administrators love numbers... especially ones they can show accountability to parents with.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#69

Post by Maro »

fuzzmeister wrote: post #53
zemote wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, silly rants like this is absurd and really doesn't do any good and is not productive. Execution is key. I'm little passionate about my startup and that is why I replied. I never said he stole our idea. I said "almost" exact replica. Facebook borrows from twitter, eduset borrows from pownce, we borrow from twitter, facebook, friendfeed.

That's great to hear. I'm glad we've put this behind us.

Based on what you've written here, as an outsider: Your audience is not the HN audience. What people think of you here in terms of copying is completely irrelevant. (Also, copying is fine. Everybody copies, sometimes entire business ideas.) Your customers, who I assume are school administrators and teachers don't care which came first or who copies who. If you look at school admins, they probably don't even care about features, to win them over you need a good salesmen. Also, X always pointing out how he came first and his is better then Y is just good marketing, because whenever people see Y they also see X and are more likely to compare the two. Saying X is better is hardly evil, it's just marketing. (Remember the Apple vs. PC ads? Remember the news about how Microsoft wants to build stores right next to Apple stores? You're living it.) In the end I think you will need to sell packages to schools to make real money, and in that case it's not even going to be about features but about a good salesman with connections. That's what you get for making a product aimed at the goverment. Cheers.

Re: Ask HN: Review my classroom web tool, Eduset

#70

Post by [deleted] »

markbao wrote: post #29
zemote wrote: post #21

This is almost an exact replica of my startup http://edmodo.com which is completely free for multiple groups (eduset charges for more than 1 group), and already has decent traction with 87,000 registered users.

Jeff, Will has already explained to you multiple times in both in public and private that Eduset is not a copy of Edmodo and both products were developed independently of each other. Kindly lay the fuck off and quit advertising your startup at every mention of Eduset. Will and I both developed a teacher classroom web interface independently of each other. The difference is that I didn't lay claim to the idea and beco…

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