(translates into booking.si)
A start–up that started as a service for booking tables in restaurants and figured out that Slovenian market isn’t ready for this yet. The problem aren’t the users but the suppliers — the dining industry seems to be governed by older owners and internet and computers are a rarity. This means they need to “relocate” to bookings in other areas.
What fascinated me the most was that they think that ideas are cheap and you need to share them as much as you can — you’ll be getting valuable comments from everybody you share the idea with. I completely agree with this but I don’t entirely agree with another point they made — that you need to have a business plan done to start. I agree that it’s important to think about all this but would put the passion in front of making a well styled document.
All in all an interesting talk about how to start a web service with some really refreshing comments.
The passion for investing in stock, funds and other financial instruments in the Balkan is the basis for this start–up. The team consists of two people that are passionate about this topic and also passionate about web 2.0 services. They spent approximately 16 person–months working until now and expect to invest 8 more until launch in a few months — they’re looking for developers!
The reasons to start a new financial portal seems pretty straight forward — there is no good alternative and all the competition is from web 1.0 or older. It’s a great thing when you find out that you’re passionate about something that is not really present on the market.
(translates to giftcoupons.com)
When asked whether they ever had problems with gift buying almost everybody in the room said yes. A much smaller number bought a gift coupon. This start–up thinks the number is big enough and they started a web service that sells gift coupons for different stores. When looking back they now know that they spent way too much time on stuff that isn’t really all that important — business cards, legal issues, marketing materials,… I’m not saying these aren’t important and neither are they — but they need to be done as quickly as possible so they don’t come between you and the goal. And the goal is building and growing a successful business.
Another problem they mentioned is the huge number of ideas that lead to scope creep. This is usually also my problem but I think I rooted it out successfully — what I do is talk about ideas and write them all down. This means I don’t need to think about them anymore. I heard something similar in an Indiana Jones movie the other day.
(translates to giveaway.si)
The most famous start–up today with press coverage on the main Slovenian TV and radio stations. The team consists of two people — one responsible for the technical side and the other for PR. The final design was set on the 8th March 2007 and the page was launched a week later. A lesson they learned the hard way was that you need to buy the domains early on — as Murphy goes you’ll lose it the day you want to buy it.
Communication is key — you can actually get free stuff if you ask. You’ve got nothing to loose anyway. Because they went for a charitable cause they got a lot of free PR. And now people are passing the link on to those that want to give something away which is probably the ultimate goal of every web service. Having a fan club can be very good for your business…
You also need to think about how to handle the peaks that will come when you succeed. If you don’t your service will die when you have the link on the front page of TechCrunch. Or in the case of local service on the local TV station.
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