After the Small to Big (Kings college London) class, I started getting interested in Social networking websites. From there onwards I always had an idea lingering in my mind to start a social networking site. I know many are saying it requires hundreds of thousands of KDs and many IT developers but that’s all achievable if you have the right working mix. I DON’T!
So after I wrote my idea on paper, I contacted the professor at Cranfield university who was teaching us in November 2011 about social network sites. Tazeem Rajwani is very interested in such projects and have worked with many social startups in the UK. He read my brief and thought it was good (Mark Zuckerberg watch out)!! Eshfeeeh I think it sucked like hell but he was worried about my feelings. Anyways I learned a lot from him again and I will give you the summary of his points:
1) It has to target a niche market, examples like Human resources, football fans, food lovers etc etc
2) Transaction value, I like this word: this means that the social site I create must provide some kind of value to the end user. Where he benefits when using it and it already makes a job even cheaper or less of a cost on the user, example LinkedIn where it’s cheaper for HR people to use than hiring a head hunter.
3) Barriers of entry, how fast others can copy you, if you just started out with a budget and facebook comes and likes your idea, they can do it in days when it will take you months, its just a resources matter: he has many, I don’t.
4) Revenue stream: how will you make money, somebody has to pay! There is no free lunch my friends.
I think I did not answer the 4 above questions. So am back on the drawing board.
Below is a pic from a company we have visited in central London, they recruit staff based on social networking methods, its called bravenewtalent.com
