Do You Want To Test Your Idea?

While there are plenty of places where you can "test your idea", I have recently came by the few of them:

1. startupSQUARE http://www.startupsquare.com
2. Reincarnation of LazyWeb http://twitter.com/lazyweb
3. LoveMyIdea http://www.lovemyidea.com

If you know something else that also works, I'd love to hear about them.

P.S. Neither one of these worked for me. :)

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

No freakin calendar out there?

Keeping in mind that it's 2009 coming to its end, I'm really surprised to not been able to find any good calendaring software that just integrates everywhere. It's only recently Google has enabled the CalDAV access for iCal, so now, thanks God!, I can manage all my calendars both online and on my Mac laptop.

However, not that fast.  

My iPhone (come on, isn't is the greatest thing since sliced bread? :) can sync with iCal (not a decent approach for cloud-computing trending era), but fails to show any other calendars attached to my account.  In addition to such a boomer, it gets synced with the weirdest name you can imagine (but who cares).  I've also tried setting up a separate CalDAV account for calendar on iPhone as well as establishing Google sync through Exchange protocol - none of these things can show any additional calendars (called delegates in iCal). 

So WTF?

Here is an idea.  While so trendy cloud-computing managing panels are growing so fast, it looks like people managed to miss very basic things.  The managing panel for Mail-AddressBook-Calendar kind of stuff.  That has inputs and outputs, and dashboard.  Manageable with drag and drop.  Say, I want the Google Calendar, Google Mail and Yahoo Address Book (or, screw it, just native Mac Address Book.app).  These are inputs.  Outputs are connectors to any type of software you can imagine.  Dashboard is one screen that allows to work flawlessly with you stuff.  That's it.  That easy.

Anyone?

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

How to get a bunch of beta users in a few weeks

Find small blogs (10k-50k subscribers) relevant to your market and offer them 100-1000 signups with a custom-branded demo code.  The blogger likes getting an exclusive for her readers, and the readers like getting insider access to a hot new tool.  Contact a bunch of them at once, we felt lucky to have a roughly 20% hit rate.

via runitback.tumblr.com

Pretty creative, nice idea of bringing people on for beta testing your product. You know, once you release something, it's always a headache: "So what's up now?" Following this advice could give you at least a starting point.

# Posted via web from opportunity__cost

Giveaways thru Twitter

It seems that different drawings, giveaways and just ad campaigns are getting high on Twitter nowadays.  

So I thought that it's an appropriate time for the product performing the full-cycle of running a giveaway on Twitter, giving the owner full set of tools to monitor activity, choosing the winner, publishing the results; as well as providing an entrant's with some analytics on the competition they are entering into, as well as some statistical calculations (according to different giveaways run though the product) on how many tweets do you need to post, what's the typical profile of the winner, etc.  

This product doesn't need top be an academic innovation though.  It should be:

1. Easy for businesses to use.  (It should NOT be free.  Charge for it!)
2. Fun, Fun, Fun for entrants.  Stimulate.  Advertise.  Entertain. (Do you see an extra value for #1 already here?)

That's it folks.  Anyone?

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

Правильный "календарь"

Идея на миллион, не новая, и я ей наврядли когда-нибудь займусь. Но с удовольствием воспользовался бы плодами.Календарь. :)

Тема старая и заезженная, уже до неприличия. Однако. Тонкая touchscreen панель, которая может работать по USB от компьютера или питания, на которой просто нарисован календарь и на котором можно писать как на любом бумажном. Которую просто повесить на холодильник, стенку, возле рабочего стола в комнате. Подставки это не то - нужно именно повесить на стенку. :)

Есть факт, что ни один онлайн календарь не есть достойная замена обычной бумажке на стене, где просто подошел, написал что-то, стер что-то, отметил насколько это важно. Без логинов, сайтов, клавиатур и прочего. Не говоря о том, что это всегда перед глазами, это и будильник, и подходит для совместного пользования (семья, фирма, отдел) также отлично как для личного, легко поменяет мировосприятия из классичного "месячного" вида, в agenda, недельник или дневник. А если бы это еще штука имела wireless и синкалась с онлайн календарям, Google, iCal, Yahoo или что там еще есть - это была бы, сука, бомба.

Я бы купил такую штуку. А я жадный очень, да и технологичен не в меру. Но купил бы, одним из первых. С другой стороны минус, я конечно не авторитетен в этом вопросе, но что-то подсказывает мне что себестоимость такой штуки в плане запчастей легко встанет в $200-300, а этот порядок далеко не радует. Я его не заплачу в принципе, даже если это будет пуль управления космическим спутником Земли. Конечно, оно может выхватить совместный рынок как телевидение, фоторамки и прочего, но это перебор, такие супер позиционирования они вредны для здоровья. В таких позиционированиях теряется острота и ценность конкретной проблемы и ее решения, таким образом портят самые лучше начинания.

Технология достаточно проста, и все уже освоено - и письмо распознают PDA, и touch экраны и вообще. Где ж ты простоя тонкая панелька, чтобы тебя повесить и получать удовольствие.

К сожалению вот этот опыт работы с календарем перенести онлайн нельзя никак. Я не могу представить себе замену. Вот у меня висит дома пару месяцев бумажка. Какая никакая, но бумажка. И я заметил что мой Google Calendar довольно пустует, хотя бумажка зачеркана вдоль и поперек. Нельзя в онлайн подойти, написать где тебе надо и что тебе надо и все. А на простой бумаже удобно очень.

New personal finance startup idea

On the grounds of my last post about money management online, I came up with an idea of new personal finance Web application.

So here is the deal:

1. Make a clone of popular desktop application. Either one would be okay. Rich features of the browsers allow you to do almost everything nowadays. Keep in mind, that the most of people have Checking, Savings, Credits and Loans, at least one, for the car. Don't give up on any of these just because you think people don't need it.
2. Keep the style sticky, don't go far in the "ergonomics" and UI and UX design. The people are already stick to some specific ways of handling (and thinking!) of data. Let them stay with it.
3. Use the Google Gears or anything of this kind to let your software work offline.
4. Provide a number of communication tools to your software, like widgets, IM, SMS (text messaging from the cell phones), Web or good old e-mails. Make your software as easy as Twitter is for sending and receiving updates.
5. Don't go far in reports, you're not developing an executive software. But be reasonable in your limits. There some things that everyone wants to know. Make sure you give them a tool for that.
   
6. Give your site an iPhone application, both online and offline. Everybody wants iPhone nowadays. ;) Don't forget about other smartphones. However, it could be a simple e-mail and Web gateway.
   
7. Start with the basic features, be very responsive, provide an ultimate feedback for feature requests and their status, let people know the exact day when they'll receive the feature that they want. You know, this is just numbers, it doesn't take more then a month to add some fancy splits or CSV import. Make your (prospective) clients feel that they are part of the process. Let them know that they will get what they want. (But don't be afraid to say Sorry, but not, yet for ridiculous and unreasonable requests).
8. Make sure you have all features that let people the full visibility about their current financial situation. Don't make the wait for transactions clearance on the credit card, let them see the upcoming expenses, monitor the budget, let them stretch it for urgent needs by taking funds from other categories (for example, let people temporary save on restraunt expenses for the goal of buying a new laptop). Make this visual and straight forwarded. What you really need to deliver is a personal financial tool. People want to be in control and to be able to optimize their funds. Visual way of funds planning and optimization is the easiest way for the most of us.
9. Charge not more then 10 dollars per month (but not much less), don't mess up with different plans. I don't want to count how many accounts do I need to handle, how many transactions would be in each, etc. Give me a choice: get it free or pay for it. But make sure you give it for free. No obligations.
10. Once you're up and running, let the social networking to work. Let people give advices, mark events, whatever not. Develop content dependant advisory system. It'll pay off.
    

Yes, it'd be tough for a first three-five weeks to get the core up and running. After that you can become the next 37signals with a thousands of happy customers.