Intense Web Media

I had a great time Friday night at the TechCrunch party in Menlo Park, California.

I met some great people including Salim Ismail, who heads up Yahoo’s Brickhouse, Joe Dipasquale from Collegewikis, Duncan Riley, and lots more people from many different startups.

There were basically three types of people attending:

1)Entrepreneurs

2)Venture Capitalists

3)Women looking for mates

I was under the impression that there was a lack of good looking women in silicon valley. I guess they all decided to attend the TC Party.

All things considered, I am glad I made the trip. More people know about Intense Debate than they did before and that is all I could ask for at a networking event.

Just as Myspace is “A Place For Friends,” the new startup MyChurch.org is a place for Christians. MyChurch allows for church members to organize and socialize online.

The site was created by the owners because they wanted to be more involved in their church after 3+ years of membership.

A great conversation between the owner and users exists at the TechCrunch Forums.

I really believe this is a great niche that will soon become very crowded. The more traction MyChurch can get on the front end, the better they will be in the long run. As of right now, they have 10k members and have members from 2600 churches.

One finer point is that this community is limited to Christians. I believe this is smart because it prevents religious arguments and keeps the site focused on socializing and organizing, not debating. If you want to debate about religion, visit my site and sign up for the beta.

Another Christian site on the horizon is Shoutlife . Mashable blogged about this site here.

I love to talk about innovation on this blog. I have been observing the recent successes and failures and feel the need to breakdown what people need to do before they take action in a barney style fashion. This is to help those of you crafting your idea so that it can stand the test of time and competition.

1) Innovation

Innovation is breaking boundaries, making what already exists better, and distinguishing yourself from the offerings of others with new offerings. I believe people should push the limits of the web by creating new forms of media. To me, that is the essence of innovation on the web. Some might refer to this as disruptive entrepreneurship.
I find myself saying, “Not another video site,” or “Not another podcast directory.” You don’t want people saying that about your idea. If they do, then either your idea has a problem or there is a problem with your marketing.

2) Planning

I sometimes feel that many start ups, some with enormous amounts of funding, are created on a whim with little or no thought. Some may even have excellent ideas, but there needs to be something there to sustain your creation over time. This is not to say you should spend every waking hour for an entire year planning, as action is a key to seeing your idea into reality.

Another example of having nothing to sustain it is Browster. The idea was to give people sneak peaks at sites by rolling over the links on search engines. They recently entered the deadpool. The causes are unknown, but I would guess giving people sneak previews is not easily monetized and therefore the service will not sustain itself. Which leads me to number three.

3) Monetization

What I call “building to be acquired” is not a smart idea for most, unless you know that people will buy. This is done by due diligence and asking people if they would use your service (simple surveys would do). What you should aspire to create is something people are willing to buy. When I say buy, I mean use your service and it being so valuable to them that they will pay to subscribe to it or find it so valuable they make it a part of their life. In one sentence, create value from the very beginning.

If your site will be sustained through advertising, that is fine, but realize that you are an advertising company and not a video, social network, podcast directory, xyz. The sole function of your site, besides whatever content you provide is to present ads in a manner where they will be seen and clicked. Too many companies make the mistake of just focusing on their content and not what will sustain their company.

4) Competitive Advantage
Do you have a competitive advantage? I don’t care if you have all the money in the world to pour into your idea, if you don’t have some sort of competitive advantage, you are fighting an uphill battle. And guess what? It will always be uphill. Carve out your competitive advantage on the front end and have it take center stage in your marketing. If you are thinking of a site that will rival YouTube and yet performs the same function…sorry, but you missed the boat.
5) Marketing

Its important that while you craft the odds and ends of your idea to also take into consideration the future marketing of it. Will it depend on getting profiled on TechCrunch? Will it be dependent on viral marketing? If dependent on a mail campaign, do you have sufficient funds to carry it through to fruition?

One cannot expect folks to evangelize their product, you have to ask them.

I hope this helps those with ideas and looking to capitalize on them. Think of these things as formulate your ideas and it will certainly help you in the future.

Much has been made about “Web 2.0″ and the business models that have spun from it. Most “Web 2.0″ sites rely on advertising or they are “Built To Be Acquired” as I like to say. Many of these companies have been funded with millions of VC dollars (Mike Arrington counts $600 million in 2006). Something is about to change.

Reality will soon set in as the new year seems to have changed the thinking of some and brought their spaceship back to earth. The case for this argument is evidenced by the entry of Browster, FilmLoop, and Raw Sugar into the dead pool in the last couple of weeks.

I am calling 2007 the year of “The Great Purge.” Web 2.0 companies that are copycats, duplicative, and non-innovators will die.

Competition is a great thing as it breeds innovation and the users are the benefactors. The people behind the dying startups will move onto bigger and better things after learning slight deviation from the offering of another company is not enough. They will learn differentiation is the key as its the fundamental substance of marketing material. Differentiation is also what the user feels when visiting a new site. The entrepreneur also must learn that their service must be so valuable, the user should want to pay for it either through clicking ads or subscription. Making something that someone can live without is not what they should aspire to.
The VC’s who shut off the faucet will also become better at their trade learning that companies should be more innovative and expecting a company to be acquired is fool’s gold. Their investors will demand this.
The result of this paradigm shift will be a more succinct web. Given that sites will have to be more innovative, the users will benefit from more services and new media. We will see more disruptive startups that create their own form of media. These startups will be smaller, lighter, develop their product outside of an office and many times on different continents. These startups will also take less money from VC’s as the cost of development has lowered immensely.
This is all a prediction and it may happen more slowly than a few weeks, but one can’t deny the early progression in this direction.

Note: I want credit as being to first to call this new age “The Great Purge” (I am particularly proud of it).