Funding a Launch

andywozhere

I was wondering if anyone knew of any sources for financing a launch. I've spent so much time developing the site www.dublinbynumbers.com that I've near run out of money for a launch. I've already got a small bank loan and don't want to go back for more and I've also exhausted the DCEB route. Any suggestions?

blue4ever

andywozhere wrote: »

I was wondering if anyone knew of any sources for financing a launch. I've spent so much time developing the site www.dublinbynumbers.com that I've near run out of money for a launch. I've already got a small bank loan and don't want to go back for more and I've also exhausted the DCEB route. Any suggestions?

launch? what exactly do you mean by launch, PR or actual physical etc?

andywozhere

PR launch I guess. It's a little way off as I need a little bit more development on the site, but I think it is getting there.

stepbar

I'd shut the site down now. There are plenty of websites in your marketspace. You provide nothing different. It's pointless trying to take this any further. Save your money and invest in something else because your concept ain't salable. This sort of entrapreneurship makes my blood boil.

Here's just 2 examples of companies that already operate in your market (just 2 of which there are plenty more): -

http://www.vazumo.com/

http://www.goldenpages.ie/

What chance have you? None.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

blue4ever

stepbar wrote: »

I'd shut the site down now. There are plenty of websites in your marketspace. You provide nothing different. It's pointless trying to take this any further. Save your money and invest in something else because your concept ain't salable. This sort of entrapreneurship makes my blood boil.

Here's just 2 examples of companies that already operate in your market (just 2 of which there are plenty more): -

http://www.vazumo.com/

http://www.goldenpages.ie/

What chance have you? None.

Why don’t you cut him some slack.

Your comments are particularly unhelpful. If Andywozhere wants to set up a site its his decision. And I can take issue with you in this topic. The directory business is, world wide, particularly fragmented.

If new entrant Verizon had your attitude - it would not have gone up against the Yellow Pages in the States and gained serious market share and money.

Look again at BT – back into the Directory business after 10 years and making a success of it.

None of them said ‘someone else is doing it – so lets throw our hat at it’

The GP is market leader so thus always vulnerable to a soft underside
Vazumo – very slow on the buildup
Yourlocal – well all I can say is that someone failed a urine test investing there.

But all of these sites are poised to reap the rewards of future technology – not applied here yet.

Andywozhere – my pedigree is in that business, I am not saying for a minute you are going to make a mill out of this – but in order to try and negate the above comment/statement/retreatment – PM me;

I will meet up wit you if you want – for a few hours and give you any advice you need – for absolutely nothing, for free, with a heart and a half – then its up to you!

F**k the begrudgers

GoneShootin

stepbar wrote: »

I'd shut the site down now....

Keep on-topic please. He asked about launch info, not critique on his businsess plan.

Personally I find goldenpages.ie do be pure ****e, and if his site is better then even better.

information

1

GoneShootin

information wrote: »

99.99% of new businesses already have existing companies doing the exact same thing.

What did I just say above? KEEP ON-TOPIC

stepbar

blue4ever wrote: »

Why don’t you cut him some slack.

Your comments are particularly unhelpful. If Andywozhere wants to set up a site its his decision. And I can take issue with you in this topic. The directory business is, world wide, particularly fragmented.

If new entrant Verizon had your attitude - it would not have gone up against the Yellow Pages in the States and gained serious market share and money.

Look again at BT – back into the Directory business after 10 years and making a success of it.

None of them said ‘someone else is doing it – so lets throw our hat at it’

The GP is market leader so thus always vulnerable to a soft underside
Vazumo – very slow on the buildup
Yourlocal – well all I can say is that someone failed a urine test investing there.

But all of these sites are poised to reap the rewards of future technology – not applied here yet.

Andywozhere – my pedigree is in that business, I am not saying for a minute you are going to make a mill out of this – but in order to try and negate the above comment/statement/retreatment – PM me;

I will meet up wit you if you want – for a few hours and give you any advice you need – for absolutely nothing, for free, with a heart and a half – then its up to you!

F**k the begrudgers

Verizon, BT, Golden Pages. See anything common? I would say they're fairly established businesses TBH. If you are trying to compare what the OP is doing with what other well established companies are doing, well you're seriously deluded. With respect there's nothing unique about what the OP is doing in terms of the overall idea and in technical terms. Absolutly nothing. Businesses like the above have significant resources to move into niche areas and are prepared to spend the money. What chance has the OP? Little or none. No point beating around the bush. I'm certainly not one for giving false hope to anyone and I will call it as I see it. You might not like what I want to say but I really don't care TBH.

homeOwner

andywozhere wrote: »

I was wondering if anyone knew of any sources for financing a launch. I've spent so much time developing the site www.dublinbynumbers.com that I've near run out of money for a launch. I've already got a small bank loan and don't want to go back for more and I've also exhausted the DCEB route. Any suggestions?

The only way I can think of getting money for this is if you can find a main sponsor for your site in return for advertising. They maybe would fork out for a launch. But I am curious as to what type of launch you want to do. Most startups would send in a standard press release to the Indo or some such paper and do a photo shoot with some models on stephen's green. That would be the extent of it.

Good luck with your venture.

blue4ever

homeOwner wrote: »

Good luck with your venture.

Ye see - that's more like it!

stepbar

blue4ever wrote: »

Ye see - that's more like it!

Good man. Take you didn't read my post eh?

stepbar

homeOwner wrote: »

The only way I can think of getting money for this is if you can find a main sponsor for your site in return for advertising. They maybe would fork out for a launch. But I am curious as to what type of launch you want to do. Most startups would send in a standard press release to the Indo or some such paper and do a photo shoot with some models on stephen's green. That would be the extent of it.

Good luck with your venture.

If that's the sort of gibberish the DCEB is funding I want my tax back TBH.

GoneShootin

stepbar wrote: »

but I really don't care TBH.

Then you won't mind being banned until you cop the fúck on then.

Axwell

As homeowner said your best bet would be to get some form of sponsorship through advertising, it would be hard to get a big sponsor i would think as your site is purely Dublin based so maybe go for a Dublin based busihess that would benefit from it.

andywozhere

I'd shut the site down now.... This sort of entrapreneurship makes my blood boil.

I never thought this post would get such a reaction (good and bad). Thanks for the posts. Vazumo, Golden Pages and Your Local are all big companies with big budgets, but I like to think the site offers something a little different (just look at the front page and you'll note that dublinbynumbers looks completely different). Still Stepbar has some (sort of) valid points and to be quite honest if I'd known how much time and effort it would take to set up the site I might never have started. However the site is quite developed at this stage and it would be pointless to turn back now. Personally I think the site is starting to get there and and we'll soon see if it picks up or not (note the site already ranks about the same as yourlocal on alexa.com).

For the launch I think a photoshoot and press release (per HomeOwner) would be the best way forward and I'll probably just leave it at that and do my best to fund it myself.

Thanks for the encouragement blue4ever, a chat would be magic.

As for closing the site down... I'll consider that when Stepbar rules the world.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained (and hopefully not too much lost either).

blue4ever

good man - fcuk the begrudgers!

PM me - i will pass on my details

blue4ever

stepbar wrote: »

Good man. Take you didn't read my post eh?

well done, Sherlock

aidan.connolly

Hi, I submitted an entry to your site and was rejected because you could not find a slot in your categories for it. I think it is important that every submission is listed. Good luck with your venture,

andywozhere

Hi, I submitted an entry to your site and was rejected because you could not find a slot in your categories for it. I think it is important that every submission is listed. Good luck with your venture,

Fair point Aidan... Sorry about that. I've been concentrating so much so much on getting the site together that I might have neglected putting up new categories. I intend to remedy that over the next few weeks and will have a good few new categories up soon. I'll then get back to anyone who I did not have a category for at the time. I think your right and I shall try my best to get details up for all (Dublin) businesses who submit them. Thanks for the post.

aidan.connolly

Thanks

information

andywozhere wrote: »

For the launch I think a photoshoot and press release (per HomeOwner) would be the best way forward and I'll probably just leave it at that and do my best to fund it myself.

The indo do a section on start-up businesses on Thursday, the enterprise boards give them the details of a lot of companies (know a good few who got in via enterprise board). Contact your enterprise board about the launch get them to get you featured. The paper will send out the photographer and write the article.

The business post also do it http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/sectiondynamic.aspx-qqqt=People%20In%20Business-qqqs=news-qqqc=13.2.0.0-qqqn=20-qqqx=1.asp

Oiche_mhaith

You can easily blow a lot of money on PR and advertising in papers and you more then likely won't get much bang for your buck.

Your best bet is to try and focus and grow oganically, build your database, focus on local interests that the mulinationals don't want to know about and work really hard on your SEO, that's what will drive most traffic to your site for the least amount of money. Think of keywords you want to feature well on and write plenty of articles on those keywords to drive trafiic to your site. Get a site map up so you can indexed properly.

A viral campaign through myspace or facebook could give you good traffic and improve your optimisation and costs nothing!

lanod2407

I'm with Oiche Mhaith - be careful about spending lots on advertising. A guy at a Business Start program I did a few months back recommended that we burn our planned advertising budgets when we got home - that way we get just as much benefit but don't waste any time!!!!

Duncan Bannatyne's book - Wake up and change your life - has a good list of ideas for launching your business and searching for customers. May be worth flicking through.

I hope I'm staying on-topic, but I would have to ask if you've created a Business Plan before starting out? That would have been a great tool to track progress and you shouldn't be running out of money half-way through if you had a good plan to follow.

Best of luck - there are a good few similar sites out there, but if yours is better then you'll get business. I've seen some that offer different "features" - e.g. ability to rate a supplier/business, and a link to a map to locate the business. These would appear to be "adding more value" ..... ooops, I've definitely gone off topic now - waiting for the wallop!!!

andywozhere

Thanks for those tips, all sound advice I'd say. I'll try and keep the launch low budget... I'll definitely have ads on facebook etc. I'll also try to increase the local content and implement good SEO practices. Can't say my projections from my business plan have gone exactly according to plan, so I might have to rethink my strategy, financially speaking.

PS... I do actually have a maps section , but it needs a bit more work/content. Rating system in the pipeline.

Mickk

andywozhere wrote: »

Thanks for those tips, all sound advice I'd say. I'll try and keep the launch low budget... I'll definitely have ads on facebook etc. I'll also try to increase the local content and implement good SEO practices. Can't say my projections from my business plan have gone exactly according to plan, so I might have to rethink my strategy, financially speaking.

PS... I do actually have a maps section , but it needs a bit more work/content. Rating system in the pipeline.

Hi,
site looks good and I like the ides of the map for the different businesses, just a quick one where do you get the info to populate the gyms ect? I own two gyms and neither were there but I did notice a few that closed down 3ish years ago listed...
Also if I was you I would get rid of the google search feature on top, whats it needed for?

TheCostumeShop.ie: Ronan

I never understand why entrepeneur feel they need a big launch for their business. Just get out there and start getting traffic and customers. Launches are rarely the most cost effective form of advertising.

Best launch in my opinion is to offer customers something exciting enough to get them to talk about you.

andywozhere

Mickk wrote: »

Hi,
site looks good and I like the ides of the map for the different businesses, just a quick one where do you get the info to populate the gyms ect? I own two gyms and neither were there but I did notice a few that closed down 3ish years ago listed...
Also if I was you I would get rid of the google search feature on top, whats it needed for?

Thanks for the comments Mick. PM me or visit the listing section of the site if you want me to include your gyms. I think I'll probably have to make a few phone calls to check if details for some of the businesses are still correct up to date.

I never understand why entrepeneur feel they need a big launch for their business

I'm not really planning a big launch, budget will be pretty small, but I still think it's important to have one.

TheCostumeShop.ie: Ronan

How so?

information

Fancy Dresser wrote: »

Best launch in my opinion is to offer customers something exciting enough to get them to talk about you.

How would these customer find out about the something exciting ?

TheCostumeShop.ie: Ronan

Marketing and advertising. Not saying launches are a bad idea, just to weigh them up against ROI's on other methods.