
How the Startup Slice Got Their First 1k Customers - abouelatta
https://first1000.substack.com/p/-slice
======
oftenwrong
Slice hijacks Google Maps listings with their own websites that mimic local
pizzeria websites.

For example: Mario's Pizza in Dorchester, Massachusetts

The Google Maps listing [1] links to
[https://www.mariospizzeriadorchester.com/](https://www.mariospizzeriadorchester.com/)
, which is a site owned and operated by Slice.

The ACTUAL Mario's Pizza site is
[https://www.pizzabymario.com/](https://www.pizzabymario.com/) .

This "growth hack" was previously discussed on HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16824992](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16824992)

[1]
[https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mario%E2%80%99s+Pizzeria,+...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mario%E2%80%99s+Pizzeria,+197+Humboldt+Ave,+Boston,+MA+02121/@42.3130031,-71.0897931,17z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x89e37b0a4d75e7bd:0xe3d0c651dc5a72b)

~~~
yvoschaap
The Google search results do show the owner' site as #1.

[https://seobrowse.com/share/25c8f9129eaea94bf34531dd780a9438...](https://seobrowse.com/share/25c8f9129eaea94bf34531dd780a9438028e9636407f4bd05ac28e69ee2d161f@2x.png)

But if you look at the right sidebar under Menu and Order, you get all the
Valley players who are trying to get a cut from the order...

Update: wow this is even worse. Slice is "verified" by Google as owner and
abuses this by posting their coupons as "news" in the sidebar (look at
"Mario's on Google" part lower down).

[https://support.google.com/knowledgepanel/answer/7534902?hl=...](https://support.google.com/knowledgepanel/answer/7534902?hl=en)

~~~
yvoschaap
Looked into what tricks they are doing in a short write-up here:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23348815](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23348815)

~~~
kevingadd
Sucks that it seems like it got flagged off the front page almost immediately,
thanks for doing the research and writing it up. I'm surprised to see just how
aggressive Slice is about this, they must believe the upside outweighs any
associated risks from being caught. Wouldn't be the first startup I've seen
try to play games like this with Google though...

~~~
yvoschaap
I'll try again:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=23349819](https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=23349819)

------
ChrisMarshallNY
I suspect that part of the reason that these types of things are so
successful, is that restaurants tend to have God-awful sites, if any site at
all.

The good ones work by word-of-mouth, so SEO doesn't mean squat to them.

They also run on razor-thin margins, so they don't spend a dime they can't see
immediate, measurable ROI on.

I have a couple of friends that own restaurants. One of them is a really well-
known (local) place with a tasting menu that costs about $250/per person
(cash-only).

When I was getting started setting up Web sites (I did a lot, but always for
free, for NPOs), I offered to do their sites for free.

They declined, and their sites sucked, for YEARS.

Didn't hurt their business at all.

Now, they have sites, but their domains are an SEO graveyard, because they
waited so long (I guess an AngelFire subdomain wasn't really that good an
idea, in hindsight, eh?).

I'll bet they are representative of many restaurants, which tells me that this
is a well-fertilized field for this kind of scam.

~~~
itake
> They also run on razor-thin margins, so they don't spend a dime they can't
> see immediate, measurable ROI on.

You're not wrong, but if their margins are so thin, where is slice making its
money? VCs? Or is slice raising prices (Delivery fee, increase per item cost,
etc).

Couldn't these restaurant owners just increase their prices to what Slice is
charging?

~~~
ChrisMarshallNY
> Couldn't these restaurant owners just increase their prices to what Slice is
> charging?

Not possible (in the traditional market). Competition is _ferocious_.

Maybe that will change, with all the interceptors and delivery companies.

It's a miserable market. I don't think I'd last five minutes in it.

------
peruvian
I was happy my local pizza place set up their own ordering system so I could
stop using Slice and the rest. These "growth hacks" are just another example
of our awful startup/VC model.

------
floatingatoll
Another post today focuses on how Slice is running an SEO scam on Google to
get free top placement in results without having to pay for ads:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23349819](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23349819)

------
redis_mlc
Wow, that's some hustle:

\- wrap your car and park it outside pizzeria prospect locations

\- then do a sales pitch in person

\- then change your system flow to support existing fax numbers.

------
Larrikin
My annoyance with the app is that I discovered by directly searching for one
of the highest award winning pizza places in Chicago, Art of Pizza, and being
recommended to buy through their app.

As much as I love deep dish and their specific pizza they don't really show up
when I try to search for pizza around me. There are dozens of mediocre places
with less than 100 reviews and art of Pizza shows up way down the list with
thousands of reviews that are much higher up and me being well within their
first choice delivery zone.

Maybe they are specifically good for pizza shops but they are pretty useless
when you want good pizza and are searching for what's around you.

------
jugg1es
I especially liked the part where he converted the online orders into faxes.

~~~
tristor
That was basically the only part of this story that showed an actual value-add
rather than just injecting himself into the revenue stream of existing
businesses via unethical "growth hacks".

------
slashblake
So now we start unbundling grubhub and local shops start losing even more?

------
jevans22
I love startup stories like this. Cleverness + determination = :thumbsup:

~~~
MobileVet
Where you see cleverness, I see unethical behavior (Google hijacking) linked
with powerful knowledge.

Instead of using their knowledge and skills for good, they are exploiting
loopholes in technology to take a slice of others' businesses that were built
with real hustle and determination.

Edit: to clarify the unethical piece (which is left out of the op)... nothing
wrong with the in person sales pitch and fax optimization

