
Ask HN: Solving chicken and egg problem - pascalchristian
How do you solve chicken-and-egg problem especially for web 2.0 apps requiring hard traction (and many users) to function (e.g. date site, marketplace, etc)?<p>I have an idea for a collaborative/shared marketplace for a niche product (think airbnb, but for other niche) and is currently building a prototype, but is confused on how to get the very early user for the site to function. I know how user #1 experience is crucial and how del.ico.us was started as a personal bookmarking site, but how does airbnb, craiglist, and many social site gain traction?<p>Many thanks for the help.
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jacquesm
One way to get past this (it worked for 'reddit') is to fake a bunch of
accounts and stop sleeping for the first three months or so, until you have
enough real 'eggs' and chickens to keep real ones interested.

The way I got past it on ww.com is to launch the site from a mailing list that
was already 'on topic' so a large number of people decided to try it out at
once and found each other.

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pascalchristian
that has not crossed my mind.. still it's unbelievably difficult though..

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mixmax
Check out Strategy Letter II: Chicken and Egg Problems by Joel Spolsky. It has
some good thoughts on the problem.

<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000054.html>

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pascalchristian
wow thanks. I'm reading it now.

edit: i've done reading it and it seems that the solution is to provide some
sort of backward compatibility so you would have a user base or (software
base) on day 1. so essentially if i want to start a date site, i should flirt
with random girls on the street on behalf on requests from the internet as a
backward compatibility?

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maxdemarzi
You need to either:

1\. Tap into existing communities that would be a good fit for your product
that are already using other processes for transactions...

2\. Provide some utility to the eggs (or the chickens) that doesn't require
the other party.

3\. Spend money on advertising to both sides.

