
 We  have 5 ideas and can't decide on what to build, so we made this site - flexterra
http://www.ideafunnel.co?s=hn
======
peteforde
I strongly recommend against wading into the complex, political, dominated,
corrupt and extremely competitive online ticket sales industry.

I'm a friend of <http://guestlistapp.com/> folks and it's a great alternative
to EventBrite and TicketMaster. It's fairly minimalist and is still a huge
undertaking for several people.

I suggest that you step back, take off your programmer visors and start
listening for people who say "I wish" a lot. Chances are that if it's obvious
enough to brainstorm, someone has already lost a lot of money discovering that
the customers love it so long as it's free. You need to find something that's
niche and causing great pain.

~~~
cdcarter
As someone in the arts administration world, I can tell you that the ticketing
app is not a great shot. I'd never heard of Guestlist, and EventBrite is
fairly new but used, but most people these days are using bespoke solutions
(TicketMaster, Tessi, etc...) and most midsized organizations I know have
floated to Brown Paper Tickets.

However, I think I can safely say most midsized resident arts organizations
would love a social media reporting app. Most non-profits can only hold a
social media intern for the summer, and they dip off and seem awkward during
the main part of their season. To alleviate this would be awesome.

------
Terry_B
Nice idea, but you're not really asking the target audience for each of those
products are you. Best ask the people with the chequebooks in question.

~~~
colinwinter
Very good point! Feedback from other entrepreneurs is usually arbitrary, and
you usually have to qualify the advice based on each person's unique
history/background. It's nice to see if entrepreneurs agree with your idea,
but it all comes down to the market agreeing.

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pabloiv
Hi everyone I'm Pablo Tirado, the bald guy on the right with the glass of
bourbon.

First of all I'd like to thank everyone who has voted for the story, and
particularly to the commenters, which we'll be responding to individually;
because we really want more feedback.

Second I'd like to give some background on what this is.

Last weekend we spitballed a list of 37 ideas which we thought could be made
into something. Some were brand new, some we'd worked on for some time but
most were harebrained.

This list of 5 are the survivors of our own elimination process. We made this
landing page to send to friends in the industry whose opinion we trust.
Giovanni (flexterra) decided to post it on Hacker News to see what the
community thought and here we are.

We have other projects that are very close to launch (receiptsloader.com [if
your purchase receipts are a mess, you want this]) and this 5 piece voting
site, is to help us decide on what to concentrate our efforts on next.

Again, thanks to everyone for commenting and voting.

~~~
david927
Add to the site a textbox where people can add their own ideas. Allow them to
make it public or private(hidden).

Personally I think you'll get much better ideas than the ones you've listed.

------
colinwinter
Okay, I'll bite. I've researched and critiqued dozens of ideas; I've also had
my ideas ripped apart by others. So here's my feedback; playing devil's
advocate here because there's no mention of these ideas being a true passion
for your team.

 _Customer Service a la Zappos_

I like the area that you are targeting, I think there's opportunity, but I
don't see/understand what you're providing that's new. Are you
managing/offering awesome people to provide the customer service or is it
software that will help guide an existing company's support staff to be
awesome? Perhaps a training program with some sort of systematic reminds of
how to be awesome (could be interesting).

 _While You Were Out Notes_

I know people use different hardware/software for communications but I don't
see how there's any value here. Making voicemail accessible outside the
office? If someone visits, do they need to know YOUR system for leaving a note
or is someone in the office going to add it to this unnecessary system?
There's a thing called email, and it works if you don't suck at it. Not
convinced there's a pain/need here.

 _One Click Social Media Reports - My pick_

Another area that is appealing to me, but I'd like to know more. List the
kinds of things you'll be collecting. I do think there's data missing from
other related services/tools.

 _Recurly for Dummies_

Not to say there isn't a market/possibility to make money here, but doesn't
Paypal offer subscriptions. Not everyone is accustomed to using/managing their
subscriptions with Paypal but how will you make it any easier with your
service?

 _Online Ticket Sales_

Again, with limited information it's hard to see how you're going to approach
this differently than Eventbrite. I think the opportunity here is the
promotion aspect, but how you accomplish this is a mystery. I just feel a lot
of people aren't aware of events in their area until it's too late. However,
getting them to subscribe to your service to receive updates about events is
going to be hard. You have to solve the relevancy/quality issue in addition to
marketing to these people who don't search out for things on their own. Maybe
some sort of partnering/incentive program can make this more possible. Make it
fun and rewarding.

~~~
pabloiv
These are great observations. I visited your website, and you have a pretty
cool, trajectory. I'm gonna shoot you an email, I'd like to pick your brain a
little more.

------
aymeric
What about turning <http://www.ideafunnel.co> into a web app to allow other
entrepreneurs to ask the same question?

I am not sure people would pay for it though.

~~~
netmau5
I built <http://www.sparkmuse.com> just for that purpose. We've gotten nearly
100 ideas now, but not alot of traction, so I wouldn't build another :)

~~~
david927
You don't have a lot of traction because you don't show how you add value. If
you need a signup before getting to the app, you're already behind the 8 ball.
The best you can do is to make the landing page really sell me on why I should
do that.

------
miguelrios
I am a big fan of these guys. While engineers are underpaid and schools don't
promote the startup culture _at all_ in Puerto Rico, they have stayed loyal to
hack and build stuff in their own in the island. They deserve at least your
vote or advice.

------
acabal
For your ticket sales idea, I believe Ticketmaster has exclusivity agreements
with many venues that will block you out. I remember reading some time ago
about a startup (this was long ago, can't remember the name) trying to upset
Ticketmaster that ran into that problem.

Your Recurly idea will also probably be a headache regulation and compliance-
wise.

Not to say they aren't great ideas, but probably not something you'd want to
get in to without investor backing and a specialized team in mind to maximize
your chances.

~~~
aymeric
"Your Recurly idea will also probably be a headache regulation and compliance-
wise."

What if you simply run on top of Paypal?

~~~
acabal
That might work depending on Paypal's TOS, but then again building your main
revenue stream on someone else's API is asking for a headache too. Think
Twitter or Facebook apps, but even more sensitive because it involves cash
transactions.

Plus Paypal's reputation might make them think twice, depending on how they
plan on implementing things.

~~~
bigiain
I'd be very careful recommending PayPal for "recurring professional services
billing" without doing a lot of research first...

PayPal is great if you're selling physical objects delivered within a day or
two preferably with trackable delivery methods - thats PayPal's most favored
transaction type since it minimizes their possible fraud losses about as far
as you possibly can. The further away from that you move, the more likely you
are to end up being another one of the many PayPal horror stories that are all
too common. Things that can't be confirmed "shipped" by a disinterested 3rd
party raise a flag. Things that can't be verified as having been delivered to
a specific physical address raise a flag. Things that have long delivery lead-
times raise a flag. I suspect recurring billing rasies a flag. I suspect high
dollar amounts both raise a flag and act as a multiplier on other flags...

I strongly suspect this idea would end up with the PayPal account being stuck
in the "can't make withdrawals for 180 days, but we'll continue taking your
customers money so you're still on e hook for providing the goods/services
right now" state, pretty much permanently...

~~~
aymeric
"I suspect" "I suspect" "I suspect"

I have both recurring payments and one-off payment for virtual services on my
website and never had any issue with Paypal.

~~~
bigiain
Yeah, it is all suspicion - Paypal (necessarily) keep details of their fraud
detection algorithm very opaque.

And I too, have many happy clients who've never had Paypal issues, even ones
doing some of the things I listed above.

_BUT_, if you think Paypal in general are _not_ a source of _major_ headaches
for some people, "I suspect" (there's my phrase again) that you've not been
here long. Paypal account freezing has a long history of being discussed here
(and elsewhere). I've been through that particular drama myself, in fact I've
got one client who it happens to annually when he starts accepting pre-orders
in Sept for a book that gets printed every December...

------
jack7890
_Event promoters need a service that will allow them to sell tickets and
promote their events online._

I disagree. There are kick-ass startups already doing this, e.g. TicketFly,
Eventbrite, and TicketLeap. That isn't to say that you couldn't beat those
folks, but I don't get the sense that there's a desperate need in the
marketplace that those companies aren't filling. The real battles for
promoters are structural and legal (Ticketmasters long-term exclusive
contracts).

------
brianbreslin
ok not a fan of the ticketing idea, reasons have been rehashed here a dozen
times (venue lockout, ticketmaster/eventbrite, brown paper tix, etc)

Social media reporting, this is a tough one, as someone who built an early
social media reporting tool years ago, I'd say the market is tough to get
people to pay for the functionality. However, if you can get the right clients
they will pay large sums. The market for this is very fickle and competition
is tough (salesforce/radian6 for one). One key thing I learned: small
business/midsize biz don't have enough chatter to validate spending on
reporting yet (imagine how many people are talking about John Doe dry cleaner
in San Juan on twitter on a given day).

recurly for dummies, can't you do that with a paypal widget that is an embed
code anyway? right now my fav of the ideas though

i don't see value in while you were out notes system. maybe the way its
presented doesn't make sense. i could definitely see a use for a push
notification of incoming things (i.e. voicemail to your desk line, package
received via fedex at front desk, etc)

zappos customer service one is tough to do, as a huge part of zappos customer
service is not the crm they are using, but the policies they've put in place.

~~~
sushrutbidwai
social media reporting is also very costly to do now. Most social media tools
license the data and costs for licenses are very high right now.

~~~
brianbreslin
very very true. anyone who wants to sell a "complete" report has to get
twitter firehose. or talk to gnip. that will run you $2k/month EASILY.

------
programminggeek
Build all of them.

One at a time.

Until you win.

You don't know which one is the best idea, so just pick one you most want to
finish and build it. Market it. And if it doesn't work pivot or move on to the
next idea.

The way I look at it is you build ideas into products and sell those products.
Always charge. That way it is relatively easy to turn a small, but meaningful
profit. Then, keep building products until you find a "hit".

Even if you don't get to your home run you have some nice cash flow so you can
keep doing what you love.

Think of yourself as a band. You love making and performing music. The first
record might not be a hit but you keep making music until you come up with
something that resonates. Your startup is a band. Keep cranking out albums
until something resonates.

~~~
aymeric
"Build all of them."

I hear so many people saying "just build it". Do these people have so much
time in their lives that what they build is irrelevant because they will have
time to build everything anyway?

Time is a precious resource to me and if I must build something, I'd rather
increase my chances of success by picking the one people need more.

~~~
prpon
The difficult part is knowing what people need more.

It's just an opinion until you find out for real. We all bring our own biases
into what is essential/pain point for people.

Until the rubber meets the road, you never know.

~~~
Terry_B
You can do a fair bit of work up front to get a pretty good idea though I
think. At least about which of them don't stand a chance. People just don't
like doing it, including me, because it's hard.

~~~
prpon
I have gotten opinions both ways. People who do not want to critique an idea
until they see something they can lay their hands on aka demo. And the other
side where people who want to make sure the idea has market before they write
a single line of code.

I am not sure which one works. Being a coder and as someone who tends to code
before evaluating, I would like to know specifics on how to do evaluation
before execution.

~~~
Terry_B
If a prototype is trivial to build then absolutely. But I don't think there's
ever an excuse for not going out and asking people who might have these
problems some good questions. "Would you pay for this?" being one of them.

------
madmoose
To quote the great Piet Hein:

A Psychological Tip:

Whenever you're called on to make up your mind,

and you're hampered by not having any,

the best way to solve the dilemma, you'll find,

is simply by spinning a penny.

No - not so that chance shall decide the affair

while you're passively standing there moping;

but the moment the penny is up in the air,

you suddenly know what you're hoping.

------
FeministHacker
None of them. The only suggestion listed that you seemed vested in was away
notes, so do that one if any.

None of the others really cover the main problem you're aiming to fix, and you
don't sound like you are excited about the task they exist to help with.

You don't have to be personally invested in a problem to build a winnning
application solving it. But you need to have became excited by the possibily
that you could solve it - that suddenly, you will be making someone's life
better. Withouth this, you'll just repeat the existing mistakes with what's on
the market.

------
cryos
Hefty competition on all fronts, I'd probably try looking for another not so
congested market if I was you, unless you have some marvelous mechanism big
players won't be able to implement.

But if you must I'd possibly look at the social networking reporting for a
couple of reasons.

\- The market is hot and you might be able to get funding or flick it easy

\- It looks like all the other projects are going to need an decent
advertising base, and (as long as you build carefully) you'll be able to re-
purpose parts of the social networking... so can look at as an investment

------
dkordik
I strongly suggest one of you start using a Windows PC, at the very least to
experience your app like many of your customers will- that font doesn't turn
out so well with Windows' ClearType.

~~~
callmevlad
This was my first thought (FF4 on Win7) - looks really bad.

------
Andi
None. Continue brainstorming, guys ;)

------
gallerytungsten
"Customer Service a la Zappos" strikes me as the most interesting of the lot.

The Ticketmaster clone won't work due to venue lock-out, as others have
mentioned. "One Click Social Media Reports" seems kind of vague. "Recurly for
Dummies" - the name is kind of a turnoff. One would also need a high volume of
recurring payments to make such a service attractive. Then it also has to
interface to existing accounting systems. "While You Were Out Notes" seems a
bit too trivial. Who will pay for it?

------
prpon
The problem I see with recurly for non-technical people is that non-technical
people will find it complicated to embed a widget, tab, javascript etc into
their sites.

Yeah, it comes down to execution. But if you can execute it so well that it is
dead easy and doesn't require any technical know how, you might win over even
technical people.

~~~
marknutter
But if you make it easy to embed in Facebook, or Wordpress, or other social
networks, it may catch on.

------
LarryA
Ticket Sales - <http://www.eventbrite.com> is doing similar, might want to see
how they stack up to your ideas before going that route.

------
dazzer
For a second I thought you made a site where people could contribute their
ideas and try to gain public support. At which point I would have just pointed
at Kickstarter.

------
abbasmehdi
I've found does not matter what you do, what matters is how you do it. IMHO
you should ask yourself "Which of these we can make the most kick-ass ever in
the world!?"

------
sfall
While You Were Out Notes, a stupid idea. Email simple done and existing
support for push notifications

------
nuromancer
I would start by changing the text so its legible

~~~
callmevlad
The text is quite hard to read in Chrome on Win7:
<http://i.imgur.com/CQM9Y.png>

------
ianthiel
You need to randomize the positioning of each idea, whatever you put in the
top left will most likely get the most votes regardless. Randomization helps
account for this.

~~~
aymeric
Have you tried to refresh the page before posting this comment?

------
yahelc
Isn't "Recurly for Dummies" just...Recurly?

------
code_duck
I like the ticket idea. If well built and reliable, the described would be a
great system.

------
sheriff
s/Costumer Service/Customer Service/

~~~
zephjc
Perhaps they wanted to service people who make/sell costumes. A very niche
market indeed :)

~~~
JonnieCache
Plus the word is costumier.

~~~
zephjc
In the UK, yes. In the US, the word is Costumer.

