

Show HN: Selling a web app, Auto Swatch - nicksergeant

Unfortunately, I have a failed startup that needs to pay off some of its debts. Myself and a few others have over a combined 300 hours of work into this project. I'm hesitant to put this on Flippa or eBay or whatever; I just don't think that crowd will appreciate it. I'm looking for suggestions on where to try and sell it (other than HN).<p>The site is Auto Swatch: http://swatch.nick.sg (this is just a demo site for the purpose of selling it. Actual domain is http://autoswatch.com). Discussion of the launch on HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2466545<p>Obviously this is a depressing outcome. The project IMO still has a ton of potential, but I don't have the resources or time to make it successful. I've grown tired of the idea of investors, shlepping myself out just to get some PR, etc. The business side of things sucks. I hope someone can take over and go up against the big guys like Edmunds, Cars.com, etc. New-car research online still needs help.<p>The project also includes an entire dealership inventory management system that pushes to Cars.com, etc. Just this mini-project alone has a ton of work into it: http://cl.ly/311e1B132N3S3l3E2P08<p>Email's in profile, if interested.
======
nicksergeant
Btw, there's a not-insignificant cost of keeping this project up. Finding
high-quality photos of every new vehicle in every color offered by the MFGR
was tough. I negotiated a contract with Evox (<http://evox.com>) and the buyer
would need to setup their own contract with them (they're super helpful and
there are no tricks involved).

The photos will run you around $195/mo for every asset Evox owns (not just
what you see on Auto Swatch). They have 360 views, videos, etc etc.

~~~
hboon
Sorry to hear about your project this way.

Are you based in Singapore? Or was the domain just to match your last name?

~~~
nicksergeant
Nope we're in NY, nick.sg is just my personal domain. The actual project
domain is <http://autoswatch.com>. I just threw up a quick demo site at that
domain.

------
nate
I don't have much help probably. But my sympathies. I'm actually looking for a
car now, and your search is gorgeous. I usually just go to carmax to use their
search because it's user friendly, but your onto something better here.

"I have no idea who I would talk to about something like this (without
connections there)."

Really though? Just email a few people in each place using LinkedIn with
titles like "Business Development" or "Corporate Development". In 2 seconds
this guy looks promising:

<http://linkd.in/wOV6ze>

You can probably guess their email addresses or use google to ferret out the
pattern. Lead411.com is actually useful to save you time, but their customer
support sucks when you decide you want to cancel that account.

If you search for them in LinkedIn and their name turns up "Private", use
google to find bits of their linkedin profile. Coming to linkedin from a
google search gives up all the "private" data.

Be bold. I've emailed complete strangers everywhere and have gotten meetings.
I have a habit of emailing whoever I want. Mark Cuban. Marc Benioff. Howard
Schultz. And I get meetings.

The most important part of reaching out to folks is to follow up. I can't
believe how many times I've had to send two or three notes to the same person.
Yes, you can become a nuisance. Try to do it nicely. There is a way to
accomplish this without coming off as an automated spammer. I've heard from
multiple people I've emailed 3 times, that they are glad I followed up with
them, because they simply get too busy to remember to make an entry for me in
a calendar. Even if you hear from someone and then they blow you off (e.g.
don't make it to the conference call, etc.) Keep following up!

~~~
nicksergeant
Some good points, nate. I'm going to spend some time putting the site back up
in its proper place, then emailing some folks.

Thanks!

~~~
nate
Another couple things:

\- Make the subject and context of your email, "I could really use your
advice". Ask these contacts for help and advice on what they would do in this
situation. A guy at cars.com might know that they won't buy this site, but
knows someone at XYZ that would be worth talking to.

\- Use any and all networks/groups of folks you can think of at LinkedIn. E.g.
Find people who went to your same school that work at cars.com. No matter if
you have ever met them. Mention the alma mater. It helps.

------
nicksergeant
More background: the entire UI was designed by the very talented Ali Ali:
<http://alialithinks.com>

The back-end is Django. Should easily be Heroku-able if you offload the assets
to S3.

------
jckay
Hey Nick - a quick Devil's Advocate thought for you. I have heard a lot of
people lately say that they want to sell ______ (insert anything) and that is
has a lot of potential. They are working on another project and need the money
to move that project forward.

I challenge you, as I have challenged these people in the past, if it has
"that much" potential than why not continue to do it yourself?

I am sure if you saw an opportunity to make a lot of money, you could get past
the idea of working with investors, and media folks. Shit if you made enough
money you could just hire someone to handle it.

Thoughts?

Jonathan

~~~
nicksergeant
This project has an opportunity to make a lot of money. But it's going to take
a lot of money. And a lot of time.

I simply don't have my heart in it, anymore. That's why I'm selling. I have
other projects that I'd like to focus on, and this project has become
basically stagnant for the past year. This is the type of project that can't
become stagnant - halfway through the year people want data on the next year's
vehicles, and that takes time.

The amount of money that Auto Swatch can generate depends on the amount of
time you put into development, and money you put into marketing and
advertising. I'm the only developer, and I'm burnt out, and I know nothing
about marketing / advertising, and have no more cash to put into those
details.

We tried a few different business models but were never able to make any of
them work.

------
gawker
Hi Nick,

Saw your site when it first launched and really loved the look and feel of it.
Just curious about the numbers for the site - i.e. maintenance costs, monthly
visitors, etc. How much would you value the site?

I'm sad to see that you're at the point of shutting it down but I hope it's
provided you with a learning experience that drives you toward success.

~~~
nicksergeant
Hard to put a value on it. If you paid someone to build the site the way it
is, you'd be well over $30k with wireframes, design, dev, market research,
etc.

We were around 100-200 uniques daily before we pulled the site a few weeks
ago.

Maintenance costs are about $250/mo - photos + basic linode server.

~~~
gawker
Thanks Nick!

I definitely agree that there's a lot of potential with the site - especially
since your maintenance costs are only for server and photos. Once the data is
in there, it doesn't really have to change much either right?

~~~
nicksergeant
Not necessarily, there's some manual work required for updating to the next
year's vehicles...

------
consultutah
A couple of thoughts: First, you have a beautiful site the purpose of which
appears to be to help people quickly and beautifully research cars. For
someone buying the site, $200/mo shouldn't be a concern, iif they think they
can make money off of it.

If that is the primary reason you are interested in selling though, I would
start thinking: how could you re-position the site to be successful? Just to
throw out some ideas, instead of researching cars, could it be for recruiters
to research programmer candidates? Or could it be for scrap-bookers to
research and purchase scrap booking materials. Or could it be for gardeners to
research and purchase plants? Or could it be for homeowners to research and
purchase snow blowers? Etc...

With the current site, you are trying to get revenue outside of where the
transaction is made. While this is possible, it is ALWAYS easier to make money
at the point the transaction is made.

~~~
nicksergeant
Thanks, some good ideas. Right now, I have other projects, though. I don't
really have any interest in reforming the site to serve a different purpose.
These are certainly some opportunities for a buyer to explore, though.

I agree about the revenue-at-transaction thing. The problem with cars is,
well, no one buys cars online (though that may be changing relatively soon).

------
tstegart
I think the big guys you mention in your post are your best bet for selling.
Have you ever got feelers from them? It hurts you that you've taken the site
down while you're trying to sell btw. You'll probably take a hit on your
asking price for that. Check out:
<http://www.inc.com/guides/leadership_strat/24005.html>

~~~
nicksergeant
Also, those big guys are so tough to do business with. They've got many-a-
corporate-layer. I have no idea who I would talk to about something like this
(without connections there).

~~~
tstegart
Search Linkedin to find emails or just cold call. I would suggest getting a
strategy together to do this, just like you had a strategy for the business.

For example: Identify possible buyers: The large players, Edmunds, AutoTrader,
etc; Large dealerships - they might want this for their own inventory, it
seems like it could be easily adapted for a dealership. Concentrate on finding
dealerships in large metro areas. They sell millions of dollars worth of cars.
Places like the tri-state area, virginia/dc/maryland, LA, Seattle, Texas, etc.
Get a list, find some emails, put it together. Car companies: email them all.
They might want to buy your software to showcase their stuff. Its very clean,
and they can adapt it. Email the ones out of America too. China, India,
Europe;

Identify the people in the organization who will buy. Spend a day researching
them, put as many emails down as you can find. Be clear about what you're
selling, and how it might be useful to that organization. Get a spiel together
for emailing car companies, dealerships, etc. Show how it can be adapted to
their needs. Every email you get, its like raising your price. Go after this
selling thing like you went after building your website. With gusto.

Hold an auction on a certain date, and ask that bids be submitted.

Don't worry about the lawyers for now, they'll get involved when a buyer is
actually interested. Until then they stay out the picture. So lawyer
involvement is a good sign you've piqued some interest.

------
SingAlong
I just took a look at this site out of interest. And the site's the kind of
place where I would love to browse cars to buy. Been trying to find a used car
online for sometime. By far this is most amazing UI to browse cars.

Like nick says, this does have a lot of potential to people who have time to
invest.

Nice job! (to everyone who were involved with it)

~~~
nicksergeant
Thanks!

------
nicksergeant
Also, search is disabled on the demo site. Just spooled up this quick instance
without firing up Xapian and all that.

------
trustfundbaby
Why do you think it failed?

~~~
nicksergeant
Two reasons:

1) The auto market is huge, and the players are huge. Competing with Edmunds,
Cars.com, Auto Trader, is extremely difficult. Word of mouth only gets you so
far. You need a marketing budget, and you can't stop building. Auto Swatch was
only ever a side project for us, and that spells failure.

2) Our sub-project within Auto Swatch, the dealership management software, was
impossible to sell to dealers, even though we were cheaper than their system
(usually <http://carsforsale.com>). They didn't want to spend any more time
online than they have to, and they actually resented the fact that they needed
to get their inventories onto Cars.com, Auto Trader, or the internet in
general. Dealerships make money when people walk into the building, not when
people shop around online for the best price. So when we said to dealers "we
have a better online inventory manager for you, and we're cheaper", they said
"we don't care if it's better, and it's already cheap enough with our current
provider".

~~~
kenrik
I think you're giving up too easy, IMO double down add new features and fight
for it. You must have had some faith in the project at some point otherwise
you would not have committed to the $200 a month in the first place. Burn the
Ships.

In 1519, Captain Hernán Cortés and his army set out on one of the greatest
conquests in the history of the world. Cortés was going to accomplish his
goals no matter the consequences, despite being up against incredible odds.
When he arrived near Veracruz with 500 soldiers, a dozen horses and a few
cannons, the first thing he did was burn his ships so there could be no
retreat. He told his men “You can either fight or you can die”. Returning to
Spain was not an option anymore. By burning his ships, he not only cut off his
only means of retreat, but also made his soldiers fight harder. They were all
fully committed to the cause.

(I love this story)

Seriously don't give up now, failure is only the beginning of future success.

~~~
nicksergeant
From the outside looking in, it's easy to say we're giving up too easily.

We've been on this project for over a year. We've tried multiple business
models, strategies, etc. We know where we went wrong, and we know what it
needs to make it successful. But we don't have the time, energy, or money to
do it.

------
badclient
Carwoo should buy you.

~~~
nicksergeant
We've had an informal relationship with Carwoo on Twitter. I @'d them this
morning, we'll see if they're interested:
<https://twitter.com/nicksergeant/status/165451476800507905>

We've always been a huge fan of CarWoo and thought it'd be a neat partnership
with them.

