6 ms·

Demystifying the TechCrunch effect

37 points by paraschopra 16y ago

lachyg 16y ago
Wow, a lot lower than I would of thought it would be. Do you think the quality of the article is also a factor of the amount of hits? Or just time of week?
- paraschopra 16y ago
  I think time of week could have been the greatest factor. But definitely if the article included a video or a screenshot, that could have piqued interest.
paraschopra 16y ago
Hey guys, if any one else has other data points it will be great to know if their experiences match mine (as far as getting covered by TC is concerned). My key lessons: * Sent less traffic than I expected * Converted less than average site traffic * Engaged with site more than average site traffic * Generated some indirect interest in the company/product
- necrecious 16y ago
  Thanks for sharing your info. I haven't sought coverage by those tech startup blogs since my customers aren't going to be visiting those kind of blogs. Looking back on my referral log, the highest is from a blog called geckoandfly which I've never heard from. It generate consistent traffic for the last 3 months! My coverage from Computer World was a spike like TC, with peak at 5k and dropped to zero after a few days.
- lukestevens 16y ago
  I got 5k visits for a little project (aggregator) which got covered in a different time of the week, so I expect the traffic sent is about par for the course. I was surprised there wasn't a bigger 'techcrunch effect' too; I guess not many of those 4M subscribers are particularly engaged!
harscoat 16y ago
Prepare a network effect before hand if possible. As one person pointed out to me as a critic to our own project: "so what is the multiplier effect, once 1 person signs up? How many more can he invite or get to come?" so that the bump gets feeded back. I don't have the answer yet. Anybody?
- niyazpk 16y ago
  + give some incentive to invite others, like the extra storage space dropbox gives.
  - patio11 16y ago
    I would be interested in hearing from startups who have used this to positive effect. My experiment with it was a failure - total flop, got me less new users than $5 of AdWords. This tracks with the experience of a couple companies I have talked with. I am sure there are better ways to do it, and would love hearing some.
- paraschopra 16y ago
  Ours is a B2B app so it is incredibly hard to have a network effect. Some B2B apps naturally have that (e.g. Basecamp) which with a niche A/B testing product I doubt there can be a well-engineered network effect.
some1else 16y ago
Interesting. I don't seem to find value in getting covered by TC. At least not if it takes two months that could be spent increasing conversion and retention rates. Good luck though, looks like a decent tool.
- paraschopra 16y ago
  The total time investment (over a period of two months) would be a couple of hours. So, in my opinion it was totally worth it. Thanks for appreciating the tool!
  - some1else 16y ago
    Oh :-)
Zakuzaa 16y ago
TC's 4 million feed subscribers gave you just 3k visits, much much much lower than I'd have expected.
- paraschopra 16y ago
  Yep, that's why I am curious if it is the norm or not.
- steveklabnik 16y ago
  I've heard that explained by this: as more stories hit the front page, each individual one stays on the front page for a shorter amount of time, meaning that even though TC is more popular than ever, it actually sends less hits through for each story.
  - dasil003 16y ago
    Not to mention people can just hit reload and read a new story instead of following a link.
sosuke 16y ago
The same thing happens with all major news sources, the benefit is in the incoming links that don't have nofollow on them and the various sources that then reblog and retweet about that post again sending more links back to your site. The traffic boost is fun but it is the long term link back benefit that is actually good. I get traffic all day long from stumbleupon and that is useless traffic if you want to talk about horrible conversions.
- swombat 16y ago
  You forget the rubber-stamp effect. "As seen on TechCrunch" is a good thing to put on your site, for most businesses.
- vaksel 16y ago
  the incoming link really isn't that powerful due to the # of stories. yes the front page is a PR8. But at the end of the day you are already on page 3...which is PR4. And page 4,5,6,7+ all have a page rank of 0. So unless your story gets picked up by CNN and hundreds of other real news sites, and they link to your article as a source....that techcrunch story will stay at Page Rank 0.
patio11 16y ago
On the plus side, you are now As Seen In TechCrunch, and if you think your customers care about that I would mention it on your front page and sales pages. if in doubt, I suppose you could find some way to do an A/B test :) Plus it goes in every solicitation for coverage from here out, until you get better social proof (like a NYT article).
- paraschopra 16y ago
  Yeah, still recovering from TC effect. Now it is time to start leveraging it! I don't have it on the homepage (yet), but should A/B test it for sure :)
  - InfinityX0 16y ago
    I would suggest less text on the homepage too, or at least get some kind of better image-text ratio going.
  - phoenix24 16y ago
    Hey, I realized you are based out of new delhi. I too am working on my startup here. Just curious would you like to meetup sometime ?
pclark 16y ago
Its also simply quite cool to have Techcrunch - the leading Startup news site - feature your service, if you think about how many startups there are ... congrats!
snide 16y ago
Since 2006 I've had four separate sites and two separate companies covered by Tech Crunch, a couple of them with multiple stories. The effects of each crunch were slightly different but I'd call almost all of them positive. The biggest thing Tech Crunch provides is not traffic or users, but awareness within the industry. In every instance the traffic that TC sent was fleeting at best and our sites, while technologically impressive, had nothing to do with a tech audience, so we never gained users from them. Over the years I've noticed that the actual traffic sent is less than before. This has very little to do with a change of influence with them, but in the fact that they now have more writers and more blog posts. The stories don't live as long as they used to. 3k uniques though is generally on the low side. The awareness that TC provides though is great. In the first years especially it helped provide some easy networking for a couple nerds that were very unlikely to leave their code dungeons. Don't discount the ego boost of attention which gives you the thought you're working on something that might actually be a success. Also don't forget the baffling amount of lazy biz-dev guys at VCs who have very little in the way of drumming up new companies other than calling up every company featured on TC with a decent design and idea. Never bet on these kinds of calls, it's just something that is part of the business. Concentrate on your product above all else.
TamDenholm 16y ago
http://upload.imghostr.net/941stats.png http://upload.imghostr.net/941stats.png For anyone interested this is the traffic on instantise.com from the last 2 days. Techcrunch and HN were the main contributors but as you can tell HN kicked TC's ass completely. Just based on me measuring the time that it happened i'd assign a good 80% of the "Direct" hits to HN. The google referrer is google reader so thats mostly TC. My estimated breakdown: TC total uniques: 3.5k - 3.8k HN: 7k
- bl4k 16y ago
  You actually show much higher engagement from the TC audience than from the HN audience. Highest time on site and lowest bounce rate you got was from TC. The other note on TC is that it is a brand impression to a lot more readers than what click through. ie. ppl read/scan Techcrunch and will remember brands, only to recall them later. This is part of the '6 impressions' rule that marketers talk about. There are a lot more stories on TC now though, so your own share of those eyeballs is lower, and is competing with the other companies and startups featured.
bbuffone 16y ago
We recently got our company posted on techcrunch and the numbers line up almost exactly only off by 4% and our traffic has fallen off exactly the same way. Our post went up on a Monday so day mattered little in at least these two instances.
vaksel 16y ago
"No, we are a proof that the TechCrunch club is not hyper-exclusive and if your startup has a good product or service, they will eventually cover you." I actually got the opposite impression. You had to beg and plead to get covered...made posts asking for community support and you only got covered because you just became too big of an annoyance. And let's not forget that you actually got yourself established with paying big name customers first. Meanwhile the YC company got coverage just for launching.
- paraschopra 16y ago
  I wouldn't call it begging but demanding. There is a sea of difference between these two terms. That's why I said the club is not hyper-exclusive. Yes, it is difficult to get covered if you aren't funded but not impossible.

37 points by paraschopra 16y ago

Wow, a lot lower than I would of thought it would be. Do you think the quality of the article is also a factor of the amount of hits? Or just time of week?

paraschopra 16y ago
I think time of week could have been the greatest factor. But definitely if the article included a video or a screenshot, that could have piqued interest.

paraschopra 16y ago

Hey guys, if any one else has other data points it will be great to know if their experiences match mine (as far as getting covered by TC is concerned). My key lessons: * Sent less traffic than I expected * Converted less than average site traffic * Engaged with site more than average site traffic * Generated some indirect interest in the company/product

necrecious 16y ago
Thanks for sharing your info. I haven't sought coverage by those tech startup blogs since my customers aren't going to be visiting those kind of blogs. Looking back on my referral log, the highest is from a blog called geckoandfly which I've never heard from. It generate consistent traffic for the last 3 months! My coverage from Computer World was a spike like TC, with peak at 5k and dropped to zero after a few days.
lukestevens 16y ago
I got 5k visits for a little project (aggregator) which got covered in a different time of the week, so I expect the traffic sent is about par for the course. I was surprised there wasn't a bigger 'techcrunch effect' too; I guess not many of those 4M subscribers are particularly engaged!

harscoat 16y ago

Prepare a network effect before hand if possible. As one person pointed out to me as a critic to our own project: "so what is the multiplier effect, once 1 person signs up? How many more can he invite or get to come?" so that the bump gets feeded back. I don't have the answer yet. Anybody?

niyazpk 16y ago
+ give some incentive to invite others, like the extra storage space dropbox gives.
- patio11 16y ago
  I would be interested in hearing from startups who have used this to positive effect. My experiment with it was a failure - total flop, got me less new users than $5 of AdWords. This tracks with the experience of a couple companies I have talked with. I am sure there are better ways to do it, and would love hearing some.
paraschopra 16y ago
Ours is a B2B app so it is incredibly hard to have a network effect. Some B2B apps naturally have that (e.g. Basecamp) which with a niche A/B testing product I doubt there can be a well-engineered network effect.

some1else 16y ago

Interesting. I don't seem to find value in getting covered by TC. At least not if it takes two months that could be spent increasing conversion and retention rates. Good luck though, looks like a decent tool.

paraschopra 16y ago
The total time investment (over a period of two months) would be a couple of hours. So, in my opinion it was totally worth it. Thanks for appreciating the tool!
- some1else 16y ago
  Oh :-)

Zakuzaa 16y ago

TC's 4 million feed subscribers gave you just 3k visits, much much much lower than I'd have expected.

paraschopra 16y ago
Yep, that's why I am curious if it is the norm or not.
steveklabnik 16y ago
I've heard that explained by this: as more stories hit the front page, each individual one stays on the front page for a shorter amount of time, meaning that even though TC is more popular than ever, it actually sends less hits through for each story.
- dasil003 16y ago
  Not to mention people can just hit reload and read a new story instead of following a link.

sosuke 16y ago

The same thing happens with all major news sources, the benefit is in the incoming links that don't have nofollow on them and the various sources that then reblog and retweet about that post again sending more links back to your site. The traffic boost is fun but it is the long term link back benefit that is actually good. I get traffic all day long from stumbleupon and that is useless traffic if you want to talk about horrible conversions.

swombat 16y ago
You forget the rubber-stamp effect. "As seen on TechCrunch" is a good thing to put on your site, for most businesses.
vaksel 16y ago
the incoming link really isn't that powerful due to the # of stories. yes the front page is a PR8. But at the end of the day you are already on page 3...which is PR4. And page 4,5,6,7+ all have a page rank of 0. So unless your story gets picked up by CNN and hundreds of other real news sites, and they link to your article as a source....that techcrunch story will stay at Page Rank 0.

patio11 16y ago

On the plus side, you are now As Seen In TechCrunch, and if you think your customers care about that I would mention it on your front page and sales pages. if in doubt, I suppose you could find some way to do an A/B test :) Plus it goes in every solicitation for coverage from here out, until you get better social proof (like a NYT article).

paraschopra 16y ago
Yeah, still recovering from TC effect. Now it is time to start leveraging it! I don't have it on the homepage (yet), but should A/B test it for sure :)
- InfinityX0 16y ago
  I would suggest less text on the homepage too, or at least get some kind of better image-text ratio going.
- phoenix24 16y ago
  Hey, I realized you are based out of new delhi. I too am working on my startup here. Just curious would you like to meetup sometime ?

pclark 16y ago

Its also simply quite cool to have Techcrunch - the leading Startup news site - feature your service, if you think about how many startups there are ... congrats!

snide 16y ago

Since 2006 I've had four separate sites and two separate companies covered by Tech Crunch, a couple of them with multiple stories. The effects of each crunch were slightly different but I'd call almost all of them positive. The biggest thing Tech Crunch provides is not traffic or users, but awareness within the industry. In every instance the traffic that TC sent was fleeting at best and our sites, while technologically impressive, had nothing to do with a tech audience, so we never gained users from them. Over the years I've noticed that the actual traffic sent is less than before. This has very little to do with a change of influence with them, but in the fact that they now have more writers and more blog posts. The stories don't live as long as they used to. 3k uniques though is generally on the low side. The awareness that TC provides though is great. In the first years especially it helped provide some easy networking for a couple nerds that were very unlikely to leave their code dungeons. Don't discount the ego boost of attention which gives you the thought you're working on something that might actually be a success. Also don't forget the baffling amount of lazy biz-dev guys at VCs who have very little in the way of drumming up new companies other than calling up every company featured on TC with a decent design and idea. Never bet on these kinds of calls, it's just something that is part of the business. Concentrate on your product above all else.

TamDenholm 16y ago

http://upload.imghostr.net/941stats.png http://upload.imghostr.net/941stats.png For anyone interested this is the traffic on instantise.com from the last 2 days. Techcrunch and HN were the main contributors but as you can tell HN kicked TC's ass completely. Just based on me measuring the time that it happened i'd assign a good 80% of the "Direct" hits to HN. The google referrer is google reader so thats mostly TC. My estimated breakdown: TC total uniques: 3.5k - 3.8k HN: 7k

bl4k 16y ago
You actually show much higher engagement from the TC audience than from the HN audience. Highest time on site and lowest bounce rate you got was from TC. The other note on TC is that it is a brand impression to a lot more readers than what click through. ie. ppl read/scan Techcrunch and will remember brands, only to recall them later. This is part of the '6 impressions' rule that marketers talk about. There are a lot more stories on TC now though, so your own share of those eyeballs is lower, and is competing with the other companies and startups featured.

bbuffone 16y ago

We recently got our company posted on techcrunch and the numbers line up almost exactly only off by 4% and our traffic has fallen off exactly the same way. Our post went up on a Monday so day mattered little in at least these two instances.

vaksel 16y ago

"No, we are a proof that the TechCrunch club is not hyper-exclusive and if your startup has a good product or service, they will eventually cover you." I actually got the opposite impression. You had to beg and plead to get covered...made posts asking for community support and you only got covered because you just became too big of an annoyance. And let's not forget that you actually got yourself established with paying big name customers first. Meanwhile the YC company got coverage just for launching.

paraschopra 16y ago
I wouldn't call it begging but demanding. There is a sea of difference between these two terms. That's why I said the club is not hyper-exclusive. Yes, it is difficult to get covered if you aren't funded but not impossible.