3 ms·

First of all, HN isn't a place to find a co-founder for your start-up. You can't seamlisly find a co-founder. Co-founders are people you may have known for a wh

First of all, HN isn't a place to find a co-founder for your start-up. You can't seamlisly find a co-founder. Co-founders are people you may have known for a while, such as colleagues, roomates, friends, etc. Second of all, if you end up hiring a UI designer, they won't work for free, given the reason 80% of startups fail, just because you had 2 successful start-ups from the past, doesn't mean you will have a third start-up that will succeed. So in this case, you will have to pay them enough so they can work with you, and I'm sure they'll ask for the same amount they currently get paid for. Finally, if you know your start-up will be a clone, in this case it obviously is, you know theirs going to be an issue. You're gonna have to come up with better ways to make money as a start-up, and market your users, which is strategically challenging, because these two start-ups (I've interviewed both founders) are launching worldwide in less than two months. Zaarly will hit the grounds first, soon TaskRabbit will follow, so my best advice would be that if you could tell us one good reason why your start-up will succeed, I'll give you props, other than that, it's undoubtful that your start-up will succeed.

ig1 15y ago
You say that as if launching a two-sided marketplace worldwide is a trivial thing. In the market in question you have to fight for dominance in each city individually having to attract both workers and customer. Even if Zaarly and TaskRabbit launched in the UK tomorrow it would still take years for anyone to become established. And the fact is that both of them have only penetrated a handful of American cities at the moment, it would be crazy for them to pursue a tough international growth plan when they've barely penetrated their home market. If you look at a history of two-sided market startups (job boards, classified listing, auctions, daily deals) what happens in most cases is that you end up with a large number of local players who end up merging or being acquired to form a global player.
- shadananu78 15y ago
  Even if Zaarly takes time to establish it's grounds in the UK, a clone is a clone. You have to have a better idea than whats out in the market, you can't create a Groupon clone and expect for it to rocket (unless you have an amazing deal that offers $100 of Food for $2) but in reality, that is impossible. Zaarly already uses Geolocation. I'm here to help, if you can provide us with mockups, or designs of what your start-up will offer to it's users, we can improve the stability, and provide harsh feedback for it to succeed, and take on those competitors.
  - ig1 15y ago
    Tell that to SoSasta (India), Groupoer (Israel), Twangoo (South Africa), Disdus (Indonesia), ClanDescuento (Chile), CityDeal (Europe), GroupMore (Malaysia), etc. All local Groupon clones which were acquired by Groupon for multimillion dollar amounts.
    - shadananu78 15y ago
      I'm sure the OP doesn't want to get his start-up acquired, well atleast that is what I'm hoping, to beat the guys in the market he needs to provide some key features that can set him aside from his competitors. Why won't people go out and create Groupon Clones and sell them to Groupon for millions of dollars? - Because Groupon has a key acquiring strategy they use, and a lot of other start-ups use. They look at the key features that Groupon doesn't have, then they look at their market and get term sheets ready.
      - ig1 15y ago
        Acquisition is the primary exit route of startups, only a very very tiny minority of startups going the IPO route. Despite me giving a list of Groupon clones who Groupon have acquired you seem to have missed the point. Groupon enters new markets by acquiring the leading player in the local market, it's absolutely not about features but rather about market share.

ig1 15y ago

You say that as if launching a two-sided marketplace worldwide is a trivial thing. In the market in question you have to fight for dominance in each city individually having to attract both workers and customer. Even if Zaarly and TaskRabbit launched in the UK tomorrow it would still take years for anyone to become established. And the fact is that both of them have only penetrated a handful of American cities at the moment, it would be crazy for them to pursue a tough international growth plan when they've barely penetrated their home market. If you look at a history of two-sided market startups (job boards, classified listing, auctions, daily deals) what happens in most cases is that you end up with a large number of local players who end up merging or being acquired to form a global player.

shadananu78 15y ago
Even if Zaarly takes time to establish it's grounds in the UK, a clone is a clone. You have to have a better idea than whats out in the market, you can't create a Groupon clone and expect for it to rocket (unless you have an amazing deal that offers $100 of Food for $2) but in reality, that is impossible. Zaarly already uses Geolocation. I'm here to help, if you can provide us with mockups, or designs of what your start-up will offer to it's users, we can improve the stability, and provide harsh feedback for it to succeed, and take on those competitors.
- ig1 15y ago
  Tell that to SoSasta (India), Groupoer (Israel), Twangoo (South Africa), Disdus (Indonesia), ClanDescuento (Chile), CityDeal (Europe), GroupMore (Malaysia), etc. All local Groupon clones which were acquired by Groupon for multimillion dollar amounts.
  - shadananu78 15y ago
    I'm sure the OP doesn't want to get his start-up acquired, well atleast that is what I'm hoping, to beat the guys in the market he needs to provide some key features that can set him aside from his competitors. Why won't people go out and create Groupon Clones and sell them to Groupon for millions of dollars? - Because Groupon has a key acquiring strategy they use, and a lot of other start-ups use. They look at the key features that Groupon doesn't have, then they look at their market and get term sheets ready.
    - ig1 15y ago
      Acquisition is the primary exit route of startups, only a very very tiny minority of startups going the IPO route. Despite me giving a list of Groupon clones who Groupon have acquired you seem to have missed the point. Groupon enters new markets by acquiring the leading player in the local market, it's absolutely not about features but rather about market share.