Forum Project: Building a Web Business Step-By-Step

[KUJustin]

Hey guys, I guess this is just me trying to hype up the opportunity to help me, but I think a step-by-step development of what I want to do could be an interesting project and probably provide at least some insight for others.

Basically I've developed a pretty sophisticated system for projecting baseball performance on a daily basis. This is a service that essentially doesn't exist right now and between rotohog.com, fantasysportslive.com, sports betting, and even "who do I start?" issues in standard leagues I think there is a ton of demand for this. I'd also be able to offer high-quality "from this point forward" projections throughout the year.

My current plan is a subscription model with subs not starting until next spring in order to build a user base now and to allow me to finish polishing the projection system. I hope to launch the site within a week though and I'll have a blog, forums, and some other contest that's of use/interest to rotohog and fsl players.

Let me know if you think this would be of value to the forum and if so I'll post part 1, "selecting a domain name and hosting options." Future parts could include site design, content cultivation, encouraging user-created content, product promotion, pricing, etc, etc.

[Sotiria]

I like both the idea for your site, as well as the idea of posting how you put the project together.

For the idea behind the site itself, is there some sort of algorithm that takes stats into account, or is there a human element involved? Have you tested the system out to see how accurate its predictions are?

[KUJustin]

The system is algorithmic. A couple of the coefficients chosen have a pinch of subjectivity, but not much.

I have no accuracy "tests" per se. The methodology is obviously sound, though that does me no good for marketing purposes.

I'm currently running top 15-20 in rotohog's game out of ~6,000 and I'm nearly undefeated in a couple dozen 2-10 player contests at fsl (yes, I'm running hot). I think that will give me credibility even with ppl who don't play those sites since both are essentially measures of how good you are at projecting daily performance.

Thanks for the feedback. I think that's all I needed to post part 1. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Tupacia]

Hey Justin,

I've been working on my own membership site for the last few months and will launch it in the coming weeks. I think this is a good idea for a thread and I hope you don't mind if I chime in here with my own experiences.

First, I think your decision to delay the monetization of the site until next season is a good one so you can use the remainder of this season to build a user base and tweak the kinks out of your system.

You will need to perform some exhaustive accuracy test if you want to attract users. If I'm a prospective user, your good performance in a few contests won't be enough to convince me to shell out my hard-earned cash. Obviously not something you need to do right away, but something you need to think about.

It's a good idea to break your project down into parts, but choosing a domain name shouldn't be Part I. First, you need to do research on your target market to determine what they're looking for that isn't currently provided. What services would be helpful? What would your market be willing to pay for those services? How big is your target market? Designing a survey at a site like www.surveymonkey.com and getting answers from your target market is the first step to determine how you should proceed further. Hope that was of some help.

[kimchi]

[ QUOTE ]
Let me know if you think this would be of value to the forum and if so I'll post part 1, "selecting a domain name and hosting options." Future parts could include site design, content cultivation, encouraging user-created content, product promotion, pricing, etc, etc.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think this could be a useful and interesting thread.

Maybe you could start a step or two earlier than the "step 1 - domain names and hosting". How about developing your initial idea?

[ChipWrecked]

Not sure if it would be of any help but this is a site a coworker and a buddy of his run.

It has been successful enough that they are talking with Google about having banners placed on the site by Google (not GoogleAds, but a revenue split where Google sells space on the site... I don't know details on this deal but ElD and others probably are familiar with how this works).

[JoshK]

So google has another advertising program that isn't adwords/adsense...

That's news to me care to explain more? Keep in mine that you can also choose to have banners placed on the site by google but it's still the same adsense program that everybody uses.

[ddollevoet]

Thanks for posting Justin. I'm looking forward to updates.

[Tupacia]

[ QUOTE ]
So google has another advertising program that isn't adwords/adsense...

That's news to me care to explain more? Keep in mine that you can also choose to have banners placed on the site by google but it's still the same adsense program that everybody uses.

[/ QUOTE ]

I know Google is rolling out a CPA (cost per action program) where sites pay Google for actions (a new member signup for example) instead of per individual click. Based on the description, it sounds like that the referenced site is just on some sort of CPA deal.

[Chrysiptera]

I'd be interested in your development too as I am developing some concepts as well..