So I have been dreaming up a series of random product ideas that hit me from time to time and since I only have so many hours in the day I will post them here for you to help me to decide which ones to build or so you can build them yourselves.
Git Notes:
If you haven't checked it out there is an amazing product out there called GitBooks that allows you to write your book using Markdown and Github and publish it right there on the site. Super helpful if you are like me and your mind stores everything in repos already.
So I thought Evernote sucks why not just store my notes in a Git repo(I already do) wait lets take it a step further and build a simple interface for it!
Why I haven't yet:
Tough to monitize, would have to be a free service at least at first.
Also probablly limited to super nerds like me.
Crawler As A Service:
This is simple you give us a link and we crawl it and return the proper shareable information in a json format. The info would be pretty much the same as facebook uses when you share that.
Why I haven't yet:
I promised no more dev tools for a while. I have not had a great track record marketing these. Building them is easy, monetizing them is tough. But if you want it that bad hit me up or tweet at me, if it gets enough love or you have a contract laid up for me I would be happy to consider building it.
A tool to turn small consumer goods into a subscription business:
I just got done reading a book by John Warrillow called The Automatic Customer. Great book on small businesses build a subscription offering and how it makes their business better. I had an idea for a simple embeddable tool(like a youtube video) that allowed say flower shops or other luxury consumables to let husbands(or wives) put in 3 important dates an address for each one and then subscribe to get a gift every year sent to that address. This would prevent absent minded people like me from ever missing an important date again.
For example you might put in:
- your wifes birthday and your address
- your mother's birthday and her address
- Valentines day(for your wife again) and your address again(or her office).
The customer puts in their credit card on our site, selects a package, and pays our site. We then notify the small business via email, text, what ever at the beginning of each month and a day or two before the important date.
This allows the small business to better plan out their month/quarters demand and order supplies/schedule employees accordingly cutting overhead costs and builds them some nice predictable recurring revenue. For the customer it ensures that they get to sleep indoors and not in the dog house(chuckle).
If you own a small business I strongly suggest reading The Automatic Customer ASAP.
Notes on Marketing:
The reason I say 'husbands' above is meirly because I had thought to replicate the marketing campaign for the Dollar Shave Club which is comical but geared tward young male profesionals. I even went so far at to buy the domain honeyDontKillMe.com(nothing is there....yet)
Why I haven't done it yet:
I wanted to define a solid customer acquisition funnel before taking this on. The tough part is getting small businesses to embed the damn widget and sign up. If any of you sales and marketing hustelers would be interested in lining up some paying beta clients hit me up or tweet at me.
Conclusion:
There will be more ideas to come. For now I am tied up with other projects. If you like one of these ideas either run with it and send me a link when its setup or come talk to me and maybe we can build something cool together.
~Thanks for reading!