Have A Big Social Footprint? Do You Talk But No One Listens?
May 3, 2011
Meet inCircled(www.incircled.com), a technology start-up due to launch their alpha version this May.
While most every else is concerned with expanding their social network and connecting with more and more people worldwide, inCircled is focusing on the opposite. They are focusing on bringing down the social network. Their business model is to be half Groupon and half Jigsaw. The technical solution is somewhere between Aardvark (acquired by Google) and MailChimp.
So what the problem they are trying to solve? Many people and businesses have been overwhelmed by social media. While only a few years old, being “connected” is now considered age old wisdom – start a blog, connect with other people, get a fan page, be findable on the Internet, create an online presence, build a linkedIn profile, tweet your heart out, and on and on. When done correctly, this becomes overwhelming. Just ask any newbie small business person and they’ll tell you they are attached to computer, seemingly constantly typing in one form of social media or the next.
inCircled’s premise is that eventually people reach a point with social media that they retreat, they pull back to their strongest and most relevant connections. They converse with their core people in their network. inCircled lets people create their own inner circle, segment it, and interact more effectively with this group.
With inCircled’s application users can ask they inner circle for feedback, or can compile the results, so it’s not looking for the best answers just answers. From the business user’s perspective, local vendors can conduct a survey in their neighborhood and promote their business to this narrow group. Participants will receive a coupon from the vendor as well as build points with in the inCircled’s system. People love to give advice and people want to make easier decisions.
The application launches this month and they already have more than 500 users signed up. The company feels this is enough to get feedback on the initial version of the product. In the spirit of a true start-up, they expect to have to iterate several times before they discover what users really want and are able to understand their needs accurately.
The Start-Up Perspective
Eventually in all my conversations with inCircled, the dialogue turned to building a new company itself.
inCircled’s biggest surprise was how crowded this space has become. There are so many start-ups addressing this area that they are becoming paranoid, which is a good thing because it one of those things that worried Andy Grove of Intel too.
As someone who listens to a lot of start-up pitches, I can tell you it’s amazing how many are similar. Consider that only one percent of start-up concepts get funded, there were more than 24 WebTV start-ups that were funded by the large investors and only 4 exited with shutting down.
The hardest aspect for inCircled so far has been to build traction; they anticipate creating momentum will be difficult.
Investors always want to probe about barriers to entry, and for the most part, entrepreneurs interpret this as meaning patents and intellectual property. But that’s not the only type of barrier to entry. Have you ever wondered why there are so few new car companies or new semiconductor manufacturers, capital and your ability to raise it can be a barrier to entry too. Likewise, your following, your audience, and your customer base can be a barrier to entry. It may be easy to reverse engineering your technology and build something similar, but recreating a large audience isn’t very easier at all.
inCircled has found many people are willing to give them advice, but finding individuals willing to actively participate in the start-up has been difficult. They have found most start-ups are started either through the incubators or by serial entrepreneurs that have the capability of self-funding the start-up, and they don’t fit this mold. They feel their experience will allow them to adapt more readily than other to the market and customer feedback, and not whimsical change every time someone offers advice. They will remain flexible and open-minded as the start-up process unfolds.
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