Someone Else

It's the content, stupid

Robert Scoble talks about the 11 rules to survive being a Web 2.0 "Dot Bomb".

Robert mentions how this reminds him to watch out for his own new business (Brave move btw Rob, a long way from being a Netmeeting MVP or living in the Microsoft 'comfort zone'  for sure).

One of the things that I miss in Robert's new venture and which I see in the article he referenced, is that you need to have the right content for your podcast, blog or even your business. Imagine a business plan where someone says something like this:

1. I'm bored
2. Get Venture Capital
3. Design Website
4. {Something Magic Happens Here}
5. Buy my own island and either retire or become a paraody of a James Bond villan.

This is what most dot-com business ventures used to look like. Most dot-com 2.0 ventures look much the same except the "something magic" is considered to be part of the website design as well as the product ("Look, it updates on screen without loading the page again... oooh magic!")

Now I admit that some web 2.0 sites are interesting, and that some blogs and interesting and that some podcasts are memorable but here is the big secret.

They're memorable because their content is memorable.

Got that? My blog site here isn't good (or if you prefer, "crap") because it's a blog, or because it's a blog built on Community Server 2.0 (oh yeah, 2.1 beta 1 is looking good btw guys). It's good, or bad, or whatever you like because of my writing. Because of the people who post occasionally in my forums. Because of the comments, as few as they are. The content.

I don't buy books from Amazon because I admire their e-commerce backend, I buy because they have the books I want at a good price. Just about every point in the 11 suggestions can be related to this single point; start a business to fill a need.

Understand how that business will make money.
Understand what a realistic goal is, and then set about reaching it.
Understand that if you have to spend 3 weeks explaining to me that your idea is cool and that I'm an idiot for not accepting that, then it might just be that your idea isn't that good.

The biggest example of this last one is in the book BooHoo, where the people behind Boo.com explain how it was everyone's fault but theirs that they built a web ordering system that would be sluggish on a LAN connection and were then astonished to find that people on a dial up pay-per-minute connection couldn't use it.

In fact, I think that book should be required reading for anyone starting an online business. Just think of the time it would save you if you're a venture capitalist;
VC: "Have you read Boo Hoo?
Online Business: "Er... yeah sure"
VC: "{Quick question about something in Boo Hoo}"
OB: "{dismal failure to answer the question properly}"
VC: "OK. Thanks for that, some interesting thoughts. Door's to your left."

You're either selling something that people want enough to actually pay for, or you're not. And if you're not, I hope you didn't spend too much money on that new office.