Following Aussie Startups and Tech Trends

Vishal Sharma Sunday, April 26, 2009 Australia , Online , Real Estate , Startup , Venture 0 comments

Today we showcase story of an exciting venture, from Brisbane, Australia, ApartmentReviews - Australia's Largest Dedicated Apartment Resource, founded by Shane Moore.

In a recent email based interview Shane, he gave insights how he is managing and juggling. This is what he has to say in his interview with us:

• How long it took before it was up and running
From the initial concept to having the first basic site live was around 3 weeks. The current design took another month or so to get right, at which point I started advertising through Google Adsense and posting on forums.

• Stage of Venture
The site launched in 2007 and since that time I've been concentrating on building traffic and attracting real estate agents to list their details. The next step will be to transition the 30 or so real estate agents we have into paying customers (currently it is free for them).

• Which Market Segment
Anyone looking to rent or buy a residential apartment.

• Customers
Anyone looking to rent or buy a residential apartment, and real estate agents that specialise in apartment buildings.

• Targeted Age Group
All above 18

• Users Using Service
Around 6,000 unique visitors per month, plus around 30 real estate agents listing on the site. Over 500 individual real estate agents are subscribed to our monthly apartment popularity (traffic) report.

• Marketing Technique
Organic search results (where most traffic comes from), Google Adsense, letterbox drops in large apartment buildings, print advertising in local publications.

• Measuring Success
The site was ranked 29th in Australian Anthill Magazine's inaugral Smart 100 list. Traffic is growing each month (albeit a little slower currently as the marketing budget has been significantly reduced) and we're attracting more real estate agents wishing to list their details on the site.

• Monetizing/Revenue Model
Currently Google Adwords plus individually negotiated banner ad campaignes. The next step is to monetise the agent listings. Each building has five positions available for agents to list their details on, and they will pay a monthly subscription fee for each building they list on.


• Main competitors
None yet, as we aren't a classifieds site like realestate.com.au and the like.

• money required
Around $10k has been spent on development costs and advertising so far. Ongoing costs related to the site itself is very low.

• Main Barriers
Hundreds of hours of manual research to get all of the apartment building information. The work never stops because more apartment buildings are popping up every week.

• Advice For People
Sites that use all user generated content, as opposed to our site which is half generated by us (the apartment info) and half generated by the users (the ratings and reviews), take much less work!

• External Funding
None

Ongoing coverage on Australian startups, innovation, business and tech trends, and interviews with experts in various domains can be found here

Vishal Sharma Friday, April 24, 2009 Australia , Interview , iphone , Mobile , Startup , Technology , Telecom , Venture 0 comments

Today we showcase story of an exciting venture, from Sydeny, Australia, infome - Find Anything Nearby from your Mobile, co-founded by Scott Middleton, Andrew Lowe and Brett McDowall.

In a recent email based interview with us, Scott gave insights how he is managing and juggling. This is what he has to say in his interview with us:

• Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?
When I was about 12 - thanks to a book my parents bought me - I found out that I could create web pages, I was so excited I distinctly remember tossing and turning the entire night because I began imagining the possibilities, imagining what I could create; especially how I could build websites for local businesses.

A year or two later, still excited and full of enthusiasm I’d learnt how to create mobile games, a well-established local mobile developer bought my first game and it went worldwide – it even made it to a top 20 list for Australian developers.

Even now, I still love mobile. I love how it can make everything so simple and so easy to do. I love the possibilities and I love that there is always something new.

In my downtime when I’m not immersed in the world of technology I’m at the gym, the beach, the pub, diving, playing Aussie rules or trying something new.

One of my partners, Brett McDowall, spends his time as the Chief Technology Officer at Object Consulting, you can read about him here.

There are a few more of our team in the wood works at the moment, but I hope to introduce them soon.

• What is the name of your venture/company?
infome. Pronounced “info me”. infome is a free iPhone application and mobile service that allows you to search for anything local. You can check out what we are doing at infome or through my blog.

• Please tell us about your venture/company?
Like I just mentioned, searching with infome is like asking a friend who knows all about you as well as the details of every business and every product in the local area.

infome takes things a step further than your usual search, infome is about giving you the ability to search for everything in the world around you. Remember those times you’re out after a great party and you need to find a bar that is open, with infome you can search “bars that are open”. Taking it further, imagine you’re late for a dinner, in a suburb you aren’t too familiar with and your friend only drinks shirazs, just search infome with “open bottleshops with shiraz”.

At the moment we are building up our database and working on making our technology that little bit extra special. So you might not find exactly what you are after just yet.

• What is the main objective/mission behind your venture?
infome will be like your best mate that knows you and knows the area you’re looking for something in. Soon you’ll be able to say to infome “I’m hungry” and it will know who you are, where you are, what you like and present you with the best places nearby for you to eat.

• How long it took before it was up and running?
It's taken myself and my partners a few months of tossing ideas around to finally grab onto this one. Once we decided we were up in a month or so.

• Stage of venture
The version that is out in the open for everyone to use is very much an early version of our product, some would say beta. We want to get the ball rolling and we want to see what people think. We’re currently focusing on particular suburbs of Sydney and the iPhone. Soon we'll be branching to more suburbs and more technology.

• Market Segment
People that love technology and get out and about.


• Users sing service
We average about 30 searches per day and about 9 users using the service per day with little to no advertising.

• Marketing Technique
We've just finished testing both AdWords and flyer drops. We're now focusing on 'hyper-local' initiatives like focused websites for particular communities and needs.

• Measuring Success
First it was 1 user we didn't know. Then it was 1,000 users. Now we're looking at capturing the hearts and minds of a particular suburb.

• Monetising/Revenue Model
Similar to Google AdWords in that a merchant pays per view of their listing. Listing just the business details is free, listing products/special offers and more incurs a fee. It is all performance based because why should you pay for something that you aren't seeing benefits from?

• Main competitors?
TrueLocal, Sensis and to some extent PocketLife.

• Main barriers?
Finding a niche away from the big broad brushes of the TrueLocals and YellowPages.

• Advice for people
The most important thing I have learnt is that you need to get started and then, once you’ve started you need to keep the ball rolling – in footy we say “keep the legs ticking over”. It’s important because
(a) only by doing will you learn how to do greater things and
(b) you’ll find that when you’re doing something the world turns in your favor.

• Business partner?
2

• External funding
None

Ongoing coverage on Australian startups, innovation, business and tech trends, and interviews with experts in various domains can be found here

Vishal Sharma Tuesday, April 21, 2009 Australia , iphone , Software Development , Startup , Venture , Web2.0 1 comments

Today we showcase story of an exciting venture, from Sydney, Australia, Mogeneration - Mobile 2.0 Web & iPhone Development House, co-founded by Tom Adams & Keith Ahern

In a recent email based interview Keith, he gave insights how he is managing and juggling. This is what he has to say in his interview with us:

• How long it took before it was up and running
The co-founder Tom Adams and I had been talking about working together on iPhone and mobile projects for quite a while. In the end it took about 2 months from a decision to launch..

• Stage of Venture
mogeneration started in October 2008 and launched "The Australian" on iPhone within a few weeks. We have offices in Brisbane and Sydney are still under 10 people. We have created 9 iPhone applications for Australian and US companies.

• Which Market Segment
We help companies and individuals get a presence on iPhone. We have worked with a wide variety of companies from News Ltd to small startups like Lingopal and Xumii. We are experts in publishing content in an iPhone format.

• Customers
News Ltd, Xumii.com, Lingopal Pty Ltd, Perkler, ShakeAndPlay.com, Perkler and a few more confidential customers.

• Targeted Age Group
It depends on the app - our kids games are aimed at young kids but also seem to have a dedicated adult following! The Lingopal phrasebook application contains some flirting phrases and is aimed at the twenty something traveler.

• Users Using Service
We are bound to confidentiality by our clients but we can confidentially say its in hundreds of thousands of users per month.

• Marketing Technique
As a consulting and development company we market through a variety of channels including online ads, linked in, speaking events including Mobile Monday and Cebit, contributing to open source

• Measuring Success
We were cashflow positive almost immediately and profitable soon after. Internally we measure success on how close our project estimates are to reality. Also, several clients have come to us after having a bad experience with other companies - mostly overseas. iPhone development is new and it's hard - it does not have the 10 years of community and support other environments have. We have also had some repeat business and great testimonials from our customers.

• Monetizing/Revenue Model
We have several models, the simplest is the fixed price or time and materials straight development model. Tell us what you want, we tell you how much its costs and build it. Beyond that we have also sometimes enter revenue share agreements where we offer a reduced build cost in return for revenue share. We are moving to platform model for some vertical markets such as news/magazine publishing, music and movie promotion and interactive kids books publishing. In these cases we have a license fee per app.

• Main competitors
Traditional mobile development shops like Hyro and Tigerspike.

• Technology Stack used
Front End is Objective-C and Cocoa. Back end - Ruby on Rails and Scala.

• Main Barriers
Lerning curve on iPhone O/S and Objective-C. Working with Apples rules and regulations. Establishing a new name. Educating clients about development costs and timelines.

• Advice For People
In the wise words of Mick Liubinskas of Pollenizer: "Ideas are easy, execution is hard". mogeneration execute.

• External Funding
Some angel funding

Ongoing coverage on Australian startups, innovation, business and tech trends, and interviews with experts in various domains can be found here