Regarding the business model: You ever thought of a Franchise model? Perhaps train a few folks (perhaps folks who were incorrectly greasing before) who can then take contracts for the large job sites?
I have seen this practice with diamond coring machines of companies like Hilti in markets like Dubai (building contractors don't need the machine , they just need the holes they cut and they don't need it everyday) where folks but the coring machines and then charge per hole (per Zerk in your case) and Hilti provides training to them.
Regarding the segment: If incorrect greasing leads to machinery failure, then perhaps look at operations where machine failure can be mission critical. Sites like Baffin Island, where large contractors' maintenance plan is "buy 10 of each machine" If one breaks down, they just park it and put the next one into service. OR Offshore Platforms where downtime can mean several millions down the pipe. Example projects offshore in Guyana where replacements are not available onshore too.
Can share what we do at our startup. (8 people, 100 - 200 customers). We create a WhatsApp group for every customer and stay with them right from onboarding onwards.
Beauty of it is they sneeze, we know. Everyone in the team kinda knows what's important what's not. we can confidently say things like "nobody cares about that fancy feature". It super valuable for a startup to get immedeate feedback. Especially valuable has been knowing
- the first things the notice when they start using: where is sort? how do i add team members? do i have to prepay?
- feature requests: it's painful to keep closing windows, need the ability to adjust windows, I also want to do this other thing you guys havent thought of.
- Bugs: why am i seeing double messages.
Disadvantages are that some customers expect immedeate answers, unrealistic expectations. and its cringey to lay down the rules and set expectations every time. no matter how many times you do it.
Our take is its 80% good and 20% bad. As we grow the company, the idea is to keep doing this for a "representative sample of customers" . Customer feedback is gold. If you can setup some kind of process like this, its great.
In those United States, you would be right to think so. Yes, there are other chat apps. A flood? No. A (cess)pool, maybe.
Outside of WhatsApp (2 Billion Monthly Active Users), Messenger (1.4 Billion MAU) and WeChat (1.2 Billion MAU) the others stand little chance of building and benefiting from being a platform.
Setting aside WeChat and China, if you now look at the next billion users who are going to be using the internet for the first time, WhatsApp is the lens through which they see the internet - they communicate, consume news and entertainment, buy and sell things, get medical advice, even fall in love via WhatsApp.
In India, where a significant portion of that #nextbillion are gonna come from, Messenger has ~100M users and WhatsApp has ~500M MAU. Similar multiples play out in "WhatsApp first" markets like Latin America, most parts of Asia.
Case in Point: Even though it had nothing to do with our business, we recently helped hack together a solution to conduct two, 20-question, exams for 100K students in an Indian State. Simply because every family had WhatsApp (and nothing else). Messenger simply doesn't have the reach in the emerging world.
From Businesses - small and large. Using the WhatsApp API. That alone is a multi-billion dollar opportunity.
For example, people like my startup (https://www.zoko.io) provides software that enable folks to run any business on (only) WhatsApp.
WhatsApp would make money by
- charging for certain types of messages sent via the API (already doing it)
- from ads on the WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram Platform that click directly to WhatsApp.(already doing it)
- enabling payments via WhatsApp Pay and then take a cut of the payments. (coming soon)
I am amazed by the things that my customers do with WhatsApp - like Fintech companies who provide loans to Uber drivers via WhatsApp, OR Fertility Clinics that dole out professional advice on how to make babies, via WhatsApp.
WhatsApp is just getting started! Remember when the internet was free, Google showed up and became a toll collector for doing anything on the internet? Just like that, WhatsApp is the internet of the #nextbillion people. WhatsApp, if they play their cards right, could become the "toll collector of the internet for the #nextbillion". I am literally all in, that it will.
:-) Interesting to read many describe that feeling you get when you read Chekhov. A Russian friend once told me it is тоска (toska) - an unbearable, inescapable anguish - "Really you have to be Russian to understand it. toska is rent for being Russian. More Vodka?"
First of all, good job on launching! Hopefully you inspire many others here to take that all-important step.
Not a native english speaker. So take my advice with a grain of salt. Not sure if you actually meant "eccentric". I initially thought you were addressing a niche segment of folks who wanted eccentric (slightly strange) content on their blogs just to spice things up. For example content like this - https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/utility-pole-surfaces would fit the description of content I would describe as "eccentric and delightful" content. If that's not what you meant, you can re-evaluate that main tagline.
Maybe put that line "Get Premium content on a budget" front and center. That's a great line!
Don't worry too much about getting the grammar right. Focus on putting it out in front of many people as possible. (like you have done here on Hacker News) Bracket feedback into 2 segments:
1. Feedback from paying customers.
2. Feedback from others.
Address the feedback from group 1 first.
Regarding the business model: You ever thought of a Franchise model? Perhaps train a few folks (perhaps folks who were incorrectly greasing before) who can then take contracts for the large job sites?
I have seen this practice with diamond coring machines of companies like Hilti in markets like Dubai (building contractors don't need the machine , they just need the holes they cut and they don't need it everyday) where folks but the coring machines and then charge per hole (per Zerk in your case) and Hilti provides training to them.
Regarding the segment: If incorrect greasing leads to machinery failure, then perhaps look at operations where machine failure can be mission critical. Sites like Baffin Island, where large contractors' maintenance plan is "buy 10 of each machine" If one breaks down, they just park it and put the next one into service. OR Offshore Platforms where downtime can mean several millions down the pipe. Example projects offshore in Guyana where replacements are not available onshore too.