Posted on Thursday, Aug 23rd 2012
We started today’s roundtable with a reminder that the TradeKing-1M/1M pitch fest is on as we speak, and the application deadline is September 28. The finals are scheduled for October 4 and October 11. The contest is focused on financial technology entrepreneurs, and TradeKing, an online brokerage, will be awarding 12 1M/1M scholarships, picked from 20 finalists, to entrepreneurs who are developing apps on their platform. The opportunity comes with a nice channel to bring your product to market.
Zollo
First, Daniel Rejzner from Israel, pitched Zollo, a social grocery-shopping site. Daniel’s premise is that consumers who spend a large chunk of their household incomes on groceries and FMCG would be willing to compare notes with community members to optimize their grocery bills by comparing prices, learning about coupons, discounts, etc.
I am not entirely convinced by the idea, but perhaps, for certain segments with very tight budgets, it would work. I personally do not have the time to invest in optimizing my grocery bill to shave $5 off it. An audience member suggested students who are studying far away from home would, especially those on scholarships. It’s a segment worth testing.
DecideQuick
Next Shameer Thaha from Kerala, India, pitched DecideQuick, a site that helps consumers make decisions like which college to apply to or what brand of laptop to buy not only by using the comparison shopping site data but also input from their trusted friends and family.
I would like this concept to be marketed in a more segmented way. For example, perhaps career and higher education choices could be a good category. Perhaps travel is an interesting category. Shameer needs to pick some test segments and good use cases. But a generic solution seems to me to be a harder proposition.
Keejul
Then Chika Uwazie from Washington, DC, pitched Keejul, an online e-book retail store focused on Africa. Chika rightly points out how difficult it is for consumers in Africa to access high quality e-Books. Similarly, for publishers who want to reach the African market, it is also difficult to crack. As an author of five books on entrepreneurship, I would love to have a reliable partner with whom I can go to market in Africa without piracy playing havoc with my IP.
Voyager 2012
Ranjan Bhattacharyya from Mumbai, India, pitched Voyager 2012, a manufacturing software business that currently does about $200,000 a year. Ranjan’s products are on a client-server architecture, which he is looking to move to a SaaS model. We discussed his options for financing the migration.
Lingo Polyglot
Last up, Ray Levesque from Vancouver, Canada, pitched Lingo Polyglot, a language learning community that specifically focuses on personalized skill gap analysis as well as community-based practice and speaking. I gave Ray my own perspective as a customer. My Spanish and French learning have stalled, and I would love to have a way of identifying the gaps, plugging them, and continuing to make progress on both. I am terribly time-challenged, so a solution that can help me keep progressing with say 20 minutes of investment per day, would be terrific.
You can listen to the recording of today’s roundtable here.
As always, I would very much like to hear about your business, so let me invite you to come and pitch at one of our free 1M/1M public roundtables. We will be holding future roundtables at 8:00 a.m. PDT on:
Thursday, August 30, 140th 1M/1M Roundtable, Register Here.
Thursday, September 6, 141st 1M/1M Roundtable, Register Here.
Thursday, September 13, 142nd 1M/1M Roundtable, Register Here.
If you want a deeper relationship with me, you are very welcome to join the 1M/1M premium program. If you have any questions about the program, please, first study the website, especially What to expect from the 1M/1M premium program and the FAQs. If you have additional questions, please email me, and I would be very happy to respond. Please note that I work exclusively with 1M/1M entrepreneurs.
I also invite you to join the 1M/1M mailing list for the ease and convenience of getting updates. This way we can stay in touch, and it will help you to decide if 1M/1M is a program for you.
This segment is a part in the series : Roundtable Recap
. May 23 - Turning Dreams Into Cash . May 16 - Calculate Your TAM Accurately . May 9 - Promising Portfolio From India . May 2 - Tech Recruitment in Bulgaria; Custom Fashion in India; Incubator-in-a-Box . April 25 - IT For Cleantech IN, Cleantech OUT . April 18 - From Singapore To Israel . April 11 - India’s Startup Industry Has A Major Gap – Product Marketing . April 4 - Don’t Waste Your Time . March 28 - Positioning And Focus Create Fast Sales Cycles . March 21 - Differentiation Is KeyMore »» . March 14 - Spotlight On ProductNation, India . March 7 - The Diabetics Epidemic . February 21 - Damsels In Distress . February 14 - Stealth Is Overrated . February 7 - Joint Session with Startup Weekend . January 31 - Return On Investment . January 24 - Meet The One Million Club . January 17 - Winners Of The Second New Year Challenge 2013 Final . January 10 - Winners of the New Year Challenge 2013 First Final . January 3 - Last Few Hours To Vote For 1M/1M New Year Challenge 2013 . December 20 - New Year Challenge Voting Round Begins . December 13 - Focus On Artificial Intelligence . December 11 - IBM SmartCamp Barcelona . December 6 - New Year Challenge 2013 . November 29 - An Inside View Into Mentoring 2.0 . November 15 - Democratization Of Startup Financing . November 8 - Never Too Old To Startup . Kolkata MUST Clinch This Time . October 26 - Emerging Kerala . October 18 - Carbon Trading In Bulgaria . October 11 - Don’t Wait For Someone To Fund Your Alpha . October 4 - Kolkata 1M/1M Pitch-Fest . September 13 - Five 1M/1M Ambassadors Win Scholarships . September 6 - OrangeScape Launches KiSSFLOW . August 30 - Hybrid Business Models . August 23 - Attention, FinTech Entrepreneurs! . August 2 - The Free Rider Problem . July 26 - Date First, Don’t Rush Into A Marriage . July 19 - Winners Of A&N Media-Elance Contest With Kings College, London . July 12 - Spotlight On Western Massachusetts . July 5 - The Challenge Of Navigating Long Sales Cycles . June 21 - Spotlight On Colorado . June 19 - Winners Of The A&N Media-Elance Contest With London School Of Economics SU Entrepreneurs & European Student Startups . June 14 - Winners Of The A&N Media-Elance Contest With Imperial College, London . June 7 - Winners Of Second BlueSnap-Elance Finals . June 4 - Winners Of First BlueSnap-Elance Finals . May 31 - Go, Kolkata! . May 22 - Winners Of TechHub-A&N Media Battle Of The Startups Contest In London Win 1M/1M Scholarships . May 10 - BlueSnap-Elance Contest Applications Deadline This Weekend . May 3 - Some Wonderful Opportunities With Corporate Partners . April 26 - A Rare Women-Only Session . April 19 - Tyranny Of The TAM . April 12 - More From Indian Entrepreneurs . April 3 - Rendezvous In Bangalore . March 15 - Spotlight On 3 Day Startup Tel-Aviv . March 12 - Winners Of Microsoft Israel Scholarships . March 1 - Strategy Gaps Need To Be Plugged . February 23 - Microsoft Israel To Offer 1M/1M Scholarships . February 16 - What’s Happening In Turkey? . February 9 - Are You Fundable? . February 2 - YCombinator vs. 1M/1M . January 26th - Spotlight On Jacksonville, Florida . January 19 - Are Media Sites Fundable? . January 12-13 - Spotlight On IIT Kharagpur, India . January 5 - ERP Galore . December 22 - Free Apps, Ad-Supported Business Models => Dangerous! . December 15 - Web 3.0 And Social Dancing; Romania Emerging . December 8 - Three Open Opportunities For 2012 . December 1 - 1M/1M Premium Company Freshdesk Wins Funding From Accel Partners . November 17 - Business Schools And Early Stage Entrepreneurship . November 3 - VCs Are Not Always Right . October 27 - Check Out Stanzr . October 20 - Non-profits And For-profits . October 13 - FREE Is Not A Business Model . October 6 - Dedicated To Steve Jobs, Reinforcing Mission To Restructure Capitalism . September 29 - From Poland To Argentina . September 22 - How Do You Catalyze A Region’s Entrepreneurship? . September 15 - Do Your Homework First . September 8 - A View Into Israeli Start-ups . September 1 - Fall Call To Action . August 25 - How To Use Twitter For Lead Generation . August 11 - Menlo Park And The Silicon Valley Renaissance . August 4 - How Do You Bootstrap Freemium Ventures? . July 28 - Investors And Incubators Need To Look At Pre-Incubation . July 21 - Crowd Sourced Funding Exchanges - An Emerging Trend . June 30 - Continued International Participation . June 23 - New Assessment Tool For Entrepreneurs . June 16 - Exciting Companies Lined Up For Microsoft Startup Grant Finals . June 9 - Silicon Valley . June 2 - 1M/1M And Incubators - What We Have Learned . May 26 - Twitter, LinkedIn - Why Not Affiliates? . May 19, Making Money From Blogs . May 12 - Two Really Cool Companies . May 5 - Ownership Matters . April 28 - Guerrilla P.R. & SEO Most Profitable Customer Acquisition Strategies . April 21- Incubators Are Reaching Out To 1M/1M . April 17 - High-Octane Energy In Pune . April 16 - 1M/1M Partners With Indian Angel Network Incubator . April 9 - 1M/1M Announces Partnership With TiE Chennai . April 6 - 1M/1M Announces Important Partnership With MAD Incubator, Malaysia . March 31 - Microsoft’s $100,000 India Startup Challenge Grant . March 24 - 75th Session Spotlights The Midwest . March 17 - Spotlight On Latin And Central America . March 10 - Spotlight On India . March 3 - Spotlight On The Northwest . February 24 - VCs, Angels, Incubators, Accelerators – What Are You Doing With Your Rejects? . February 17 - Indian Company Plugs Gap In Google’s Enterprise Solution . February 10 - When Keywords Are Competitive . February 3 - Indian Entrepreneurs Are Maturing . January 27 - Non-Dilutive Financing Through Revenue Sharing . January 20 - Personalization Remains An Open Problem . January 13 - Top 10 Online Advertising Trends For The Decade . January 6 - Top 10 Vertical and Social Web Trends For The Decade . December 16 - Top 10 Tech Trends To Watch . December 9 - Where Should You Raise Money? . December 2 - Niche Marketplace Businesses Can Be Interesting . November 18 - Not Coming To The Rescue Of Victory . November 11 - African Tech Entrepreneurs Emerging . November 4 - Premium Lounge Sneak Preview . October 28 – Convert Potential Competitors To Partners . October 21 - Bootstrapping Comes In Many Flavors . October 14 - Professional Investors Do Not Invest In $20 Million Markets . October 7 - Try To Get At Least $2M Pre-Money In Seed Round Valuation . September 30 - Investors Don't Fund Broad Ideas . September 23 - Do Not Spray And Pray . September 16 – 5 Cloud Computing Opportunities for Entrepreneurs . September 9 - Open Opportunities In Cloud Computing And Rural BPO . September 2 - Find High Velocity Channels . August 26 - 85%-90% Of Search Traffic Comes From Organic Search . August 19 - Niche E-Commerce Is Great For Bootstrapping . August 5 - Paying Customers =>Validation =>Valuation . July 29 - Startups In Malaysia . July 22 - Bootstrap Using Services . July 15 - A Market Of Late Adopters . July 8 - The EJ Methodology . July 1 - Get Your Pricing Model Validated . June 24 – Three Startups That Can Hit One Million Dollars . June 17 – Online Education Startups . June 10 – Efficient Targeting . June 3 – Defining Market Segments . May 27 – Is The Venture Worth Your Time? . May 20 – Validation, Validation, Validation . May 6 – Defining Value Proposition . April 29 – Finding The Right Direction . April 22 – The Original Runners . April 15 – Small Is OK; The Goal Is Profitability . April 8 – A Focus On E-Commerce . April 1 – Bootstrapping Tips . March 25 – A Mixed Bag Of Advice
