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Ask HN: Startup Marketing

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A lot of startups have the chicken and egg problem that PG describes. For example, a dating site is not great unless you have a lot of people registered as the point is to have many people there.

My startup, Grosper.com suffers from the same problem. We do group buying for real estate in the Middle East and the as the description suggests, we need a lot of early users so that deals go through. If deals don't go through early on, more members won't come - a vicious cycle.

This post is about asking for help to market my startup. Any comments about marketing ideas on a shoestring budget or resources such as great books by great mentors (More 37 Signals, less College Professor) would be appreciated.

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Here's a few things I've seen work for a shoestring marketing budget.

Reach out to bloggers in this niche. If this is something that doesn't exist in some capacity and can really help people, maybe some bloggers will mention it and you can get a few subscribers.

Look for parallel partners. Maybe you can negotiate where someone mentions your daily deals in their daily deal email and you can mention their deals in four of yours to mitigate their risk.

Trade resources for mentions. Maybe you have a specific expertise that you can sell to someone in a similar space. Instead of charging money, barter a mention in their newsletter or blog.

Start a blog and create catch titles that people can get attached to in your niche. Something like 8 secrets to a free vacation in Dubai can go viral.

Write featured blog posts for related blogs. This is nice because it usually guarantees an existing audience will read your post.

one of the issues in the Dubai is the lack of prominent bloggers. You'll find most users following prominent international blogs rather than any local ones.

Strong idea about trade resources though. We have started our own blog. We hope to get some sort of following for that.

You need to focus on content marketing around your story - which, as I gather from your post, is the real estate opportunity in the middle east. Become an industry thought leader and champion.

Write some great blog posts that have real insight and just a very light sales pitch, and get them syndicated on sites that appeal to the middle eastern real estate and emerging business market. If it's a niche opportunity, which it seems like, then there should be several relevant niche media who, like you, are aiming for growth in the market, and can mutually benefit from great content you can provide them.

Basically, you need to identify partners who are vested in the industry's growth like you are, and figure out ways to be an asset to them and not just an advertiser. And the easiest way to do this is to provide great content.

- @jonnystartup

Did you see PG talking to the guys who were doing the 'matchmaking' dating site on this weekend's startup school? He told them that instead of making it into a dating site, find some really good matchmakers, treat them really nice, and reward them, and the masses of users will come later. I don't know how it applies, but if you're having a chicken/egg problem, try changing it around to an egg/chicken problem... Try turning the whole idea on it's head.

this is actually one of the ways we considered. We called it the Tastemakers (interior designers), basically, getting people with good taste to recommend great products to put in your home, so users would be drawn to our website for the content.

See if these might help - http://howtolaunchastartup.com/2011/06/20/21-must-read-resou...

hey akshay, that actually does. thanks a lot, appreciate it.

1. You have a two-sided marketplace problem. Go read up on that.

2. Don't listen to the Silicon Valley guys. They don't know what marketing is.

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