Show HN: I built a thing
boxcarsurgery.com
boxcarsurgery.com
You could abstract away all the web and phone (press '9') stuff and just have a button "Open the door? Yes/No" if someone activates the buzzer.
Maybe add some easy management for pins that:
- always open (roommates/family/friends)
- open only one time (deliveries, not-so-close-friends)
- open only under certain conditions (time of day, day of month, etc)
Make it possible to easily share those pin numbers via SMS, Facebook, email, etc.
I think you have a product that's great for access management. You should highlight the additional benefits in your marketing, e.g.:
- easy to invite friends over for dinner
- easy to share apartment without the need for new keys
- easy to revoke access
- easy to let cleaning staff in during certain times of day
Another thought: Market it as a helpful add-on for AirBnB customers. You don't have to give someone a key to your apartment, just a PIN that only works for the time they rent the apartment (this is also useful for sub-leases). You can revoke access at any time, no matter where you are (big problem with keys).
Short version: I think you'd have a better chance packaging your product as a mobile app, abstracting away all the web/phone stuff and sell it as "entry management" instead of "automated buzzer".
Some fights are worth having. If you can find a sidekick who relishes the sales battle then sobeit.
Else consider open sourcing what you've done and move to the next problem.
Work out how many people you need signed up in order to live off the income, after a few weeks of marketing extrapolate out how many weeks it'll take to get enough people signed up to live off this business. Consider whether it's worth continuing or re-evaluate at that point.
I've open sourced the it here: https://github.com/amccloud/django-tropo-webapi/
and the bulk of it https://github.com/amccloud/django-tropo-webapi/blob/master/...
It was great because it allowed my roommate and I to buzz people in from our own cell phones. It also allowed me to set an entry code to give out to friends and for deliveries. It would sms me and my roommate when someone came through the gate. To further extend on that idea you could create specific codes for specific people that only work at specific times.
You should be marketing this towards apartment complex properties, not consumers living in apartment complexes.
- What's your price point? - How quick can you install it? - Can this be demo'd elsewhere?
Sell pain killers to people in pain.
I would try to find a larger complex to use as a case study. Set everything up for free for them, and check their retention rate before and after the install. 1 month less of an empty apartment probably pays for your product, and if you're anything over that it's a no-brainer from the complex owner's perspective.
Individuals have the pain.
Total guess, if you can get enough individuals to like it for free or cheap, then the hue and cry may motivate a manager somewhere to subscribe for $WORTHWHILE.
Or you might sell it to the lock companies.
Call every landlord in town.
Landlords love upselling tenants (parking spaces, storage space, etc.)
Edit: I want to point out that I am in no way, shape, or form saying that the op could not make a decent amount of money on this(though, 10/month is a touch steep for someone living in an apartment) but I was just curious why the manufacturers of such devices limit them in such a way.
Also, long distance appears to be at least $20/month extra on a standard small business landline here (Bell Canada). That's not much, but I can see it happening for something the landlord would think of as a non-feature: Because why wouldn't you have a phone number in the area you live?
I'm also totally not getting how the security aspect of this is being glossed over. To the suggestion that apartment owners/managers would be interested, why would they put up a security gate then install a system that allows it to be bypassed by anyone with your phone number?? I actually bet if you told your apartment manager he would demand you immediately disable it, not pay you to give it to your neighbors.
One caveat: Text messages will only be sent to phones listed as "Mobile". But I just get my text messages via the Google Voice app anyway, so this is actually a benefit to me (no duplicated texts).
* openmydooor.com
* buzzmein.com
* apartmentbuzzer.com
- Amazon is a fun name but it conveys no information how about buystuffonline.com
- eBay is a fun name but it conveys no information how about OnlineAuctionHouse.com
- Square is a fun name but it conveys no information how about chargecreditcardsonyoursmartphone.com
etc.
The fact is that you can succeed with a totally random domain name, or one that just screams your targeted message. This business could work with either as well.
Although if the OP does decide to try to monetize as B2B by selling to landlords, maybe using a Monty Python reference is not the best approach. Also, I might go with a blurb more descriptive than "Make your apartment gate awesome."
But you know what they say about advice on the internet!
Why not keep it running and collect the cash as a side project, I can't imagine this needed much maintenance, its just printing money, maybe not millions, but still real money, and I bet it would grow organically slowly over the years.
Just some information (also, pricing) to provide before asking for people to give away their emails.
Cool thing, though!
For the longest time, the homepage was Rails' index.html. It was so hard for me to bang out those few paragraphs.
Nice thing about that is I've let the UPS guy in while I was in Rome, and didn't have to pay long distance.
Some people don't get the pain point, but it's definitely nice!
I would first figure out the size of the market, then pick a price point (informed by the size of the market + the pain solved by your solution), then a marketing strategy (target either building management or individuals).
While most people on HN are telling you to market to the apartment complexes, I think you might want to market towards individuals, since they are the ones who feel the pain that you alleviate. You can target apartment complexes if you alleviate some pain that they have (maybe having your system is something they can include in marketing materials, which will get them more occupants/better occupancy).
The best thing about targeting individuals is that you may be able to get them to market for you (see dropbox), and that they will cross pollinate your solution to new apartment complexes when they move.
However, I am renting out my apartment to people and they would sometimes forget the gate key or whatever, and I'd get a call literally once or twice a day all to just press 9. I could see this being useful.
Your marketing copy has to change a little because you are now targeting management to be your distribution channel. You could say something like our app reduces the line in front of the gate because it makes it easier for trusted outsiders to enter the community.
Or if you think it's easier to go after your end-users, then you could:
- try and cross-market with other startups targeting apartment residents
- try to get access to different apartment community/common rooms and drop some flyers or quickly talk to some folks (this is kind of creepy and risky, but you might be able to hack the process by asking for a tour of the apartment from management)
- try dropping your message on apartment forums or review sites
Now think about the problem an solution in terms of Product and market
Is the market who you think it is ? (I.E. who will buy this ? people, buzzer system makers or building owners ?)
Then think about what would be the product that would allow your market to solve the problem. Might not be the one you built exactly.
A product is only successful if it solves a problem for a market. Both problem and market are mandatory.
I ended up getting a google voice number to solve the issue which then simultaneously rings both me and my wife. However, I love your PIN idea and the "automatically let anyone in during a set time period" approach.
> And unfortunately, I haven’t found a succinct way to market it or even just describe it.
My first tip is to stop using such vague and obnoxious phrasing.
You would be surprised how a simple small compelling USP can nearly monopolize a small market... Than I would branch out to other delivery services to your building... Once you have 3-5 places using this marketing pitch you can go to property owners and say, "Here is a way to squeeze extra revenue out of your property, while providing a great service to your tenants... You can take it a step further and offer the first part of the app (with a PIN) to tenants for free, sponsored by the local pizza delivery joint...
The best part is that you already have a relationship with the local pizza place, so start there... prove the model and slowly scale throughout your neighborhood, etc...
Is the phone calling thing a new process, or is this just an Australia vs. USA thing?
Can you set it up to use the same number, but validate accounts with access numbers? That way you only pay for 1 number and could possibly ask for donations on the site for hosting costs (sounds like you could still get away with the free heroku account for your building).
There would be people who might pay for not having to bother to write the code (and maintain it, and maybe innovate on it) for this. You never know.
"it's trivial to write" does not mean people won't pay for it. Things are more complex than that.
I think the real problem is that these gate systems at apartment complexes setup to only handle 7 digits. It was install in the 70s or 80s when our state when our part of the state had only 1 area code (leading 3 digits). Now, we have several. When we dropped our land line, we found that the door buzzer system could only call the 763 area code, but our cell phones use 651.
Yes, this is oversimplified and there are billing options which do strange things, but it's unlikely that the reason for the local number policy is the cost of the call.
Billing landlords is a better way to price it, after-all you said you hated getting a $20 bill every month just to access your apartment by phone, so residents wouldn't be much happier if they were billed by this system.
Note: rule n° 1 of marketing: identify your market (clients)
My current fix: I created a Google number with the local 617 area code.
I could see this being very useful however.