webstartupper

For those interested, Feedly gave 5000 lifetime license to certain backers for $99. However, once these were taken up, the rest of the customers still have to pay a monthly/yearly amount.

Feedly has probably used the lifetime license as a promotional method (and apparently very well too) and not as a sustainable business model.

Thats what I thought as well, but I have not come across any SAAS apps that do this.

Could you tell me which online games do this - a one time fee for lifelong gaming? Thanks

I have not used Kik. I use WhatsApp. I would think the following would be reasons why WhatsApp scores over its competitors.

1. No need to log in - WhatsApp uses your phone number and a hash of your IMEI number as credentials to log in to their app. Although this means that your account could be compromised, its ease of use is therefore unparalleled.

2. No need to authorize people to add you - this means that if you have anyone's phone number, you already have them on your contact list. If I had to choose one reason for WhatsApp getting over a 100 million users in a short time, this would be it. A lot of people find this a privacy issue (including myself), but most people just don't care.

3. Sending images and video through WhatsApp is super easy and the content is compressed.

4. WhatsApp has restricted their emoticon set - I think this makes a big difference in keeping the clutter down.

Yeah. Fotolia does have cheaper pictures - but hard to find the variety that istockphoto has. Thanks.

Thanks. Wattpad looks very cool. Is there anything like this that is self hosted?

The penalty is probably due to the Google Penguin algorithm update. Buying a new domains and redirecting your blog to it will not help as the links will point to the new blog which will also receive the same penalty.

Register with Google Webmaster Tools. See if you have any message from Google on "unnatural links". Check your link profile. Try and figure out which are the sites that are causing the penalty. Try and get in touch with webmasters of those sites and ask for your link to be removed. If this does not work, you can use the disavow links tool (from within google webmasters) which is used to tell Google that you do not want them to consider the specific link.

Not movies. But definitely something that does not need your full attention - something that you don't mind tuning in and out of. This would mostly be TV shows - Simpsons, Family Guy, Two and a half men, How I met your mother. Seinfeld was great for this.

Has anyone used http://textcaptcha.com/ or a similar service? I really like the idea - a self hosted solution would be great.

I guess you mean something like http://textcaptcha.com/ - any feedback on this service?

For anyone else who is having the same issue, I found a brilliant article on verifying email addresses without sending an email.

http://www.webdigi.co.uk/blog/2009/how-to-check-if-an-email-...

None of the email addresses exists - hence all the emails bounce back. The user records are added to the system when the user registers but they cannot confirm it since they never get the email. The bounce messages are real.

Definitely worth AB testing this - But I believe that testimonials work on the human herd-instinct-purchasing thought process - e.g - I don't want to be the first (and maybe only) person to have bought X. Seeing a list of people having purchased X before me is rather comforting. Due to this, testimonials with pictures of real people have the most impact in the decision making process - especially if (i) the SAAS website is relatively unknown and (ii) its a SAAS for consumers (i.e. customers are consumers and not businesses).

If you are just starting out i.e. validating the idea - go with the cheapest and the easiest option which allows you to get the site up and running in front of your users. If this means cheap web hosting (assume you have no experience with a VPS) - then so be it. If you have managed a VPS before, then start with the cheapest VPS (say prgmr or linode). You can always easily scale the VPS until you reach a point where you need a dedicated server.

Best to cross the scaling bridge only when you come to it.

I've had pretty good success with using facebook for this. Put the email address in the search box and more often than not you get the subscriber's name and details.

This is also a great way to do research on your subscribers (and to customize your emails). Read up on their profile, check out their websites, interests etc.

I targeted the forums where the prospective customers would most hang out at - and it has worked out pretty well - its just not as scalable as I wish it would be. Unfortunately advertising at those same forums has not worked out as well.

The referral idea sounds good - definitely worth a shot.

Clickable - http://www.domcop.com

You may want to reduce the speed of the slider on the homepage. It moves too fast to be able to read the text on the slide comfortably.

Alternately, if you want to keep the current speed, you could reduce the text to just a heading.

Link to DomCop - http://www.domcop.com/

Bought a customized T510 during Christmas 2010 online from lenovo website. Absolutely no hassles with shipping. Dunno if things have changed since then though.

The reason I love Lenovo is for their build quality.

The Tell-Tale Brain - V S Ramachandran. This has been one awesome book.

Clickable - http://www.gomommyauctions.com/

Go Mommy Auctions - Better UI and functionality for GoDaddy Auctions.

http://www.gomommyauctions.com/

Thank you for the comments Nicholas. I found your suggestions very useful. I made the changes to show 1000 records and plan to add an advanced search to incorporate your other suggestions.

I have been unable to find the free guide you released in 2007. Could you please post a link here?

Clickable Link - http://www.gomommyauctions.com

Clickable Link - http://www.gomommyauctions.com

Clickable - http://www.gomommyauctions.com

I'm not thinking of providing direct SEO services to the companies in the same industry. The app would simply allow them to check and validate their seo strategies and see comparable data for all the other companies in the same industry (on-page and off-page seo stats, back links etc).

At the moment, I'm not confident that there is any niche-specific value the app can provide to the companies. However, assuming I can figure that out, would a company really be put off if their competitor was able to access the same value?

Hi Tommy,

Thanks for the answers. I'm definitely interested in brainstorming. Will send you an email in a while.

Akash

Clickable - UI - http://axemantech.com/HostingSEO/