Nowadays, everybody and their mothers want to start a company focused on the college student market. I kid you not: about 7 out of 10 young entrepreneurs that I come across either want to start a company focused on students or are in the process of starting one.
Focuses your startup on the college market is cool, no doubt. It makes sense that young entrepreneurs want to focus on their market…because…ahh….we’re young and we are living this market! But the fact of the matter is that many entrepreneurs who are starting these companies really don’t know jack squat about the market. Doesn’t make sense, I know. But there’s a big difference from being a part of a demographic and actually starting a company around one.
It’s true. Time and time again I hear:
“Ok, I want to start another social network site… but I’ll just add a tutoring system and it’ll set us apart from facebook… YAY!!”
or something like
“ I’m going to create this wiki that’ll allow professors and students to work on projects together and make loads of cash at the same time… Right on!!”
Blah..Blah…Blah….
Believe me guys, if the college market was that easy to penetrate, then there would be millions of successful sites for college students out there. The reason that there are only a few memorable sites that really suck in college students – I’m sure that you know of the sites – is because this particular market is the hardest to penetrate, hands down.
Fickle. Fickle. Fickle. Should I say it again?
That is the exact word to describe the mind of the partying, studying, high, drunk, lazy, hungry, sleepy, typical college student. And you actually think that your service which is no different from the rest of the bunch, loaded with a million unnecessary features, requires registration, and offers absolutely no incentive to participate… is really going to get the attention of students?
No way.
So what’s the key to targeting this market?
Three words: Simplicity, Simplicity, Simplicity.
Your services must be as simple as possible and with a zero to minimal learning curve. And though simplicity is the main ingredient, you must also find a harmony with a few other words: flexibility, scalability, and value.
When I say simple, I really mean simple. A great example of simplicity is facebook. Once you come up with a service simple enough to understand within seconds of visiting the page, you better make sure that your service is in a position to scale an expand almost immediately…it needs to be able to bend and flex with the ever-changing minds of students.
Sure, you’ll be the initial visionary of the service, but you’ll soon find out that the students will be the ones defining the company with the features that will need to be added – so you better be flexible or expect your company to snap in half like a twig.
Oh and don’t let me forget value. Without value, there is no company. There is no sexy. There is no appeal. There is no traffic. There is no money. There is no membership. There’s nada!
You service needs to have that
“wow, this is awesome… I’m coming back to this site”
factor. Think of it as a super sexy person that you simply can’t resist and you want to visit his or her hour every…… single……. night…… for ________ (fill in blank) over and over again.
Your company needs to be that sexy person.
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Great article Dave! Yes, I’ve also met a lot of students who want to start a student business, and I agree with you: sexy & simple is the way to go!
Great article!
A very open the eye article. Just because someone is a college students doesn’t mean he know how to start up a business that is relate to college. There are a lot of plan to do. That is the key.. planning
I really enjoyed your article Dave, you hit the nail right on the head. Everybody (even very large and old companies) are trying to target the college age market because it is so much money to be made there. But these large companies are spending millions of dollars on research to try and figure out marketing and selling points, and I still don’t think they’re even getting it right. It’s a tuff market to penetrate, like you said we’re just so fickle!
Thanks for the awesome feedback, everyone! So many really don’t understand how difficult this market is to break into… however, there are so, so, so many possibilities for this market that I am sure we can expect great companies to be created — always!