Executive Summary:
This business plan elaborately discusses SceneOn’s services and provides an
in-depth analysis and evaluation of our idea to launch a new site in the
event/venue listing industry. The plan will evaluate the current industry and
environment to which SceneOn caters and functions. It will also highlight the
strengths and challenges of launching a start-up website with our solutions to
said challenges. It also outlines our strategy for SceneOn to gain a profit in its
first year, and maintain profitability, financial stability and longevity.
SceneOn is a website and mobile app that matches people with venues,
activities, restaurants, events and happenings in an urban space based on the
results of a fun, in-depth and interactive one time personality questionnaire,
SceneMe! Starting in the New York Metro area SceneOn aspires to be a leading
force in the event and activity listing industry on a global scale. Large urban
spaces like New York have been a hub for social activity since the 50’s. With so
much happening people needed access to information on events and activities
that were tailored to their interests. This need led to the creation of publications
like Time Out New York and New York Magazine- they jumped onto the model of
listing events, activities and happenings according to interests. Today such
publications have been multiplied, digitally distributed and have morphed into
more of social media services. With multiple publications online, the search to
finding the right venue has become much overwhelming. There is a high demand
from people to find activities based on their individual personalities without the
excess online noise. Enter SceneOn!
The activity and event planning industry has embraced social media and mobile
in order to provide the most up to date information for its audience. These sites
stimulate the local economy, help grow small business and improve industries
such as the arts by engaging an affluent demographic interested in trying new
experiences and sharing them with their friends.
SceneOn knows the value of social media and how it has revolutionized the
consumer’s power position and the world of marketing. People are more likely to
trust peers on social media platforms than advertising, hence the social media
component, the use of sharing and recommending, is very much integrated with
our services. SceneOn will match your personality profile to people and friends
similar to you so that you may follow them and give and receive
recommendations of events and activities. Furthermore, our users will also be
given the option to upload pictures of their SceneOn experience to their profiles,
either through the web or through the mobile app.
The real competitive threat lies in other social recommendation sites like
UrbanDaddy, VirtualTourist and TripAdvisor. What makes SceneOn different
from our competitors is our ability to offer a service that can add genuine value
and create an indispensable difference in our users lives. Existing services offer
suggestions that are much too narrow. UrbanDaddy and DailyCandy cover
restaurants and nightlife; Gilt lists sample sales; CourseHorse catalogs special
interest classes. SceneOn will give widespread venue and activity suggestions
that span all these categories, so users can rely on the company for any
occasion or mood. With the right creative advertising strategies on social media
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platforms, celebrity endorsements we are certain to stand out from our
competition. From a business perspective, having an array of listings opens up
the field for SceneOn’s two primary source of revenue: Advertising and Feature
Partner Venues. The greatest source of revenue for SceneOn will be through
selling traditional banner advertisements on the websites and mobile. The best
situation would be that SceneOn would gain immediate popularity, due to word of
mouth marketing or mentions on existing websites or celebrity uptake. In this
case, consumers and advertisers would approach SceneOn, allowing for strong
user content and allowing the management team to be profitable from day one.
Also, if in the future, based on our success, If SceneOn goes global our services
will have a much greater appeal to advertisers because SceneOn will be able to
reach consumers with marketing campaigns that are specialized to their exact
needs upon traveling and exploring their own urban neighborhoods- we can
extend on to an international market. Another source of revenue is the selling of
featured listings; if a venue or an event wants to be highlighted and greatly
featured on our platform they will be labeled as a “featured listing” and will pay
SceneOn. Other business ventures include adding partnership opportunities and
a coupon and deals component on SceneOn.
Through a group of highly trained individuals, a strong management structure
and state of the art technology SceneOn will excavate, categorize and then
match the urban scene to our users personality type-giving them the power to
find events and activities they love easily. Our users can then share events with
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their friends. SceneOn will forever revolutionize the world of each individual
explorer. The Scene is On!
Who We Are:
New Media and Mobile Technologies have created an environment where tasks
are handled with minimal time and yet the utmost efficiency, creating optimum
results. SceneOn embodies just that through its services. In a world where there
is an oversaturation of online content about places to go, where to eat,
happenings at the newest hotspots and activities to attend in a city - the search
for the right spot can be quite time consuming. Catering to the individual,
SceneOn.com is a website and app that matches users with venues and events
based on his/her personality profile.
After a one-time detailed, fun, interactive, and user-friendly personality
questionnaire that deals with an individual's style, age, music tastes, values, and
income, SceneOn will generate a list of venues, restaurants, festivals, activities
and events tailored to personal needs. Similar to online dating sites like
Match.com or eHarmony.com that pair individuals based on personal
compatibility, SceneOn will match you with events and venues that appear
attractive to your personality.
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Mission Statement:
Through the personalization, mobility, compatibility, simplicity and efficiency of
our services we envision SceneOn to be the leading service provider in venue
matchmaking for a people of every age, gender and personality type.
Once a person has registered with our services on www.SceneOn.com, we will
create a full profile for the user and allow them to create a visual checklist where
they can upload pictures and rate how they experienced our suggestions and
share it with their friends by posting it to their profile.
The sharing experience can be extended onto other platforms through the
immediate integration of Facebook and Twitter. However, unlike other social
media platforms where you are constantly bombarded with what others suggest
for you, our services minimize that excess information, and skip the gratuitous
information to get you to the places you want and enjoy being at.
Studies have shown that most people who are regular users of social media
technologies religiously spend more time posting, sharing and blogging about
places, venues and events they wish they could be in rather than actually going
out and experiencing them. SceneOn is all about actually getting your Scene On,
moving away from the digital social to the physical social universe. Instead of
“scening” on digital platforms, SceneOn enables you to be “scening” and be seen
in real time at real spaces at real events! SceneOn services ultimately allows its
users to cherish, value and embrace the experiences because they are catered
solely to users likings, creating memories that will last a lifetime. By using
SceneOn people will no longer use social media to browse about events, places
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and venue they wish they had gone to or known about. In fact, users would use
social media to share content of substance, their SceneOn experiences!
How many times have you gone online or on Facebook and seen pictures of an
event, or a venue or a restaurant and thought, “Hey! That’s totally my scene!” It is
SceneOn’s mission to find exactly what it is that you are looking for in terms of
experience without the add on headaches of third party digital applications and
oversaturated content on the web. Through our state of the art personality profile
generator if you’re a Culture Vulture type, a Hipster Shifter, a Zen Master, or a
Glamourati, trust SceneOn to inform you about the right scenes in the city that
you are in. Your scene is certainly on with SceneOn! Once you have created
your account with us and filled out the questionnaire, no matter where you are in
the world, with a few clicks online or on your mobile device you’ll be directed to
places, events and activities suited just for you! If you’re in Zurich and we know
you’re a Foodie we will guide you to that cheese and wine tasting.
Vision Statement:
SceneOn aspires to be a leading force in the event and activity listing industry on
a global scale, starting with the city of New York. We cater directly to each
individual’s needs instead of general assumptions. SceneOn’s proactive service
will be successfully delivered and maintained through a dedicated group of
employees who truly understand what it means to cater to individuals who enjoy
physical experiences in the digital age. Satisfaction for our users is certainly
guaranteed.
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Industry Overview:
New York is full of movers and shakers; it is a city full of people that need access
to information on events and activities that match their interests. In 1955, the
Village Voice was launched from a two-bedroom apartment in Greenwich Village,
NYC. The paper began as a free publication to New Yorkers with a focus on the
local region, but it became a resource for event and activity listings for millions of
residents over the past 50+ years. This model of listing events and activities in a
weekly format was adopted by other publications through the years, such as
Time Out New York and New York Magazine.
With these publications, one did need to look far to find out what to do with free
time, and these classified sections were tailored to interests: Arts, Dance, Music,
Theatre, Restaurants, Gay and Lesbian, Sports, the list goes on. When the
Internet was introduced and publications went on-line it became increasingly
easy for the publications to cater and filter events for individuals. New websites
cropped up that didn’t have print editions, like Flavorpill, Thrillist, Gothamist, and
Goldstar. Niche consumers had spoken, they wanted to find activities based on
their personalities and situations from singles looking for a night out to busy
parents trying to find activities for their children to get them out of the apartment.
These savvy activity seekers tend to be young, eclectic, curious, connected, and
have a built-in desire to do more. The industry of event and activity listing has
embraced social media because activities are inherently social and users want to
share their discoveries with their friends. These sites typically offer the option to
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share via Twitter, Facebook, or e-mail, which then increases viewership ten-fold
if one activity seeker shares an event with their friends. The sites also benefit
hugely by the invention of mobile applications: if you find yourself in New York
with nothing to do, a few clicks can show you events within steps of your location
and in your chosen price range.
These kinds of classifieds are also incredibly helpful for other industries such as
the arts, sports, restaurants and even more niche areas like Burlesque, LGBT
event, and even science or academic meet-ups. There is literally something for
everyone and partnering with an event listing publication has proven to do
wonders for certain small business that otherwise would not get the foot
traffic. For example, the Russian and Turkish Baths on East 10th street in the
East Village, which opened for business in 1892. Before being listed in Time Out
New York’s annual Winter Preview editions the baths was struggling to attract
new patrons, as most of its members were growing older. Being featured every
year in either the Winter Preview or Spa editions of the magazine have increased
their business bringing in younger patrons who otherwise would have never
known about the Russian and Turkish Baths.
These sites not only provide activities for New Yorkers, they also help stimulate
the economy and grow businesses that have had difficulty affording effective
advertising.
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Current Situation and Macro Trends:
The event and activity guide industry is moving toward existing exclusively on the
web or in mobile applications. The print editions sometimes cannot keep up with
the fast pace of changing events, fluctuating ticket prices, or listing which events
have been sold out or where tickets still remain. There also is not a way to
engage with your social network through print, so users turn to the sites or apps
to share information with their friends quickly, especially important if you are
purchasing tickets for a large group of people. Our demographic is of a
generation that feels a compelling need to share and over-communicate with
their friends; it is no longer enough to just attend an event and maybe post a
picture or two afterward. It is now the norm to tweet or post to Facebook events
you will be attending and while you are there, live-stream the your experience
using Twitter or Instagram. SceneOn will tap into this need by providing an
opportunity for our users to share their personality type, the quizzes they’ve
taken, and a profile with the community as well as easy ways to share activities
using social media. At some point, it might be the case that the App becomes
more popular than the website itself, especially among our constantly on-the-go
target audience.
Advertising:
Any new brand must spend time focusing on how to gain an audience and build
brand awareness, usually with a small advertising budget. SceneOn should
spend the first year’s advertising budget on transit advertising such as bus
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shelters, subway platforms, in-car advertising and taxi-tops. Our target spends a
lot of time outdoors in the city that they love, so television and radio advertising
would be far less effective and not reach our demographic. SceneOn will also
advertise itself throughout the city on bar coasters, public restrooms, and use
guerilla techniques such as wild postings and grassroots marketing to engage
the audience in the environment they feel most comfortable in, the streets of
NYC (the first city where any campaign will launch). SceneOn will rely heavily on
social media and enlist the help of social media influencers in the NY
Metropolitan region to spread the word about the brand before our website
launch. The site will also purchase space on websites such as Facebook,
Gawker, the Huffington Post, Gothamist, PerezHilton, and other sites that our up-
to-speed, connected, audience would be visiting on a regular basis.
Incorporation and Legal Affairs:
We will form a corporation in the State of New York. As a C Corporation the site
will have a board of directors from a variety of backgrounds that will invest in our
site and also manage financial reporting and help operate the business under the
rules and regulations in New York State. In the Corporation model investors can
put money into the company and we will be able to issue stock to
anyone. SceneOn will need to register our business name, file a certificate of
incorporation, draft company by laws and have a Board of Director’s meeting to
quality for C Corp Status. We retain general counsel for the purposes of setting
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up the C-Corp and also to assist our start-up following the rules and regulations
of Internet Advertising as set forth by the FTC.
Competitive Landscape:
The competitive landscape within social media startups is intensifying by the day.
In 2011, 30 million applications were downloaded each day, but few were able to
cut through the clutter.
(Appadvice.http://appadvice.com/appnn/2011/01/number-apps-downloaded-day-
reaches-30-million. January 2011)
One must be highly differentiated and stay focused on key features and
uniqueness if one wants to survive and establish a brand. Social networkers are
daily exposed and tempted by new services and applications that promise
improved convenience, value and sociability.
Consumers and corporations are progressively interested in taking part in new
social media opportunities. However, it is important to keep in mind that to the
average consumer, being actively engaged in the largest social media platforms
like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram is sufficient. SceneOn’s recipe for success
depends on our ability to offer a service that can add genuine value and create
an indispensable difference in our users lives. SceneOn will enter into a “survival
of the fittest” market with 725,470 applications available, already primarily
dominated by social media giants like Facebook, Yelp and Foursquare.
(Appshopper. http://appshopper.com/iphone/all/new/28)
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Facebook has an established position with more than one billion users, acquiring
privately shared information from globally diverse individuals. Yelp, an online
rating and recommendation site, has a worldwide recognizable brand and a wide
variety of represented venues and restaurants. Foursquare operates as the
markets leading “check-in” app, allowing their 20 million users to notify chosen
friends of their whereabouts and activities, simultaneously offering discounts at
restaurants and venues upon users check-ins. Smaller, yet similar competitors
include LinkedIn, Google + and social recommendations sites like UrbanDaddy.
Various traveling sites like Virtualtourist, Tripadvisor and Expedia are also viable
competitors. SceneOn is different because we decide to focus on the “U” in
Venue, and will initially appeal to niche markets. Facebook and Foursquare have
consumer’s general information, but unlike SceneOn they do not adequately
explore the scale of interests a consumer has when touring an unknown city, or
when users are searching to experience different events in their hometowns. Our
personality questionnaire and carefully calculated recommendation system
provide consumers with a significantly more personalized and detailed venue
recommendation than the other more standardized and touristy travel sites
available.
Opportunities:
Social media, including social networks, blogs, microblogs, wikis, podcasts,
photo and video sharing, aggregators, lifestreams and review applications, have
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created a new kind of consumer. Consumers today are informed, engaged,
passionate and vocal about their experiences.
Word-of-mouth has always been a dominant driver of consumer purchasing
behavior, and social media technology has revolutionized the consumer’s power
position and the world of marketing. Studies show that online social network
users are three times more likely to trust their peers’ opinions over advertising
when making purchase decisions (“Social Networking Sites: Defining Advertising
Opportunities in a Competitive Landscape,” JupiterResearch, March 2007), and
almost two-thirds (62%) of consumers read consumer-written product reviews on
the Internet (Deloitte & Touche, September 2007). The Trust in Advertising
survey found that consumer recommendations are the most credible form of
advertising (“Social Media Marketing: The Right Strategy for Tough Economic
Times” Awareness, 2008) and more importantly 69% of consumers who read
reviews share them with friends, family or colleagues, thus amplifying their
impact (Deloitte & Touche, September 2007).
These statistics indicate SceneOn’s vast opportunities within marketing and
consumer connectivity. In addition to the standard word-of-mouth
recommendation from complete strangers that other sites offer, SceneOn also
matches your personality to people and friends similar to you so that the
recommendations you receive are tailored and guaranteed to match your style
and adventurous needs. Besides the fact that people now travel and seek unique
experiences more than ever, we expect to see growth and sustainability within
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our site’s social networking options, further expanding our mobile and tablet
platforms and advertising/marketing capabilities.
The use of social media has exploded during the last few years. Statistics prove
that a market for curious social networkers exists. 46% of American adults now
have smartphones and sales are projected to grow by 38% thru 2012.
(Your Smart Phone Knows You So Well Its Scary)
http://mashable.com/2012/11/29smartphone-knows-you-infogrpahic/.November
2012. 85% of international leisure travelers depend on their smartphones when
traveling abroad proving that smart phones and social sharing has become an
integrated factor within the traveling experience. 76% post vacation photos to a
social network, 46% check in to locations on Facebook and Foursquare and 70%
update their statuses- all while still on vacation. (How Tech and Social Media are
changing Travel) http://mashable.com/2012/03/24/how-tech-is-changing-travel-
infographic/. March 2012. As more people connect and subscribe to SceneOn,
users can follow chosen friends and visit the same venues as them, an option
that undoubtedly appeals to the aspiring social networker. The opportunities to
expand and scale our business are limitless. In addition to all the people traveling
in groups, many also choose to travel individually to seek new friends,
experiences and connections. In large urban cities like New York, Tokyo and
London people often seek experiences individually and depend on their phones
to navigate them through the vast amount of opportunities available. In the future,
SceneOn could also match users with potential partners, friends and business
connections upon their request.
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On the marketing side, businesses already use networks like LinkedIn, Facebook,
Ryze, PartnerUp, Twitter and Google Plus to extend their marketing reach,
improve customer service, and cut business costs for communication and
collaboration. Today's customers are sophisticated users of digital
communications, whether these are delivered through mobile, email, social
media or the web. Consequently, social networks are a ready-made
communications channel through which businesses can connect and interact
with their buyers.
SceneOn will have an advantage by being able to reach consumers with
marketing campaigns that are specialized to their exact needs upon traveling and
exploring their own urban neighborhoods. A consumer does not have the same
needs when traveling abroad and exploring events in their hometown, and
SceneOn will notify their advertising partners where and what specific wants their
demographic is conveying at the time. This enables them to tailor campaigns and
advertising seamlessly, and to connect with their audience no matter their current
city or state-of-mind. Considering that mobile and tablet advertising is a market
on the rise, SceneOn will embrace this and focus primarily on the mobile/tablet
platforms. Research shows that 15% of consumers download mobile applications
and 52% “like” Facebook pages specific to an upcoming vacation. These
numbers indicate that our services will be relevant not only during, but before and
after traveling, and also that the market has significant room for further growth.
As our business develops, it will encourage users to both travel and experience
more. Growth in advertising will exceed from embracing only venues and events,
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and eventually combine and integrate the entire travel or exploration
experience. Hotels, flights, cars services and events can customize complete
nights-out, vacations or trips based on your preferences, income, earlier
experiences and personal situation and be able to market them directly to the
palm of their hands.
Business Proposition/Funding:
To fund our start-up we are planning on seeking angel investors, an individual
that has significant resources and would be interested in a start up business like
ours. Our prospective investor is a person who follows his or hers instincts,
sufficiently comprehends and believes in the aspects and opportunities of our
business and is familiar with the industry. Ideally, our investor is a person who
has vast experience in digital businesses and has dealt with or previously
invested in startups. A potential investor may get a percentage of return on the
investment, and if all goes well a partial ownership and a voice in management
decisions. We will also explore the possibilities of peer-to-peer funding, by
engaging in websites that connect small businesses and investors together. If we
find a suitable investor we will privately negotiate an interest rate for the
investment. In the event that we fail to find an investor, we would seek a bank
loan or consider introducing friends and family members to our business
proposition. We would also try to attract a Startup incubator. Business
incubators such as YCombinator are likely to fund tech niches. Their funding
offers are typically smaller than from angel investors or venture capitalists, but
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they tend to be more accepting of a promising idea and a smart entrepreneur. If a
personal investor is interested we would make sure to negotiate the deal in a
strictly business matter, including the size of investment, rate of return and
potential ownership arrangement. The start-up team is also planning on
personally investing in the project to prove our belief and commitment to future
and prospective investors.
Site UX (User Experience):
SceneOn’s user experience will go as follows:
1 User visits www.SceneOn.com
2 User is prompted with a sign-up/log-in page. Only personal information
needed to sign-up is an email address and password to start the basic
profile. An automated email is sent to the user immediately, encouraging
the user to download the app onto their smartphones (where applicable).
3 Once an email/password is submitted, the user takes the SceneMe
personality questionnaire
4 Upon finishing the questionnaire, the user is notified that SceneOn will
aggregate a list of suggested venues, activities, and experiences, and will
update the user’s profile automatically on a daily basis. User can also opt
for daily or weekly email updates with the new suggested list.
5 User can now also browse SceneOn’s database of venues.
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Strength and Challenges:
SceneOn’s strength is that it is a one-stop-shop for all types of activities based
on the user’s personality quiz. Existing services offer suggestions in too narrow
of fields. UrbanDaddy and DailyCandy cover restaurants and nightlife; Gilt lists
sample sales; CourseHorse catalogs special interest classes. Yelp hosts public
reviews of all types of venues and experiences, but it does not tailor listings to
any user. SceneOn will give comprehensive venue and activity suggestions that
span all these categories, so users can rely on the company for date night ideas,
pop-up shopping sales, nearby concerts of local bands in the style of one’s
favorite music group, and under-the-radar classes for particular skills.
The main challenges intially facing SceneOn include aggregating all the content,
keeping the calendar of events of the venues up-to-date in real time, and building
the back-end programs to match the venue or activity to the combination of
answers from the personality quiz. To face these challenges, SceneOn should
start front-end development by using its Ground Force team to cover content.
Made up of experience-seeking individuals, this Ground Force team will visit and
categorize venues by neighborhood, and create a report with details on the
venue including vibe, location, calendar-of-events and price points.
Once the Ground Force team is established, SceneOn should create a
Partnership department to bring in Featured Partner venues, which will help our
revenue stream. This team will be made up of sales reps and network leveraging
agents, the latter having PR contacts who will want to get their represented
venues as much exposure as possible. Lastly, an Account Management team will
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be hired to maintain the Featured Partner accounts once they have been
acquired.
SceneOn’s back-end will need equal attention in the beginning phases. A
development and UX team will be essential at the start to build the personality
quiz and subsequent technology that will match the venues and activities to the
user’s profile. A subset of this team will also oversee the calendar of events for
general listing venues, assist with any troubleshooting a venue has with
SceneOn’s back-end structure, and implement a system of strikes for any venue
that fails to update its calendar in real time.
Setting up SceneOn in each city does require a fair amount of manpower, the
Ground Force team will need resources to gather venue and activity information.
But once the database holds a significant number of venues, the business
becomes much more scalable, mostly due to the site’s back-end technology.
That being said, SceneOn does present many opportunities in terms of scope. In
particular, SceneOn could develop many successful e-commerce platforms out of
its database of venues. In particular, a great source of revenue for SceneOn will
be the establishment of a deal component and couponing site. SceneOn will be
profitable through revenue sharing. This is a competitive advantage for SceneOn
because they will have the existing platform to promote events, and then have
the deal site that can sell specific items related to the events, including meal
discounts, drink tickets, and other activities for the users to do before or after the
event in the same geographic area. SceneOn holds great potential to tap into
consumers via its venue database.
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Economics:
SceneOn is a unique digital product offering that can be profitable through
various revenue streams:
● Traditional online advertising
● Partnership Opportunities
● E-Commerce
From a business perspective, having such an array of listings opens up the field
for SceneOn’s two primary source of revenue: Advertising and Feature Partner
Venues. The greatest source of revenue for SceneOn will be through selling
traditional banner advertisements on the website. Both conventional and IAB
(Interactive Advertising Bureau) approved ad units will be sold, including
leaderboard and big box ads. Additionally, Rich Media will be used, including
peelbacks and transitionals, and full website takeovers will be sold to allow for
the greatest amount of revenue for the company. Videos on the site, promoting
events, will allow for both pre-roll and mid-roll advertising. These ads will be sold
at a premium rate, as they will provide the greatest exposure for advertisers to
sell their products directly to users. SceneOn can eventually undertake e-mail
marketing as well, to inform users of upcoming events that they may be
interested in attending. These e-mails will have digital advertisements as well,
which will be sold separately, or as a part of a larger package for an advertiser.
With its expansive number of categories of venues and activities, SceneOn can
attract more types of advertisers compared to its competitive sites. NYC Institute
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of Culinary Education would not advertise their classes on Gilt, but could do so
on SceneOn as part of a schedule that includes Gucci, Ketel One, and Madison
Square Garden.
The second main source of revenue for SceneOn in its first iteration as a
company is its Featured Partner opportunity for venues. Once on board with
SceneOn, a venue will opt to list itself in one of two ways:
1 General Listing. This option will be free for the venues, and include built-in
self-serve technology for the venue to update its calendar of events on the
SceneOn system. These listings will appear alphabetically in suggested
lists for a user, and will never be withheld from a suggested list.
2 Featured Partner. These listings come at a cost to the venue, but they
offer many more opportunities on the site. SceneOn’s team will create
profiles for these venues that include photos, links to the venue site,
traffic-driving reservation/ticket systems, and potential for more in-depth
partnerships as the site grows. These listings will appear at the top of
suggested lists above the alphabetical general listings.
The Featured Partners will be highly cultivated relationships with the vendors of
these listings, including hospitality companies, party promoters, venues and
festivals. As the number of users increases on the site, these establishments will
benefit by receive extreme exposure to all events. These events will want to
partner with SceneOn as much as they can to feature their brand and activities
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prominently on the site, giving them the greatest amount of exposure. These
sponsorships will be an increased revenue source for SceneOn.
Business Cases:
Low
The worst-case scenario is that SceneOn will have a small user base and will not
have companies that are willing to pay to have their events featured. In this
situation, SceneOn will need to reduce their current management team in order
to lower costs and they will need to focus on better building the brand to acquire
consumers and advertisers for long-term success. SceneOn will also need an
exit strategy, if they fail to see success. After a certain deadline, they can cut
their losses and close the operation.
Base
In a reasonable scenario, the site will slowly develop and continue to gain new
users and advertisers daily. The initial site-marketing plan will require a lot of
effort in order to acquire consumer attention, as competition is aggressive.
SceneOn will be required to set out a clear timeline of expectations and goals
and follow with typical digital start-up expectations.
High
The best situation would be that SceneOn would gain immediate popularity, due
to word of mouth marketing or mentions on existing websites or celebrity uptake.
In this case, consumers and advertisers would approach SceneOn, allowing for
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strong user content and allowing the management team to be profitable from day
one.
Demographics/Consumer Audience:
SceneOn is targeting a very strong consumer base. Users are expected to be
primarily between the ages of 21 and 34, who are active Internet and social
media users and consumers. They skew primarily female, and the majority are
college graduates (or higher), with an average of greater than $50,000 household
income. Almost all share their interesting experiences with friends and family
digitally and are continuously looking for new activities to explore and share.
These users are digitally active at home, work, and on the go, with smart phones
and tablets. Multiple video platforms allow for increased use and site uptake. Our
trend-setting event partners are exactly what our demographic is looking for. We
bring the right events direct to the user.
Personality Types:
http://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-personality-traits.html
SceneOn’s competitive advantage is our unique recommendation tool and
personality analysis. Once the quick, easy and user-friendly survey is completed,
our users will be categorized according to the following personality types:
· Adventurous
· Cultured
· Imaginative
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Next Steps:
After a period of detailed investor research, our goal is to have an initial seed of
$750,000 by the summer of 2013 in order to begin site development by Q4 of
2013. We will launch initially in the New York Metro area with a website and a
mobile app that is compatible with the iPhone, Android, and Blackberry. Within
one year we will begin incorporating a coupon element to the site, offering daily
deals based on your personality type and location. After the first year of launch
the SceneOn team will evaluate the success of the site with the hope of
launching in five additional key cities, such as Austin, San Francisco, Los
Angeles, Chicago and Miami. The long-term goal being to launch internationally
in major cities across the globe.
The above team will build a strong foundation for SceneOn and allow the brand to
become established in the digital industry, attracting a good base of users and
advertisers. All five team members will sit on the SceneOn board and oversee the
entire decision-making and development process.
Once Mallika, the CEO, believes that the product has reached a certain level of
popularity and is running successfully, the team can be reduced to only three senior
executives, to decrease costs and allow the other team members to work on other
projects externally. These members will remain on the board of directors and have
decision-making power.
It may be beneficial for SceneOn to hire consultants with previous experience in e-
commerce and digital advertising, or hire someone who has worked as an executive
at a competitor like Facebook, Urban Daddy, Four Square or Yelp.
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