To my first 10,000: thank you for reading! (And I will try to blog more)
Lately I have been tweeting more than anything else, and if you haven’t followed me already, you can do so here: @andrewchen.
Best,
Andrew
PS. I updated my list of essays recently, so all the latest stuff is on there. I wanted to include it below, for your convenience.
Viral marketing and user acquisition
For web entrepreneurs, growing your userbase is a key challenge, alongside product development and financing. These posts emphasize a quantitative approach to getting traction and growing users.
- Adwords is not enough for success on the consumer web
- Are your SEO efforts working, or failing?
- Is your site really viral? Viral Branding versus Viral Action
- Viral marketing is not a marketing strategy
- 10 obvious strategies to ruthlessly acquire users
- Go-to-market strategies for vertical social products
Engagement and product design
Using principles from game design and analysis of consumer behavior, these essays cover the process of creating experiences your customers will love.
- 10 signs you’re a product fanatic
- Are people like lab rats? Using reward schedules to drive engagement
- Does Facebook reflect your true friendships? How about e-mail?
- Friends versus Followers: Twitter’s elegant design for grouping contacts
- Is your website a leaky bucket? 4 scenarios for user retention
- Public and private spaces, and why YouTube comments are so awful
- Social gaming design – Bartle types versus Web 2.0 participation pyramid
- Social design explosion: Polls, quizzes, reviews, forums, oh my!
- Talk to your target customer in 4 easy steps
- Technology always changes, but people always stay the same
- The design of social spaces
- User retention: Why depending on notification-driven retention sucks
- Users, customers, or audience – what do you call the people that visit your site?
- Why your friends list gets polluted over time
- Why you should make it easy for users to quit your product
- Your site will succeed or fail in the first 10 seconds
Freemium and online ad monetization
Social web product have unique characteristics as it applies to online advertising and direct monetization levels. These posts cover some of the issues around key topics such as ARPUs, conversion funnels, CPM rates, behavioral data, revenue modeling, etc.
- 3 key ideas from a recent Freemium dinner conversation
- 7 ideas for billion dollar startups in online advertising
- Data portability: Is the social network data you’re hoarding treasure or trash?
- Counting your big pile of Benjamins: 5 startup tips for maximizing ad revenue
- Creating value versus optimizing revenue
- How NOT to calculate ad revenue
- Online advertising during a recession: 5 key trends for ad-based startups
- Vertical ad networks: What are they, and why did Cox just buy Adify for $300MM?
- What’s the value of a user on your site? Why it’s hard to calculate lifetime value for social network audiences
- “Stealing MySpace” and my personal experience monetizing MySpace ads
- Super Rewards and the leadgen side of Facebook virtual currency – can it last?
- Remnant ads and the advertisers who love them
- Revenue, ARPU, Funnels, and RPM: My talk from Startonomics on Revenue metrics
- Will social payment platforms really work long-term? (Guest post by Jay Weintraub)
Metrics
Without metrics, web entrepreneurs are just flying blind. These essays cover some of the organization and development issues around instituting a metrics system – what to measure, in what order, and how to implement them.
- 5 steps towards building a metrics-driven business
- Obama and McCain: How political marketing has evolved from offline to online
- Recency Frequency and Monetization (RFM): Optimizing your notifications strategy
- How to generate awesome test candidates for A/B testing
- Why metrics-driven startups overlook brand value
Media and games
Traditional media, including TV, music, games, and movies are at a crossroads. Here are some thoughts on how the industry is changing and evolving.
- From analog dollars to digital pennies: The crisis in traditional media
- Game design tutorial at the GDC
- What every Web 2.0 entrepreneur should know about virtual goods
- Social Gaming Summit: Recap and observations
- YouTube vs Webkinz: Case studies for new product adoption
- Prosper.com and peer-to-peer lending in the economic downturn
Entrepreneurship and startup life in San Francisco
Just a couple thoughts on things I’ve encountered while arriving in SF.
- 10 tips for meeting people at industry events
- Bay Area investors I’m following on Twitter
- Couple quotes on Facebook in Wired, Fortune, and NYT
- Does Silicon Valley noise detract from long-term value creation?
- How do you find a badass co-founder, Part 2
- How do you do concrete interviews for non-technical people?
- How do start a professional blog: 10 tips for new bloggers
- Is blogging worth it? What’s the ROI?
- Moving to SF and joining the tech community – Lessons from my first year
- What’s an Entrepreneur-in-Residence?
- What is your W2SAT* score? (*Web 2.0 Startup Aptitude Test)
- Which startup’s collapse will end the Web 2.0 era?
