Idea - 5 New Websites for 5 separate BitShares businesses

[bitmarket]

That is defo where it will head.  But there is some work to do before then.

[GaltReport]

 

Right way to think.  Priority is whatever facilitates utility for BitUSD.

[emailtooaj]

My 2bts,
I can relate to both sides of this debate and see the underlying intent for both. Yes there is definitely a use to have 5 sites to explain how and what each asset does and how it can benefit the end user. But, I believe there should be one (stupid easy) main web site that anyone can easily understand, with the ability to click a named icon (like bitUSD, bitGOLD, bitOIL, bitETC.), go to a separate page (or site) and read more about  that particular asset.
IMO the main BitShares site should have the exchange front and center. Then cleanly listed below that a section (or group of icons) name "BitShares Most Popular Products!" and have the icons listed for the bit assets.  Keep in mind that the main page should have all this be fit and visible on one screen, no scrolling down to see more. The current site looks awesome but is not stupid easy enough to make this idea work.
IF all bitAssets are listed under their own web page and linked to the main site like mentioned above, now you can drive traffic which ever way fits best for the proposed advertising or referral.
Wish I was a web developer to help this side of the project out lol!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[ak]

In the long term we definitely need to break up each part. In the beginning we should focus all our efforts on a single selling point, the excellent decentralized exchange.

100% agree, if we can take over "decentralize exchange" niche it would be much easier to expand to other markets.

 

[ak]

i like the idea ... but let us get first 1 good site out there before talking about 5 sites^^

 

[liondani]

Common we are struggling to get one good site up... and still waiting for a better version... how do we manage to keep  5 sites in good shape and up to date?
Better one very good site about BTS instead 5 average separate sites, except we are ready  to do it! (I doubt we are...+ I think we have other priorities right now)


edit:

just saw your comment 
 

i like the idea ... but let us get first 1 good site out there before talking about 5 sites^^

[mike623317]

My only problem with this is that because of the merger and now marketing 5 different business will have people think BitShares got divided again. At least it will probably get most people who aren't up to date confused again.

Maybe you could have a series of website all with a common look and feel - bitshares bank, bitshares exchange etc - and each site links to each other funneling people that are interested in other services to the respective site?

[mike623317]

Something like a simple savings and checking account offering 5% and nothing else (no trading, basket currencies, blah blah blah) would be extremely popular.  Most people don't have, or are even interested in, access to markets for example.

Absolutely true. Keep it simple.

[cass]

i like the idea ... but let us get first 1 good site out there before talking about 5 sites^^

[kisa]

Agree it has been quite confusing, especially for newcomers hard to understand. it is early for marketing to end users anyway. I think that marketing the whole business concept, incorporating various products, should be to new BTS investors...

[teenagecheese]

Yea I get you, not a ridiculous mindset, but I'm still sticking with my opinion. I really think it's too early for that approach.

Adoption is not low because people are confused by the concept of a decentralized exchange. It's low because they are confused about what we were and what we have been through. Protoshares then Bitshares PTS, AGS, BTSX,BTS, Keyhotee then KEY ID, New PTS, all the other DACS, I3, non inflating currency then no, wait, shareholder dilution, share drops, no share drops, the merger, etc.  In it's current state it's good, BTS the decentralized exchange is clear and simple, it's just all the other stuff that we have to shake off. Just stop changing things, it will only further confuse people.

Adoption is also low because the product currently sucks. The website sucks and the wallet sucks. Thankfully that's changing (I think), although wow, it has taken way too long.

I've said all I can, now all I can do is wait and hope you don't do it.

[kisa]

  this thread is very important imo

various businesses (disrupting various industries), all 
POWERED BY BITSHARES

how can one conclude whether two businesses belong rather to the same or to different industries?
Well, according to Porter which I found quite useful, compare to what extent they are driven by same manifestations five competitive forces:
suppliers (incl. employees), customers, substitutes, market entry barriers, and existing competitors...

[vegolino]

I agree with Empirical on this one. Separate "entity" websites would be a great way to laser-focus on a particular customer set, without overloading them with the million different things BTS is trying to be. This will eventually become essential if we want to resonate with the masses.

BTS is the backend. Our frontends need some work.

I agree   

[onceuponatime]

I agree with Empirical on this one. Separate "entity" websites would be a great way to laser-focus on a particular customer set, without overloading them with the million different things BTS is trying to be. This will eventually become essential if we want to resonate with the masses.

BTS is the backend. Our frontends need some work.

I agree   

[nomoreheroes7]

I agree with Empirical on this one. Separate "entity" websites would be a great way to laser-focus on a particular customer set, without overloading them with the million different things BTS is trying to be. This will eventually become essential if we want to resonate with the masses.

BTS is the backend. Our frontends need some work.

[Empirical1.1]

Ok I understand what your thought process was now, but yes, I want all of those people to go to a decentralized exchange. It is not confusing. People understand what exchanges are. It's fine.

It's worse to try to split up one brand into five brands and get brand recognition for all of them. Be one thing and let people hear and fined out about that, it's much more powerful. I'm sure you've seen all the conversations about the network effect on these forums.

Maybe in the future, once you've reached high adoption/critical mass, you can branch out. No one starts out like that. We've had all of these conversations before, it's like half the reason we did the merger. A good example is Facebook. They started as Facebook, then added in messaging, then eventually branched out "Messenger" as its own separate app. That wouldn't have worked if they tried to get it going on its own in parallel with the original Facebook. Same thing with Google and all of its brands.

Cool yeah, we differ. I definitely don't want to send those customers to a decentralized exchange.

(I've heard about the network effect that would be gained from funnelling everything into one & it sounded plausible. However if you look at our forum stats you'll see topics, posts & new members have all been steadily declining for the past few months. Partly explained by the crypto-downturn I believe but also points to the fact that a single BitShares has quite a high learning curve & few even in the alt-coin market easily understand it.)

The decentralized exchange focus is good, because it breaks out one of the business models of the five so people can focus on just that instead of everything all at once.

But we may lose a lot of customers to others who are focused on building the future UBS's, Western Unions, BitGold.com's & PayPals of the future at our unfocused expense imo, so it's worth thinking about.

[teenagecheese]

Ok I understand what your thought process was now, but yes, I want all of those people to go to a decentralized exchange. It is not confusing. People understand what exchanges are. It's fine.

It's worse to try to split up one brand into five brands and get brand recognition for all of them. Be one thing and let people hear and find out about that, it's much more powerful. I'm sure you've seen all the conversations about the network effect on these forums.

Maybe in the future, once you've reached high adoption/critical mass, you can branch out. No one starts out like that. We've had all of these conversations before, it's like half the reason we did the merger. A good example is Facebook. They started as Facebook, then added in messaging, then eventually branched out "Messenger" as its own separate app. That wouldn't have worked if they tried to get it going on its own in parallel with the original Facebook. Same thing with Google and all of its brands.

[valzav]

In the long term we definitely need to break up each part. In the beginning we should focus all our efforts on a single selling point, the excellent decentralized exchange.

100% agree, if we can take over "decentralize exchange" niche it would be much easier to expand to other markets.

[Empirical1.1]

Please don't do this. It's fine as it is, an decentralized exchange for all different types of assets. People will understand that fine. Having 5 different websites that are all linked somehow will only confuse people MORE! Talk about causing the same problems with changing our image all over again. I'm getting confused just thinking about it. Even despite the image change I think this is a poor marketing tactic in general.

At most have a separate wallet/site for just bitUSD, but only do that once you're ready to focus on mass market adoption. At this point adopting bitUSD by itself is kind of stupid, because it is not useful anywhere, so you should still present the whole bitshares package until it is developed enough where bitUSD be its own product.

I can't believe everyone thinks splitting up into five different websites is such a good idea.

Your dad keeps gold in a vault he's heard about blockchain gold. Where do you want to send him? The decentralized exchange? Will he go with us or BitGold.com?

A guy in Argentina has heard about dollar stable assets & could be interested in BitUSD. Do you want to send him to the decentralized exchange? Will he go with us or NuBits?

A businessman has heard about currency stable accounts that are better than having a Swiss Bank account. Do you want to send him to the exchange? Will he go with us or a competitor that has branded themselves similar to a bank?

A taxi driver wants to send money home to his family. Do you want to send him to the exchange?
Will he go with us or a simple branded site set up specifically for remittance.

That was the idea behind it, that we actually make it simpler that way, but it's just an idea.

[teenagecheese]

Please don't do this. It's fine as it is, a decentralized exchange for all different types of assets. People will understand that fine. Having 5 different websites that are all linked somehow will only confuse people MORE! Talk about causing the same problems with changing our image all over again. I'm getting confused just thinking about it. Even despite the image change I think this is a poor marketing tactic in general.

At most have a separate wallet/site for just bitUSD, but only do that once you're ready to focus on mass market adoption. At this point adopting bitUSD by itself is kind of stupid, because it is not useful anywhere, so you should still present the whole bitshares package until it is developed enough where bitUSD can be its own product.

I can't believe everyone thinks splitting up into five different websites is such a good idea.

[Empirical1.1]

In the long term we definitely need to break up each part. In the beginning we should focus all our efforts on a single selling point, the excellent decentralized exchange.

Yes. I'm for that. It's too hard to market BitShares as all these things and creating sites for each business model right away is not feasible so BitShares should try be one thing at first and that's the decentralized exchange, I'm pretty much with that, I wouldn't mind if we gave the exchange a name like BDEX as Matt suggested so it can also become known as it's own thing eventually. (Ultimately looking like one of the major exchanges.)

Though we can try promote BitUSD & BitGold a bit separately already as Method suggests and is doing via whatisbitusd.com as there is a big market there and hopefully those will be the first to morph into their own sites that compete with the likes of NuBits and BitReserve respectively & don't require a huge understanding of everything else involved in BitShares.

[Rune]

In the long term we definitely need to break up each part. In the beginning we should focus all our efforts on a single selling point, the excellent decentralized exchange.

[Empirical1.1]

My only problem with this is that because of the merger and now marketing 5 different business will have people think BitShares got divided again. At least it will probably get most people who aren't up to date confused again.

This is an internal idea, not something we would be trumpeting. Its not even a clear demarcation, more like refocus activities to push specific products rather than tell the folks 'Buy BitShares! the digital Onion!'

For instance, BitUSD is coming up with its own website. In future I hope we would get an wallet which only has BitUSD on the front and we would like to promote it without talking about the scaling of 101 delegates and what not. The only way any customer would know that its part of BitShares is a small *powered by BitShares logo.

Yeah exactly it's just more the idea of having a site, video & wallet targeted to specific markets but on BitShares.org it would be clear they're all 100% BitShares.

It's just if your mom needs a BitUSD wallet, you send her to a branded site with the BitUSD pitch, video and wallet. So she doesn't need to understand BitShares on the back-end that well at all. If your dad is interested in Bitgold & Silver we can send him to a branded site that competes with BitReserve & so on that was the idea.

[sumantso]

My only problem with this is that because of the merger and now marketing 5 different business will have people think BitShares got divided again. At least it will probably get most people who aren't up to date confused again.

This is an internal idea, not something we would be trumpeting. Its not even a clear demarcation, more like refocus activities to push specific products rather than tell the folks 'Buy BitShares! the digital Onion!'

For instance, BitUSD is coming up with its own website. In future I hope we would get an wallet which only has BitUSD on the front and we would like to promote it without talking about the scaling of 101 delegates and what not. The only way any customer would know that its part of BitShares is a small *powered by BitShares logo.

[Akado]

My only problem with this is that because of the merger and now marketing 5 different business will have people think BitShares got divided again. At least it will probably get most people who aren't up to date confused again.

[mike623317]

Keeping it simple and targeted, will be a great way to make navigating this new space easier. BitShares is too complex to sell all of it at once...

 

[bubble789]

I think this is one good idea

[hpenvy2]

BitShares is difficult to understand as a whole, I like the idea of breaking up the marketing into manageable chunks.  We can better tailor the message and measure which parts of our message are resonating with the audience.

[davidpbrown]

 

Keeping it simple and targeted, will be a great way to make navigating this new space easier. BitShares is too complex to sell all of it at once - bare in mind these topics can be a dull aside for most people; trivial useful options they might take up on for the sake of it. Once they are engaged, they will catch on to what else is available.

[blahblah7up]

This is the correct way to think!    New businesses which are understandable with independent UIs.

Something like a simple savings and checking account offering 5% and nothing else (no trading, basket currencies, blah blah blah) would be extremely popular.  Most people don't have, or are even interested in, access to markets for example.

Forget marketing Bitshares!  Bitshares is the backend!  At least long term this is the only way it will ever be digestible to a wider public.

[Empirical1.1]

This is just a re-post of ideas I've been brainstorming on NullStreet. I find trying to sell/pitch BitShares as a whole is hard even to alt-coiners but within BitShares we have many businesses that are easy to pitch & easy to grasp on their own.

----

Q: What is BitShares?

A: BitShares is the blockchain & currency behind BitAssets. There are many decentralized businesses built around BitAssets that will each disrupt huge centralized players.

The first are launching this month...

BDEX

BitAsset Exchange

Disrupting Centralized Crypto Exchanges and ultimately stock & commodity ones too with an exchange that has no counterparty risk, eliminates HFT & lets you privately trade currencies, stocks & commodities in seconds for 1¢

BlockchainUSD 
       
BitUSD and other BitCurrency wallets

Disrupting PayPal & M-Pesa with simple lightweight clients and mobile wallets  that let you save, spend or share any currency in seconds for 1¢ & earn interest on your balances.

TheNewSwissBank

Private BitAsset Bank

Disrupting Private Banking jurisdictions like Switzerland with banking that's more private, charges less, pays more & is transparently backed by 200%+ reserves.

SovereignVault

Unseizable BitGold & BitCommodity Vault

Disrupting BitReserve with blockchain commodity storage that has no centralized counterparty risk but is redeemable for physical gold & silver whenever required.

 E.T.SendHome

Global BitCurrency Remittance

Disrupting Western Union & MoneyGram with global remittances in any currency that takes seconds & costs 1¢.

------

The names are just examples, the point is anyone of those could be a competitive business in it's own right and would be worthy of a Bitcointalk ANN. (BitReserve, NuShares, BitStamp, Blockchain.info & others prove that.)

As I said trying to understand & sell BitShares all as one is hard. Trying to understand & sell the value proposition of anyone of those businesses is easy. So we could create websites and brand 5 different businesses that we view separately but are still managed by BitShares and the same 101 delegates.